Xbox Game Studios head Craig Duncan has hyped up the new Fable game. He’s especially excited about its Living Population feature.
Following the Xbox Developer Direct 2026 show, Xbox Game Studios head Craig Duncan ( formerly head of Rare ) was interviewed by Gamesradar , with a particular focus on the Fable reboot , arguably the showcase’s centerpiece. The executive called Fable ‘mindblowing’, sharing his excitement particularly for the Living Population feature, which will allow players to interact with the NPCs in many different ways.
When I think about Playground and their history with the Forza Horizon franchise, and their desire to take on Fable as a franchise, I think it’s really about this relentless pursuit of excellence. We all know what that means in Forza Horizon, we’ve all seen that franchise get bigger and bigger every year, but what does that mean for Fable? I have played a bunch of the game, I’ve messed around with the combat and the Living Population, and it’s just mind blowing. I’m so excited that we talked about it in the Developer Direct, because it’s something that people wouldn’t expect.
There were some really special ideas in the original Fable trilogy, but what I think Playground has done is take some of these ideas and modernized them – my brain pops every time I think about the Living Population, how it works, and what it adds to the overall game; it’s an incredible invention, and Fable is going to be an incredible RPG. It will be amazing to see what players do with it, and it’ll be massively shareable.
Elsewhere in the interview, Duncan acknowledged some inconsistencies in Xbox Game Studios’ multiplatform releases. For example, at the Xbox Developer Direct, Fable and Double Fine’s Kiln were announced to launch day-and-date on PlayStation 5 (as well as PC and Xbox), whereas Forza Horizon 6 will launch on PC and Xbox first. Duncan said the goal is to be more consistent in the future, but he also clarified that it may not always be the same, depending on the game and the resources behind it.
There’s always development realities about when these projects start – how big a team is, and what plans we have at the start of development. When a strategy changes, maybe you’ve got a plan that exists with a game and maybe you can adopt that, maybe you can’t. So that’s why. And to be clear, this is totally fair feedback. Sometimes we are inconsistent. You see some games in one place, some games in multiple places. Just know that we’re going to work on that, and we’re going to try and be more consistent with what we do.
But you know, for our game makers, if you’re on the Fable team you just want as many people who love Fable to appreciate the great work that the team’s doing. That’s always our goal. It’s rarely more complicated than that. It’s like, how can we get this game to as many players as we can?
In other Fable news, Playground’s Game Director Ralph Fulton confirmed that the action RPG will actually feature the mockumentary style we’ve seen in previous trailers in the game itself, inspired by the hit show ’ The Office ‘. We won’t have to wait too long to see whether it’s a good fit, as the game now has a Fall 2026 release window , with more details expected to be shared in the next months.
Follow Wccftech on Google to get more of our news coverage in your feeds.
