As usual, I say pay attention to what the reviews are saying and go from there.  Sometimes, there are reviews that are out and out wrong (like Gamesradar's review of Comic Jumper that gave plenty of misinformation) but for the most part, the content of ther review is pretty accurate.  Same goes for the few Fable III reviews I've read.  The game is buggy.  The game does have glitches.  At the same time, the game is super immersive, addictive, and will consume your life.  I love it!

I'd compare it to GTA San Andreas.  We have a game that's not instantly impressive on a technical level and has glitches and a few issues--but at the same time offers up so much content, innovation, and fun that it can score an 8/10 and still be good enough to be considered one of the best games ever.  I can't get enough of Fable III.  Too much emphasis placed on scores these days, anyway.

You know what?  I agree with this thread title.  It says don't pay attention to reviews.  I say don't read reviews at all!  Not in the case of Fable III.  All you need to know is it's good.  Very good.

i've never listened to reviewers at all in the first place

This is a radical idea, I know, but have you considered reading the reviews in question to see why Fable III received a lower rating than Fable II?

The pretty number at the beginning/end is the least important part of the review, and this is something which everyone seems to forget, and which annoys me as a reviewer. If we wanted you to make a decision based on a number, we wouldn't spend hours writing and editing a text review.

I came here to say this, pretty much.

Seriously, scores are useless. They only serve as fanboy fuel, and nothing more.

Edit: Lmao at the sour grapes in the comments section of the IGN article.

Sour grapes are to be deserved when the title of the article is flamebait.

You should ignore them because reviewers are not real gamers. Sir Peter said so. 

"Can everyone please just ignore the reviews about my new game please. Reviewers are not real gamers, they don't play my games properly." 

http://gamernode.com/news/9700-peter-molyneux--reviewers-arent-real-gamers/index.html

Yeah I would definitely say Fable 3 is the most underrated game this year and on the 360 total.

I've read a few of the reviews and the content doesn't seem to match the score.  They mention there's a few bugs with dialogue overlapping but overall they say it's a more fun experience and state that it's the game that Fable 2 should have been.

Final score = -0.7 points lower than Fable 2?? 

Go back and read the link again. That's why I never consider Twitter reliable source material for articles.

Franchise fatigue and less advertising. Both lead to lower reviews of a product given sites with say big Fable 3 full page advertisements don't tend to give them less than 9s and if a game series doesn't appear as fresh it doesn't get rated as highly. It is the same reason Halo: Reach scored less inspite being a better game in every way than Halo 3 by a considerable margin.