The Forlorn Fable of Fabled Lands

Over on Bit-Tech, chilli-loving young Joe Martin is embarking on an epic quest to document the far corners of the British games industry. He's thrown up quite the gem for today's instalment: a hefty look at Eidos' unrealised MMO adaptation of the Fabled Lands choose-your-own-adventure books. (There's a PC port of them here). A fascinating tale, both in terms of where the game itself was going, and as a reveal of the painful flipside to that early-2000s era of hyper-creative development. For every Giants: Citizen Kabuto or Sacrifice, there's probably a dozen crash'n'burn cases like this.

Fancy a quick quote? "The Fabled Lands MMO might have had an incredibly advanced AI that acted as a digital gamesmaster. Hypothetically, this ‘AI God’ would have tailored the experience for each player, beefing up quests to meet skill levels – a technology that was likely beyond reach at that time." Now, go read the rest.