Walking Dead CD Key for Steam

Adapting something already-beloved into a game isnt a job anyone should want. Games have their own set of restrictions and expectations, and designing around those while trying to execute your own creative vision tends to create compromises scary enough to dress up as for Halloween.

Its a creative miracle, then, that Telltale avoids the error made by something like the Watchmen film. It doesnt exist for the sake of homaging itself; it isnt hyper-loyal to its source material for the sake of appeasing ComicCon attendees who threaten to blow their This Isnt Canon Whistle.

A parallel story to those already told on TV and in print, Telltale lets the tone of Robert Kirkmans graphic novel naturally inform and inspire the games design. The result is novel, focused and emotionally engaging in a way thats totally disproportionate to the two hours and 20 minutes it took me to complete.

Lee (foreground) is exactly what a Walking Dead main character should be: likeable and flawed.

Interactivity does take a purposeful backseat to storytelling. TWD operates more as an interactive TV episode than a conventional adventure game. You never run from zombies in real-time. Puzzle solutions are transparent. Interstitial scenes take control away from you entirely.

But I dont see player freedom as the games function. By sweeping away almost all of the work of item-gathering and riddle-unraveling that some of us associate with adventure games, whats left is pure presentation and breathless drama. Going through the games motions (in part thanks to animations, and the best art Telltale has generated since Sam & Max: The Devils Playhouse) roots you in the world. It takes no brainpower to put batteries into a radio or hand an energy bar to a shaken stranger, for example, but these acts reinforce your sense of helplessness and reliance on simple resources.

A 2D/3D illustration style adds detail to relatively low-polygon models. Lip sync is good.

The Walking Deads light interaction only began to bother me in later zombie encounters, where the ease of timing a single click at a large target to deliver an axe strike to a zombies skull started to wear on me. The nervousness produced by these encounters will diminish if Telltale overuses this template for zombie combat in future episodes. Telltale does show restraint with keyboard quick-time events, which are used sparingly to stir tension. Unlike the developers other recent conversion, Jurassic Park (whichwe did not like), The Walking Dead doesnt structure itself as a theme park ride that you convince not to kill you by tapping your keyboard. Not much of the game is centered on avoiding a game over state. Otherwise, the final 15 minutes of the game felt a little compressed to me; one or two moments of interaction in place of (or in addition to) cutscenes at the end wouldve been welcome.

I barely felt challenged. I died once. But I did feel entirely engaged. What dominates the first episode is the sense that youre planting seeds in a zombie garden that you actually care about. Relatable characters are the basis of that connection. You encounter ordinary people dealing with unbelievable circumstances that are made believable by grounded dramatic writing. I wanted to know more about someones wife. I felt suspicious of strangers. I rooted for a brave IT guy. Telltale doesnt clone existing archetypes from The Walking Dead fiction (although Glenn and the Greene family make cameos); Lee, the main character in this spin-off, is as likeable and imperfect as Rick Grimes or Dale Horvath.

This first episode starts in the first days of zombie panic. Most of the characters are optimistic about the whole thing blowing over.

Ive watched the entirety of the TV series and read most of the comics; I cant imagine a better take on the games source material than this. As long as Telltale doesnt recycle too many interactive sequences in future episodes, I cant imagine regretting spending $25 upfront for the five-part series. A lot of the games value lies in the conversations Ive had with other players. They feel a lot like the discussions I have with fellow watchers of Game of Thrones or Mad Men, except we can talk about how our decisions differed and speculate on how thatll influence next months episode.

Id encourage playing with “minimal” mode turned on, doing so hides pop-ups that tell you when youve made a story-affecting decision, which puts you in a position to make choices that feel natural to you, rather than being conscious of what variable youre changing in the games save file.

Note: Compressed voice-over audio was an issue in the version of the game that originally released on Steam. This issue was patched during our review.