- You play
- The Hero of Briar Hill, voiced by Lily Nichol or Ukweli Roach.
- The hook
- A mysterious stranger turns your village, grandmother included, to stone.
- The villain
- Isabel, the Hero of Wraithmarsh, played by Hayley Atwell.
- Timeline
- A new Albion, not tied to the events of the Lionhead games.
How it begins
A childhood in Briar Hill
You start as a child in Briar Hill, a forest village, and your heroic powers emerge there. Ralph Fulton put this opening at about the first 90 minutes on the Official Xbox Podcast. You were found abandoned in the woods and raised by Samira, your adoptive grandmother and landlady of the Rose & Thorn pub, alongside your adoptive brother Connor.
A time jump
The story moves forward and you return to Briar Hill as an adult, "the first Hero in a generation", which is how you play for the rest of the game.
The village turned to stone
A mysterious stranger turns everyone in the village to stone, your grandmother included. Your aim is to find out what happened and reverse it. Before it happens, she tells you that the great Heroes live at the Heroes' Guild in Bowerstone, and that they are the people to ask for help.
Out into Albion
Once you leave the village you can go almost anywhere. Fulton told Xbox Wire there is "no ticking bomb": the main story waits while you settle down, take a job or marry in another town. On the podcast he named Isabel as the Hero who turns your grandmother to stone.
Who is in it
| Character | Played by | Who they are, per Playground |
|---|---|---|
| The Hero of Briar Hill | Lily Nichol and Ukweli Roach | You: the female and male voices of the player character. |
| Isabel, the Hero of Wraithmarsh | Hayley Atwell | The main villain, a grieving Hero set on undoing a tragic injustice, and Humphry's former ward. |
| Humphry | Matt King | Albion's greatest Hero, or once; now hidden away in the near-empty Heroes' Guild. |
| Arden | Susan Wokoma | A Hero who does not believe in Heroes and would rather make shoes. |
| Dave | Richard Ayoade | A self-declared intellectual who accidentally turns himself into a giant. |
| Jenny | Natasia Demetriou | One of two feuding heirs to Bloodstone. |
| Jacob | Nathan Foad | Jenny's brother and rival, who wants a more cosmopolitan Bloodstone. |
| Connor | Kwame Augustine | Your adoptive brother, who always hoped he would be the Hero. |
| Samira | Nina Wadia | Your adoptive grandmother and landlady of the Rose & Thorn. |
| Nigel | Robert Whitelock | The anxious, out-of-his-depth Sheriff of Silverbrook. |
Places named so far
- Briar Hill, the starting village.
- Bowerstone, the reimagined capital, with the Heroes' Guild and Fairfax Castle. Fulton named Warminster, the wealthy district at the top by the palace, and Copperbottom, where a first house is more affordable.
- Bloodstone, the city its two heirs are fighting over; the lore posts place it in the North, on Bloodland Bay.
- Silverbrook, a farming town, whose people and house prices change depending on whether you spare or kill Dave the Giant.
- Wraithmarsh, the place in Isabel's title, about which nothing more has been shown.
- A once-flooded, now-haunted mine, the setting of the quest "Mud and Death" from the gamescom demo.