u/Decent-Progress6821

Scored this baby for $40 off an eBay auction "brand new" 🤓🏕 There's a couple dings and scratches from shipment, but otherwise, I couldn't be happier to add this to my camping kit.

Visual guide to follow along and my original source material:
NotJustSomeGuy - https://youtu.be/98ACUnkzqx0?si=Qlnii-IOO0_xdllj (We absolutely love Guy for adding the patches for Xenia and making this killer video)

!!! DISCLAIMERS !!! 

1. If you are missing the Fable 2 download files, I cannot explicitly state where to get these files, there are answers to these questions elsewhere on the internet. 
2. This is not a perfect installation, the game still crashes at random and there is audio bugs during voice lines. However, as I've played more, it crashes less, and I've just turned subtitles on for voice lines. 🤷‍♂️
3. MAKE SURE TO SAVE OFTEN AND BACK UP YOUR SAVES IN CASE OF CRASHES WHEN SAVING. Save every time you enter a new zone, finish fighting a group of enemies, after a cutscene, every 15 minutes, whatever gets you into the habit of saving often. I create a separate backup save folder with my save file after each successful gaming session for the day. 
4. During the tutorial Child playthrough, the game will run at about 10 fps, but I swear it jumps up to a playable 30-40 once transitioning to an Adult. The only fix I found was enabling the High Tick rate patch, and changing gpu = any ---> gpu = d3d12, since it would previously cap at 3 fps.  
5. I use the Femtofork files instead of Guy's listed in his YouTube video because I ONLY emulate Fable 2 in Steam ROM Manager. I've found that the build 3.toml file is missing the "Disable texture morphing" patch and I had to manually enter it myself in order for the shadow textures to disappear from the Adult player character and dog. I understand this probably made things a little more complicated, but this is how I got it to work FOR ME.
6. If you emulate multiple games, you can keep the patches folder in place.
7. The dog texture will STILL explode during this time and cause visual glitches during the Bower Lake playthrough. I would highly recommend playing until you're able to reach Bowerstone Market and can buy a dog breed potion from Murgo. This changes the texture of the dog in the game (like how the player character texture changes from Child to Adult), and thus makes the dog exploding stop. The potion costs 10,000 gold, but you can go into your Hero000 folder (under /xbox360/content/…/Hero000**) and edit your** Fable2PubInfo.xml file to adjust your GoldBalance. (PICTURE 1)
8. If you are new to emulation and don't know where to start or all of this is very confusing, I suggest you watch this video explaining how to install EmuDeck and your games:
   1. Darkuni- https://youtu.be/M1JwSQMINnU?si=0lzvIMJc8-g55WHz 
   2. EmuDeck - https://www.emudeck.com/

 

!!! INSTALLATION STEPS !!!

Femtofork latest build - https://github.com/just-harry/unofficial-xenia-femtofork-for-fable-ii/releases/tag/build3 

1. Install EmuDeck
2. Choose between Low (Emulation Station) or High (Steam ROM Manager) - I chose High because the only game I'm emulating this way is Fable 2. Darkuni explains both pathways in his video
3. Download the unofficial-xenia-femtofork-for-fable-ii BUILD 3 patch file
4. Find the Xenia Canary Xbox360 file folder on your deck, if you followed Darkuni's video it should be something like: home/deck/EmuVirtual/Emulation/roms/xbox360
5. REPLACE every folders/files (EXCEPT FOR ROMS*) with the contents of the FemtoFork download. Again, the only folder you're keeping is roms.
   1. *If you emulate multiple games using Xenia Canary, keep the original patches folder as well
6. Open xenia-canary.config.toml with KWrite and make the following changes:
7. readback_resolve = false
8. draw_resolution scale x/y = 1
9. gpu = any ---> gpu = d3d12
10. Go into the patches folder, and enable the patches you want in '4D5307F1 - Fable II (GOTY_Platinum Edition).patch.toml' by changing ‘is_false’ to ‘is_true’. I have these ones enabled:
11. 60 FPS
12. 1280x720 Resolution
13. 600p resolution 
14. Disable MSAA
15. High Tick Rate
16. Unlock website items
17. Unlock collectors edition content
18. Disable texture morphing
19. If this patch is missing, please add it by copy/pasting this command:

