The Walking Dead Season One Review (Spoilers)
Warning: The following review contains spoilers. Reader's discretion is advised.
“The Walking Dead” is an episodic interactive drama graphic adventure developed and published by Telltale Games. It is based on Robert Kirkman's “The Walking Dead” comic book series and has been published on anything and everything it can get its grubby little hands on, except Nintendo. I'm just going to say right now that I have never read the comic books and I have never watched the TV show. I will be reviewing the game on its own merits.
The game opens up in the back of a police car as Lee Everett, our primary protagonist. All we know at this point is that it has to do with his wife. While the cop is driving he asks, “Well, I reckon you didn't do it,” and we get four different dialog options to choose from as seen in the picture above with a timer. Fail to pick an option before the timer runs out and your character will remain silent.
What's this? The character actually recites what's the dialog option says? That's a first. Usually I'd get some variation like on Mass Effect, or there won't be any voices for my character so it doesn't matter what I say. I can make Lee say anything I want. I can make him say smurf. I'm going to make him say smurf. Hey, Lee, say smurf!
Lee opens his mouth to speak but goes silent
Aw. You let the team down, Lee.
So, the police officer is just yacking away paying no attention to the patrol cars and the helicopters passing by us or the dispatcher calling in for all available units. Eventually his inability to keep his eyes on the road bites us both in the ass as a zomb– Ahem. “Walker” strolls up along the road and causes us to crash. First it was “runners” and now it's “walkers,” can't we just call them zombies? Is that such a dirty word?
Let's recap, I'm handcuffed, my leg is broken, I still don't know what I was arrested for; probably had the “Bonnie and Clyde” thing going on with the misses and she left me to the police. I'll deal with that later.
We all know what's coming next, it's the same thing with every zombie game. That first zombie encounter. In “Resident Evil” we were shown a zombie eating a person, in “The Last of Us” we had– I actually don't remember. Everything happened so fast. Anyways, what does “The Walking Dead” have for us?
I'm about as useful as Lee is himself at this point; I'm just crawling back trying to get away and find a shotgun shell. A hell of a lot of good that does me without a shotgun. I could throw it at him. Can I throw it at him? No? I didn't think so. I wouldn't survive the zombie apocalypse, guys, I'm not that observant. Because right after I get my first game over I thought to myself, “It's right to my left, isn't it?” And sure enough it was. Oh, and this is one of those games that tell you you're dead on the game over screen. Nice.
It's easy to see this whole thing transpiring in real life, being in a hurry to get something you need with your life on the line and messing up more than you'd like to admit. Right after I finally get my hand on the shotgun I lose the shotgun shell and have to snatch it up with “Zombie Cop” still closing in. Get used to dropping things. I just put the shell in the shotgun, load her up, aim at the walker's head and then FIRE!
And that's pretty much it for the first walker encounter. Our next big moment comes when we find supporting character, Clementine, house after being chased by a group of “Walkers” who are lured to you at the sound of the gunshot and the smell of fresh blood. I'll take this chance to go over how we move in this game, a little more restrictive than we're used to. Can't move the camera around much either. You can only go where the cursor will go. I feel confined, like I'm in a tight space or something. Since it's like a storybook, exploration and choices are more important than action, and harder too. Quick Time Events are better implemented as well and don't feel out of place. The closest I played to a game like this would be “The Longest Journey” and “Dreamfall,” although “The Walking Dead” feels more thorough.
The first real tug on my heartstrings happen at Clementine's house and the drama is persistent throughout the course of the game. So much so that I chose to be quiet in one scene and scared Clementine. I can't tell you how many times this game managed to make me feel like trout even when I made decisions based on sound logic, or times where I saw the timer counting down and couldn't decide what to say. Even if someone pissed me off or did bodily harm to the group, the game somehow found a way to make me feel bad for them. Everyone in the main cast feel like real people which only makes certain moments all the harder. I'd rather try to shoot walkers from a first-person perspective and button mash than have to make those life altering choices. At least during the first playthrough, some of it loses its impact when you play it again. More on that later.
We have a couple of moments where it's an either or choice and you don't have much time to decide. I know at least one of them will get you a game over if you neglect to make a choice, which is kind of disappointing when you think about it. For a game where choices are important and the consequences are heavy, you'd think the game would punish you with more guilt each time you fail to make a choice.
That said, I'm sad to say that a lot of the time your choices don't matter anyway. The changes throughout the story are minor. I'll use the above picture as the first example; the first time the game made me choose between Ducky and Shawn ,I went with Duck. Just the way I was raised. When things get bad look after the kids first. The second time around I went with Shawn to see how the game would change, and all that happened is that Shawn's dad doesn't hate you and all the guilt goes to Kenny. Shawn still dies, Ducky is still rescued, and you still drive off with Kenny's family.
At the beginning of episode two you get a choice to saw off a guy's leg to save him or leave him to die by walkers. Once again, it doesn't matter what you choose. You still return back to the Motor Inn with Ben and a wounded, and the wounded turns into a walker, and Ben stays with your group. The story still has a definite narrative it needs to tell and your decisions only make up a small part of that. Choosing between Doug or Carley has more of a difficulty change than anything else. Picking Carley makes the game a lot more easier in episode two and three when you're being attacked by walkers, because Carley has the gun. Doug sets up an alarm and uses a laser pointed to help you, but dealing with the walkers in the latter two episodes are harder as a result.
