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wfmag.cc \ 51Peter Molyneux \^ Developer Profilegod made way for a corporate overlord,
lord of a dungeon, oversalting some
chips in a theme park – there was a lot
of mileage in this concept, and a lot of
kudos for Molyneux’s work. But two
things started to catch up: EA, now
owner of Bullfrog, had pushed Molyneux
into a management role, rather than
a creative one, and he was unhappy.
Also: people had started to pay more
attention to the man’s promises.
HOUSE ON FIRE
While the exaggerations were there
pretty much from day one – some
of Molyneux’s accounting software
was called “the most complete
database system conceived on any
microcomputer” by the man himself – it
wasn’t really until ol’ Pete struck out
on his own with Lionhead Software
that the world really started to take
notice. With a much higher profile than
before, and with free reign to say what
he wanted outside the confines of EA
ownership, the promises trickled out
to the press. First Black & White, with
its life-changing AI. Fable would see an
entire world change – and grow – with
the player. Black & White 2 would, no,
really, this time, feature AI that would be
life-changing. And with every tale, the
response grew pithier and pithier.
By the time Molyneux left Lionhead
in 2012 – again escaping a corporate
embrace, this time by Microsoft – people
were positively waiting for the man tomake the ultimate outlandish claim.
They didn’t have to wait long, as
Molyneux’s new studio, 22cans,
launched Curiosity: What’s Inside the Cube,
an online tap-‘em-up that saw thousands
of players chipping away at a block in
a white room for weeks on end, and
promised an amazing prize to its winner.
That prize was... Peter Molyneux
delivering a promise. Which he never
lived up to. From that day on, the man
became a punchline to many a games
writer or YouTuber’s jokes: the formerbean exporter had, finally, gone a bit too
far for people to let him off anymore.
But Peter Molyneux is undeniably
talented – his track record speaks
to that. For all the scorn poured on
him, however fashionable it became
to make him the whipping boy for the
gaming internet’s misguided rage, this
is a man who has had a hand in the
creation of an entire genre. A man of
more than one all-time classic. Of some
of the most original, interesting, funny,
smart, and fun games ever made. Of a
series of titles that brought with them a
Britishness not found since the heyday
of the 1980s bedroom programming
boom, and brought it to a worldwide
audience with huge success.
This isn’t to whitewash Molyneux’s
half-truths – his sometimes outright
lies, whether malicious or not – but it is
worth bearing in mind the man’s output
when we judge him. He’s a character;
we’ll probably never really trust him
again when he makes promises about an
upcoming game, he is (by some reports)
somewhat difficult to work with at times.
But... like... Populous.“Inventing a new genre
isn’t something you
do every day”Interface
Peter Molyneux \^ Developer Profile Godus made many promises, and it’s no
exaggeration to say it let many people down. It might not quite have been the
all-conquering future of gaming as we were
told it’d be, but Fable still managed to be a
great game – and series – in its own right.