PS4 Review: The Walking Dead – Season One

Developer: Telltale Games
Publisher: Telltale Games
Platforms: Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, XBox One, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, iOS
Genres: Third Person Point and Click,Action Adventure
Released: April 2012-November 2012, Retail Version: December 2012, 400 Days: July 2013
Modes: Single-player
Distribution: Physical CD, Download
Rating(s): ESRB: M / PEGI: 18
Content Warning: Blood and Gore, Adult Language, Adult Situations, Suggestive Themes

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What Remains

The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans ’round with many voices. Come, my friends,
’Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Though much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will.
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
– Ulysses, Alfred Lord Tennyson

There is but one single, undeniable event in all our lives. On the day, the moment and the second our lungs fill with air, as we cry out across the place of our birth huddled by anxious faces nervous with both worry and hope; it is this moment, when we accept the gift of life, that we must also accept the price of death. In time, with what time is given us, we must one day stand upon the misty shores of Avalon and wait gently for the Riverman to come and take us to that place that many have gone, but none alive have yet to find.

We are for the most part not remembered for how we died; but rather, for how we lived. For how we treated our fellow man. For how we left our own indelible mark upon the world. We are remembered by those who loved us, oddly by those who hated us, and those who took from us all the wisdom we could pass on before we left. Lessons on how to live, how to leave their own indelible mark, and how to treat a world both beautiful and cold. If we do what is intended, the lessons that we’ve taught will not only better their lives, but better the people around them. For though we are not perfect creatures, striving to do what is right is all that we can hope for. Because hope is all that we have sometimes.

And in the fullness of time, when I myself must stand upon those misty shores to cross that shadowed river into the final beyond, to souls once lost but at last found, I can only hope that I did the right thing by me, by the people I leave behind, and by the world that I once tread underfoot. I can only hope.

By then it will be all that I have left.

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There’s a deepening sadness that seems to settle in the moment you begin your journey in The Walking Dead. A sadness that never seems to let up until the end. And that end that is just as powerful as it is tragic, as beautiful and tender as it is ugly and violent. I cannot think of a story in the last five years that has moved me, on so many emotional levels, as this one. This was a story that made me question every decision that I made, as carefully as I’m able, considering that some decisions must be made quickly. Once made, I had to be willing to live with the consequences. There’s no right answer sometimes to some of these decisions; no middle ground to make both sides of the debate happy. You simply go with your gut, stick to your guns, and hope for the best.

In the game, you play as Lee Everett, once a prominent University professor on his way to prison for supposedly murdering a Georgia State Senator who was having an affair with his wife before the world as he knew it changed forever. And it’s n the wreckage of his old life that Lee’s new one will be forged. Through the people that he meets, by the ones that he must care for the most during the small, quiet and brief respites, and for those that he may or may not lose during his journey. Through you Lee’s life will be defined in ways you would not expect. Through you, he is remembered by those that remain. Through you, they become the living testament to how Lee acted throughout the episodes of his life.

Most important out of all of the people he meets is a small and precious little gem known only as Clementine; a nine year old girl that acts, effectively enough, as Lee’s moral compass throughout the game. Voiced beautifully by VA actress Melissa Hutchison, Clementine makes the game, the story, the struggles, and the decisions throughout, completely and totally worth the experience. I think it would be a safe bet to say that the game would still be worth it had Clementine somehow never been added, but would the experience have been as emotional, as impactful as it turned out to be? Without question no, no it would not have been.

The gameplay is point and click, or point and…well…QTE I suppose? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ve said it before a million times, QTE’s are kinda lazy. But I have said that when they make sense to the context of the story, then I have no problem with them. And here, oddly enough, since it’s a point and click and the whole point of the story is, well, the story, the QTE’s are minimal gripes.

