I've finally had time to digest the events of the first episode of the second season of The Walking Dead from Telltale. It's been over a year coming and we now get to see what happens to the adorable little Clementine and the survivors of the previous season even though those numbers were running pretty low at the end. So let's jump in and see if the wait was worth it. If there seems to be description missing that is due to trying to keep this as spoiler free as possible. You're welcome.
The Story
We pick up with the small group months after the events of The Walking Dead season one and see that Clementine made it back to the survivors in your previous play-through. A few things occur and we jump forward months again in the timeline and Clementine finds herself on her own after a raid on her camp. She survives and in normal Walking Dead storytelling she stumbles upon another group of survivors who are not sure if they should trust her and if she is infected or not. All of this to lead up to another raid on her new group. Rinse. Repeat.
Hated
If there is one glaring thing I have grown to hate about The Walking Dead it is the rinse and repeat story that is rampant in the comics and TV show. It was cool and interesting the first few times that it occurred but it became stagnant in my opinion. It was something that The Walking Dead game deviated from in the first season. I'm talking about the "everything is fine and then… oh shit there are a bunch of evil fuckers who want our shit. They kill a bunch of people and force the protagonists to find a new group." scenarios. This is what the first episode really felt like to me instead of the writers trying to introduce new characters and get rid of the old strings they just use this and wipe the slate cleanish. It just didn't seem like we had the same level of writing as we did before.
One last thing as the game was too short to really get any more gripes… oh wait, that's the gripe. We wait and wait and we get a single episode that I was able to complete in about an hour. I clearly remember the first episode of The Walking Dead's first season being almost twice as long and then subsequent episodes being the same length or slightly shorter. This just didn't seem like they were completely ready but the demand was too high and Telltale had to get more of The Walking Dead out. I guess beggars can't be choosers but if we could have chosen I would have waited a bit longer for more content in this episode.
Loved
While I don't think much was done with any of the other characters, new and old, in this episode of The Walking Dead, I do have to say that Telltale developed Clementine extremely well and made her a character in the universe that I care about just as much as I do Negan and the Governor. That is a good thing even though the later are 'villains' in the overall universe, but they have the most motivation and intriguing reasons for their actions. In the video game universe Clementine has completely stepped up and is reason enough for me to be engaged and entertained with everything that The Walking Dead has to offer up now; even if it is on the shorter side of things.
Without spoiling anything too much, I also loved the 'stealth' gameplay that occurs in this episode. While I couldn't find much in the way of being able to fail this, the setting, mood, and tone all gave me that sense that I still could fail and in turn have a very poor outcome for Clementine. It's a hard to keep that sense of anxiety during a stealth section where you as a player have to complete bork everything to fail but Telltale hit the nail on the head and it was one of my favorite sections in the new episode. I hope that we get more of these kinds of gameplay twists that are engaging as we progress into future episodes of The Walking Dead.
Overall
Even though this episode of The Walking Dead was on the shorter and repetitious side of things I don't feel like I wasted time nor would it have been a waste of money. Even on the episode only price of things. There is quite a bit of character development for Clementine, everyone's favorite in this part of the universe, so there is that. Also not every episode can be a 100% winner but I am sure it will lead to greatness as we have seen with the first season of The Walking Dead. If you have still yet to pick it up, what are you waiting for? Now that the Season Pass is available across the board you should get it and wait for the rest of the season.
The Walking Dead: Season 2 was developed and published by Telltale Games for the PC, PS3, Xbox 360, and iOS on December 17th, 2013. A copy of the game was provided by the publisher for reviewing purposes.
