Wrapping up my fireside chat with acclaimed designer Peter Molyneux (check out part one), we discussed Lionhead's next project, the sole acorn in Fable 2, the PC market, a possible revival of his older franchises, and just what it's like to be a designer in the public eye.

Shack: What can you say about that other game?

Peter Molyneux: I've already been told off for saying that it is going to be amazing. Quite why I'm being told off for that, I don't know. I'm not going to say it's going to be rubbish.

All I can say is that we have been working on some really, really cool A.I. and simulation stuff for a long, long, long time now. We had a breakthrough about six months ago, and that breakthrough led to this game.

It's a very, very different game. I don't want you to think of it as a normal Lionhead game, or a normal game. It's a very, very different game. It was a breakthrough that led to the game, as opposed to a particular idea, say, of mine.

Shack: Is this the same game that you said would be on the cover of nature and science magazines?

Peter Molyneux: That's the one. [laugh]

As you know Chris, I do say things that continually get myself in trouble. It's sort of the PR equivalent of Tourette's, I can't just help saying things that are going to get me into trouble.

Shack: Have you actually been approached by any nature or science publications?

Peter Molyneux: We haven't unveiled it. The only people that know about it are some universities here in the UK that are helping us out with one particular element.

They're the only people that really know about it, other than people at Microsoft. Also, some Microsoft research people have been looking at it and helping us with a few things on it.

But no, we haven't announced it to any major publications yet.

Shack: From my end, it seems like Lionhead's been working on simulation technology for a really long time, and attempting to somehow fashion a game out of that. I guess you really can't say much about the breakthrough.

Peter Molyneux: I think your imagination is a good imagination, and whilst I couldn't confirm or deny it, I think simulation, life, should be bubbling around in your subconscious at this moment.

Shack: Since we're on the subject of simulations, I wanted to briefly touch on the subject of trees in Fable 2.

Peter Molyneux: The trees? Ah ha ha!

Shack: I've heard that there will be an acorn in Fable 2 that will play a central role?

Peter Molyneux: I got into a lot of trouble with that, an acorn in Fable 1 growing into an oak tree. What we've done, and I'm not going to give you the exact story thread, there is a whole thread about something called the Golden Acorn and how it's got to grow into an oak tree.

There is a whole thread of the story absolutely about that. I don't want anyone to say, after Fable 2, that we don't have acorns. We definitely have acorns. Acorns are central to the game of [Fable 2]. If you don't get your acorn, you can't finish the game. That's how ingrained it is into the world.

Shack: Now, is there just one acorn, or are there multiple acorns?

Peter Molyneux: You're getting greedy about your acorns now [laughter]

Isn't it funny how some things just spark in people's imaginations? I think I should be absolutely clear about it.

This is as clear as I can get because I think this is where the excitement comes. You can't pick an acorn off an oak tree, decide to plant it in someone's back garden, then come back after three hours and see it sprouted into a little oak tree, and then after five years it be a bigger oak tree.

You can't go crazy and plant multiple oak trees all over the world. We did actually look into doing that, by the way. But actually, proper growing tree technology is quite tough to do, what with all the other stuff that we could do.

But, saying that, in Fable, there is a Golden Acorn. I don't want to spoil the story too much, you will see it being planted and you will see that oak tree growing over the course of the game.