I think it would have meant more if you could actually save Shawn and end up at the drug store with him and Hershel instead of Kenny's family. I know they were following canon with this bit, but then why give you a choice at all? At the beginning of episode two, your decisions should be able to save the teacher and his students or leave them all to die. I can think of a certain dinner scene that would mean a hell of a lot more if the person in question already had his leg cut off with an axe than just inserting a new character at the last minute to be used as fodder. And if you wait too long to save either Doug or Carley, you should have to live with both of them being dead. I know it's probably strange I'm advocating for more drama in a game that probably won “Most Depressing Game” of 2012, but if the whole point is changing based on how you play I'd like to not feel like I'm playing the same game each time.
Episode three introduces a first-person shooting element by taking you behind the crosshairs of a gun. At first I thought I was just being a lousy shot during this scene, but turns out it was the game's programming keeping me from taking out most of the walkers as it only wanted you to choose to kill the girl or leave her behind. Later on you're firing at bandits and walkers, and that's when my poor marksmanship came into play. Thank God for the auto-save feature. I can't count how many times it took me to get pass that part during my first playthrough since I chose to save Doug the first time around instead of Carley. The right analog stick got me killed more times than anything else. When it isn't my aiming giving me hell it's either that or the damn camera. Clementine would have been a goner in episode four if it wasn't for Chuck. The FPS elements can go crawl in a hole and die for all I care.
Another thing I hate is the way hand-to-hand fighting is played out in this game. You need to look around for the right spot to click on by the hands and do it before the other guy can clean your clock. I didn't know where to look the first time so Kenny kicked my ass in that train, and when I did know where to look I wasn't fast enough and nearly got my head smashed in by Molly. Then there are moments where you're performing a running jump and need to click on the person's hand before you make that leap. I fell to my death, guys. I survive walkers three episodes straight just to fall to my death from a badly timed jump.
Can I just say how much I love these two? The man who wanted a family and the girl who lost her parents. How their relationship develops is handled really well, and you have plenty of chance to help it grow yourself. If there was one thing I could never do, it was lie to Clem. She was the first one I told about Lee's past. I was always honest and direct with her. Checked on her regularly, kept her fed, and I fixed a swing for her. Made me feel good. There are a lot of cutesy moments between them that left a smile on my face.
Then there were the bad times, like when she ate a person because I hesitated, and when she saw me kill a guy with a pitch fork. In my defense, he was a psycho cannibal who was going to kill and eat us, but still. I felt bad all the same. The game quickly goes from being about surviving walkers to keeping that little girl safe, and I don't want to think about what I would have done to the rest of the group if the choices came between them and Clementine.
The ending is the saddest and most intense ending I've experienced. Watching Clementine pick up the gun and then hearing the gunshot made my heart skip a beat. And believe it or not, watching her just leave Lee there made me feel worse. What I like about the end decision is that there's no simple “right or wrong” choice. There's merit to choosing to leave Lee and there's merit to choosing to put him out of his misery. Either decision is heartbreaking and leaves Clementine traumatized for life. She can be left with the guilt that her only remaining caretaker is a walker or the guilt that she put a bullet in his head. You can spend your time justifying your choice until you're blue in the face, Clementine is forever changed.
Season One has five episodes overall and one bonus episode titled “400 Days.” My game came with all of them already installed. “The Walking Dead” gets more done in five episodes than a lot of TV shows gets done in twenty-two. The first episode felt so long I honestly thought saving Shawn or Chuck, and Doug or Carley happened in two different episodes. All of the main characters are fleshed out and get their chance to shine. And then they're murdered! Even the star of the game isn't safe. Wow, Telltale really ARE the perfect developers to make a “Game of Thrones” game.
Even “400 Days” has good character development and they didn't get as much screen time as the other characters did. Shel and Becca are the ones that really stuck out to me, and part of that is because they have each other to bounce off of. Shel is the bigger, nicer, more sensible sister, and Becca is the younger, rash, rebellious sister. It just works. Their scenario had the biggest impact on me because of Roman (smurf you, Roman!) forcing me to kill a friend because they betrayed us. I don't like people making me feel like I don't have a choice, so the moment I saw the car keys I took off in the RV. Give me the choice between the gun and the RV? I'll pick the RV every time. It's like what Lee said to Kenny back in episode one, “You didn't have a choice. You think you do, when you look back on it. But in a moment? When things are really out of control? You don't have any choice.”
This game has a lot of technical issues that come and go like a mood swing. Characters' lines will be repeated, and load time lags at a critical moment. One time in episode three it got so bad the cursor disappeared and I couldn't go to the next room. I could see through the train's floor, and when I talked to Kenny? The camera kept zooming into his arm. I had to restart from my last saved point to bypass it.
Another thing that annoys me is the game giving me the option to try something that they know isn't going to work. So what do they do? Have Lee tell me. Why are you giving me the option to do something just to have Lee say he isn't going to do it? Just don't give me the option! Or better yet, let me do something stupid and get a game over. I'll learn faster that way.
Conclusion: If “The Last of Us” is a game in movie format, then “The Walking Dead” is a game in TV format. We're shown through the narrative that a game can be an episodic adventure where you find yourself as the star and be left waiting in anticipation for the next one just like you would with a show you love. And nothing will ever compare to that first adventure. This is your story.
Get it.
