Playground's long-awaited Fable reboot finally showed itself at length during January's Xbox Developer Direct, when the team also shared the planned Autumn 2026 launch window on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series S and X. Autumn, however, is a pretty large window, not to mention one that intersects, at least in its latter half, with the release date of Grand Theft Auto 6, currently slated for November 19. Nobody really wants to be in the vicinity of Rockstar's title, which is practically guaranteed to suck all oxygen out of the gaming industry for a while.
That might lead Playground to delay Fable once again (although the studio recently reaffirmed the game is launching in 2026). The rumor comes from Jeff Grubb, who explained that the game has already received a slight internal delay. Playground is reportedly still trying to make a 2026 launch, but if it does end up overlapping with GTA 6, then it could very well be delayed all the way into 2027 to avoid being crushed by Rockstar's behemoth. Here's Grubb's full quote on the matter:
I'll say that I've heard that Fable has been pushed internally. That doesn't mean that it's coming out next year. Apparently, they're still trying to get it out this year, but they are worried about the launch of GTA 6. And so if it's getting delayed beyond the release of GTA 6, that could push it into December, which might make it a prime candidate to get delayed into 2027. So, while Xbox will have a lot of games coming out this year, that's one that there's still a big question mark around.
The game was originally scheduled to launch in 2025, but Playground asked and received more time for polishing, delaying its release until 2026. Based on this rumor, there's a chance it might not even make this new target window. However, Fable fans may be willing to wait a little longer if it means a more polished game with a better chance of succeeding and spawning further installments in the fantasy action RPG franchise. In other Fable news, it was recently revealed that the Blizzard Cinematics team is helping with that side of development.
As for GTA 6, you can learn everything we know about it, be it news, rumor, or leak, in our dedicated roundup page.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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