[[patch]]

name = "Disable Texture Morphing"

desc = "Workaround for the dog's & the hero's broken textures. Makeup is still bugged. Can make morphs look strange."

author = "Guy"

is_enabled = true

[[patch.be16]]

address = 0x8220ef10

value = 0x4280

1. Rename your Fable 2 PLT.iso -> Fable II.iso (PICTURE 2)
2. Move the Fable II.iso file into your /home/deck/…/roms/xbox360/roms folder
3. Open EmuDeck -> Steam ROM Manager
   1. If your Steam ROM Manager doesn’t look like mine, in EmuDeck go to Manage Emulators > Scroll down to Steam ROM Manager > Reset Configuration. (PICTURE 3)
   2. Deselect the blue Toggle Parsers so we can only install the Xenia one we want
   3. Select ‘Xbox 360 - Xenia’
   4. Add Games (PICTURE 4)
   5. PARSE (PICTURE 5)
      1. If you get an error that no games are detected, make sure you moved your ISO file into your xbox360/roms folder, then click Parse again.
4. Verify Fable II pops up
5. Save to Steam (PICTURE 6)

WHILE STILL IN DESKTOP MODE:

1. Open Steam
2. Go to your Library and verify the category ‘Microsoft Xbox 360’ is there and Fable II is under it.
3. Play Fable II
4. Verify the top of the window has [Patches Applied] (PICTURE 7)
   1. Guy mentions the version should say v10.1 but mine says v0.0.0.26, THEY ARE THE SAME THING.
5. Close everything and return to Gaming Mode

You should now see Fable 2 in your library! I’ve tried my best to document 16+ hours of torment trying to emulate this game, apologies if it’s confusing!

This post is combining 2 YouTube guides into one.

FaynePlay - https://youtu.be/3iz18j71Gdc?si=pw9n3i8XktN0mFvo (Stop after 2 minutes)

NotAGameAddict - https://youtu.be/6BPOaYLFWbQ?si=BR23IITy5-_i9Oxx (Stop after 9 minutes)

I cannot explicitly say where to get Fable 3 files if you are missing them, but I REALLY enjoy FaynePlay's video on YouTube from 1:15-1:22 where it highlights THE EXACT INSTALL.

Using Lutris to run the SETUP.EXE is absolutely amazing, I've tried running it through the Sream Library and it was a nightmare. I would NOT recommend running the GAME through Lutris, as that caused me hours of headaches trying to get Fable 3 to work on the Deck without crashing/forced keyboard inputs taking over.

Once you get to the 2:00 mark of FaynePlay's video, I would STOP and then switch to NotAGameAddict's video. Follow everything in regards to changing the launcher files and xlive files.

In the video, Addict sets the compatability to Proton GE-Proton9-22, which is no longer an option on Deck. I was able to get mine to work using 10-34. If you want to use 9-22, download "ProtonUp-Qt" from your Discover app on Deck (blue shopping bag). Make sure to also install Protontricks if you don't already have it.

!!! BEFORE RUNNING PROTONTRICKS MAKE SURE TO START THE GAME ONCE SO IT WILL LIST AS A NON-STEAM GAME !!!

Protontricks installs: vcrun2008 xact xact_64

NOTE: If you do NOT install those 3 above, your game will crash during the opening scene when Jasper opens the windows, or during the initial "Press START" screen.

After installing the 3 above, you should now be at 9:00 of Addict's video. A lot of this is cut out in editing, but you will be clicking OK on a million and one pop-ups about successful downloads, even after the 2 ERROR pop-ups. This process takes anywhere from 5-10 minutes.

Once everything is said and done, the game should run beautifully AND register your Steam Deck button layouts instead of forcing the keyboard one. I finally would recommend adding the Decky plugin SteamGridDB to change the cover/background art so it's not a gray block. ☺️ Hope this helps!