Played on Playstation 3

Originally written August 19, 2013

The Walking Dead has become something of a phenomenon in recent years. It started off as a comic book series by Robert Kirkman, but has since became a TV show, which most people know it for. Now we have a video game from Telltale Games taking place in the same universe as the comics, but featuring a whole new cast of characters not seen on the TV show or anything. In fact, if you’re only interested in playing this game because you want to play as characters from the TV series, don’t bother, they’re nowhere to be found (and on the flip side, if you’re like me and have never seen the TV show, don’t feel like you can’t jump into this game without any background knowledge). However, to not play this just because of that would be foolish, because The Walking Dead is an amazing video game, and if story-driven game experiences are up your alley, this one is for you. Let’s take a more in-depth look at all of the aspects.

Story: 10/10

I’ll say this right off the bat…above all else, the biggest reason to play The Walking Dead is for its story. The whole game is centered around its story, and the game gives you choices throughout that will affect how the story plays out in certain moments. And what a damn good story it is. You play as a character named Lee Everett, who as the game opens is being sent to prison for murder. Being that he now lives in a world where people are infected and being turned into zombies, however, this doesn’t last long, and the car he’s being transported in crashes after running into a zombie. Lee gets away and stumbles upon a house, where he finds an eight year old girl named Clementine, who is alone. Realizing that her parents are dead, Lee takes it upon himself to take care of Clementine, and the two move on to try and survive in a world overrun by zombies.

From here, the game takes you on a journey that I could never bring myself to spoil for anybody. Without a doubt, The Walking Dead has one of the best stories I’ve ever experienced in any medium; games, movies, books, etc. It perhaps does this so well because it has excellent characters. The two main characters, Lee and Clementine, are easily two of the best characters I’ve ever seen in a video game. The bond these two share is incredible. Even all the side characters are interesting because they have their own storylines going on, and when motives clash, it plays out in a really interesting way. What makes the story of The Walking Dead even more rewarding is that in the game you are given a lot of difficult choices, and what choices you make affect how certain things play out. This really gives you the feeling that you’re putting yourself into the character of Lee, and how you would handle a situation is how you’re making him handle it. You shape the story, and it’s always interesting to see the consequences of your actions. I could easily continue going on about why the story here is so perfect, but suffice it to say it’s an incredible journey, right up to its very emotional ending, which I’m not ashamed to say I cried at.

Gameplay: 9/10

The gameplay might be where some people are turned off by The Walking Dead, but I hope they don’t let it be. Understandably, you’d think a game involving zombies would be an action type of game, but instead The Walking Dead is a point-and-click type of adventure game. There’s really three types of gameplay you’ll experience here though. The first is the traditional point-and-click style of game. These sections have you walking around an area, examining certain items in the room, or using certain items on other items, all to try and produce the desired effect. The second is the cutscene type of sections, where your only gameplay is choosing between four dialogue choices for Lee to say, similar to Mass Effect. You’re only given a limited amount of time to choose what Lee says or does in a lot of instances, so you’re not given much time to think. The third type of gameplay is seen in action sequences, where you’re given some quick time events. These usually just consist of mashing a button, or clicking on a zombie to kill it before it kills you.

For the most part, The Walking Dead pulls through on its gameplay. The dialogue choices are very well done, and for the most part the quick time events never usually cause you to screw yourself over. The only real problem is sometimes in the point-and-click sections, the game expects you to search around for one little thing that’s sometimes hard to spot, just to trigger something that will progress the game forward. This is sometimes done by having to backtrack a bit to stuff you already examined too. Some of these moments are just tedious and boring, but luckily they’re few and far between. There was also one moment in the game where I didn’t do some things in a certain order, and the game glitched and didn’t let me continue. This has happened to other people in the same spot too, but to my knowledge it’s only one section. So, the game plays pretty awesome for the most part, but there are a few kinks that could have been smoothed over.

Graphics: 7/10

Unfortunately, in a game that’s practically perfect, the graphics department is the one area that makes the game very flawed. This isn’t because of how the game looks, however. On the contrary, the game looks beautiful. It’s done in a cell-shaded type of style, and it all just looks really great. There’s some great details to certain things too, such as blood on a character’s clothing, or the look of a zombie to make it look scarier, that just really add to the atmosphere. The details on a character’s facial expressions really help communicate the emotions of certain scenes better too.

Rather, where the game has its fatal flaw is how its engine runs. The game will lag in a lot of areas. I have the downloaded version of the game off of the PlayStation Store, but from what I hear the lag is even worse on disc copies of the game. Still, even on my version that apparently runs betters, there’s a lot of sections where the game just can’t keep up with itself. Sometimes you’ll hear the dialogue in a certain scene continue while the picture is frozen for a few seconds. Thankfully, this isn’t a problem that occurs so frequently that it makes the game unplayable or anything, but it is for sure a glaring flaw in a game that otherwise does everything else right, as it can be distracting.

Sounds: 9/10

Coming right off the heels of its big lagging flaw, some of the blame should probably be shared with the sounds department too. Since there’s some moments where the picture will be slightly behind the audio, there’s times where a character’s voice will not match up with the movement of their mouth. Again, I feel most of the blame lies in the visual department here for not being able to have the animations run smoothly, but it is a problem that the audio isn’t synchronous either.

However, aside from that, the sounds of The Walking Dead are nothing short of incredible. The voice actors sell the lines so well, and really bring so much life to these characters. The simplest things, like having Clementine having a scared tone in her voice, really bring home the emotion that The Walking Dead offers. The music and sound effects blend together really well too. The things you hear while playing the game really help set the mood and tone of the game. Whether it be the sound of a trapped zombie far away trying to escape, or some somber music notes to set the tone, the sounds of The Walking Dead do a wonderful job in immersing you in the experience.

Length/Replayability: 9/10

The Walking Dead achieves a length that feels just right, and for a game that’s only $20, you definitely feel like you get your money’s worth out of it. The game is divided into five separate episodes (giving it almost a TV show vibe). Depending on whether you want to rush through to quickly progress the story, or stop and examine whatever you can and have more conversations with characters to deepen the experience, each episode will take about 2-3 hours to finish, making for a total game length of about 10-15 hours. Each episode feels like it’s just the right length. The game doesn’t feel too short, but it also doesn’t feel like it overstays its welcome either. It’s just right.

As for replay value, that’s entirely up to you. For trophy hunters, you’ll get the platinum by simply playing through the game, so there’s no reason in that sense to play more after you’ve beaten it. There’s nothing else to unlock by playing more than once, or any other types of game modes besides the story campaign. The way you’ll get replay value out of the game is if you want to see how certain moments in the game will play out differently. Since you have to make some big decisions, you’re only seeing one way a situation will play out by playing it through one time. If you want some different experiences, there’s a few different ways you can play the game.

Telltale’s The Walking Dead is probably one of the best games I’ve played of this generation. If nothing else, it has one of the best stories I’ve ever had the pleasure of experiencing, and if that’s something that interests you in video games, you really owe it to yourself to try this one out. It’s a fun point-and-click game with a thrilling atmosphere to it that’s only brought down by some occasional bad lag. Still, it’s a rewarding experience, and one that many people will like to go back and experience more than once in different ways. Check this one out.

4.5/5