Now, there are two ways you can get your hands on this exceptional story-driven title. One is download each of the five Episodes which are (in order): A New Day, Starved for Help, Long Road Ahead, Around Every Corner, and the finale’ No Time Left. The other is to purchase the physical CD and play it off that. On the PS4, the stutter is minimal, but there are moments that can happen that sort of “fail” certain encounters mainly because that brief, little pause is all it takes in some encounters to pull up that “Game Over” screen. My advice is to download it directly to your hard drive and move on from there.

There’s also a “Bridging” episode called 400 Days (released July 2013) as, well, I guess you could call it a mid-season replacement to help fill in the gap between this season and the game’s sequel. It is a standalone episode and I haven’t had a chance to take a look at it yet, but it’s not required to finish off the first game’s conclusion.

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The game has a very interesting look about it. Parts of it remind you of comic book panels; harsh light and shadow, deep thick borders, this almost “sketch pad” design to certain characters. Almost as if they’re rough draft images brought to animated life. And I don’t know why, but visually there’s this light whisper in my head that the design almost mimics the look and feel of a Borderlands game; slightly cartoony at times, especially in certain set pieces (cars, weapons, certain buildings, etc). Which seems odd, considering how harsh, brutal, and gory this game can get at times. Yet it meshes well despite all of this. Not perfectly all the time of course, but well enough.

Since this is a point and click affair, gameplay takes a certain backseat to storytelling. There are times when the action picks up a little, but even then it’s a point and click (or rather up/down/left/right arrow decision in your cross-hairs) affair. HUD is….well…exceptionally minimal. I do find it amazing that Lee can carry a car battery in his “pocket inventory” when he has to, and not be…oh say…weighed down or encumbered in any way. But I’m willing to give the game a certain level of “suspension of disbelief” because it makes up for it with some of the best storytelling I’ve seen in a video game in quite a long while.

I love the music, the ambiance, the voice and the subtle little quirks throughout. As I’ve said, Melissa Hutchison as Clementine cements the character, solidifies the story, and makes the game completely and utterly worth every moment. That’s not to say the other voice actors are a slouch. Far from it in fact. Dave Fennoy as Lee Everett, Kenny Hammon as Kenny, and Nicole Vigil as as Carley are just some of the memorable characters given heavier gravitas due in no small part to how believable they’re made by their respective voice actors.

The music fits the mood and the current moment quite well throughout the game. Be it the tense and life threatening moments when you’re trying to fight off everything from the proverbial zombie to the not so expected cannibal nut job, to the quiet and gentle melodies that come with the all too short moments of peace in an otherwise chaotic world.

I can honestly say that I haven’t had a story move me in so many emotional ways as this one. Anger, disgust, shock, sadness. Genuine and sincere emotions that haven’t been touched quite so deeply in a good long while. Anger at the loss of a companion due to the paranoid delusions of another, disgust at the short-sightedness some people display despite the dangers around them, sadness or, more appropriately, honest tears, when the long road ends at such a poignant and unforgettable end. Every decision I’ve made is met and dealt with, and though some may disagree, I felt no real strings were left dangling when the game concluded beyond the hint of the segue leading into season 2 (review forthcoming as well). And that’s not a bad thing really.

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Final Thoughts: Despite some small hiccups now and again, The Walking Dead is a storytelling tour de force. If you haven’t experienced it from beginning to end, you’re missing out on one of the most poignant, one of the most emotional stories in the last five years of video game storytelling. The Walking Dead will tear you apart emotionally, mentally, spiritually. But in a good way. In a believable and honest way. In a way that some stories should have made you feel, but fell flat on its face due to last minute WTF’s that just didn’t make sense to the story, or to the universe it exists in, as a whole.

This. This right here is how you tell a story. This is how you make believable characters you want to cling to and love and cherish for as long as you can. And more importantly, this is how you make a Game of the Year work. You don’t make it louder, you don’t make it flashier, you don’t make it for you. You make it for others. You make it for them. For the fans. More importantly, you make it honest. And that’s not just a sign of a great developer. It’s the sign of a great game.

Final Score: 5 out of 5

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