Written by: Ian

 

 

 

After some decreasing quality from Telltale, the first couple of episode of the Walking Dead proved to be something of a revelation. Can they keep up the quality?

 

 

Being adventure games, the story has to be top notch, and so far Telltale really delivered in spades for the first episodes. Despite only drawing influence from the comic series, rather than lifting directly out from it, the developers and writers have come up with a plotline that feels drawn straight out of it.

 

It’s a dark, dark world, and episodes 3 & 4 take an even darker turn. It’s difficult to say more without giving away spoilers, but some of the characters you’ve got to know in the first couple of episodes will die, and there’s nothing you can do about it. And the ending to episode 4. Wow.

 

Well, I’ll just leave it and say that it will be a really interesting end to the season after the explosive endings to events there.

 

 

 

Interestingly, Telltale have decided to add in some new little gameplay tweaks and sequences as the episodes have progressed, whilst keeping the core gameplay very similar to that which we’ve already discussed in our previous review of the first couple of episodes. The game remains pretty slow paced, with a mixture of walking and interaction, with a number of important choices and timed dialogue sequences.

 

There are a couple of action pieces squeezed in though, including a first-person shooting sequence and a section with infinitely respawning zombies in Episode 4. Unfortunately, whilst tense, these sections fall a bit flat because the controls are a bit loose, meaning you feel that failure is more down to the game’s timing than your own.

 

There’s enough new in terms of the plot, dialogue choices and environments to not have really needed any of these new sections. Kudos for trying at least. Thankfully these action-orientated parts are pretty small, and the core gameplay is so tight and well crafted, and you’ll care so much about these characters by this point that you’ll just want to keep on going.

 

 

It’s worth noting that Episode 3 is probably the strongest episode to date, whilst 4 is probably the weakest. It’s not exactly a comedown, but it tries too much new, and had a lot to live up to after the incredible pace and dark plot in Episode 3 that it was always likely to struggle a bit.