Something relevant.
Oh man. That was pretty cool… oh, sorry, I didn’t see you there. I was just killing a five story tall demon-bear from Mercury with my bare hands. What have you done with your day? Killed a six story demon-bear from Mercury with your bare feet? Crap… at least I have style. That’s probably something you lack-
OH GOSH DANG!
WALKING DEAD!
It’s a thing, Walking Dead is a thing. More importantly it’s a thing. A TV/Comic book series thing that some geniuses adapted into a game. And these geniuses earn their name in a totally non-sarcastic Falco Lombardi kind of way. Seriously, there’s no sarcasm in there. Honestly, don’t read this in (I assume) the regular sarcastic voice you read this crap in, this is serious time. The Walking Dead might be my favorite thing since sliced peanut butter… That doesn’t exist, does it? Whatever, it’s pretty freaking great.
But I can already hear you clawing at your computer screen, claiming that I already reviewed the Walking Dead game, and you’re right. But not as right as you would think… that means you’re wrong. See, I already reviewed the first episode of the Walking Dead game, but that’s just the thing, there’s more. Four more, to be exact.
The Walking Dead game is split into five parts, each encompassing Lee Everett’s journey into the deep, with his handy sidekick, Clementine. Watch as the two do-gooders escape from the evil Zombie King and his army of Zombies, Next week, same time. Sorry… got a little cheesy announcer there. Basically every episode is between 3 to 5 hours in length and every episode tasks Lee with keeping his fun-time friends alive and make some freaking tough choices. You’ll be hard-pressed to figure out if what you did was the right thing to do in that situation, and that makes me sad, it probably makes everybody sad. Here’s why.
- Every choice (how seemingly insignificant it seems at the times) makes a huge impact on the way things play out later on in the game. See, you’ll have Clementine with you pretty much the entire time, and she’ll see your actions. Clem acts as the projection of your choices, so if she sees you murder someone, she’s probably not going to like you, if you lie to her, it’s going to come back to bite you right in your booty. Clementine is honestly probably one of my favorite characters in video games because, while most characters motivations stay the same and Lee’s are busy bouncing around the place with yours, Clem changes dynamically depending on how much of a jerk Lee acts, which is you. And Clementine is a pretty cool name.
- The writing is da breas- Best*. Seriously. The comics are written pretty good, the show is written even better and the game could win a gabajillion Mico’s-favorite-things-ever-Awards(and those don’t come easy) for expert writing. Every character has their own flaws and their own distinct personality and their own motivations, relationships, opinions and their own toast-making technique, which make you either love them or hate them and when they die you’ll always feel sad, whether or not you wanted it to happen.
- That’s also because the voice acting is superb. Each character is well-voiced and you can tell that the actors probably have, or at least should have, been paid top-notch. When a character is angry, you wish you hadn’t made them so, when a character is sad, you kind of want to hug them, when a character is being a douche, you want to bust a cap in their head. (nowhere else, lest they turn) if the actors had been any less interested in this project than they were this game would have failed, and you can tell that they’re interested and want to see that the finished product is great. And they succeeded.
That enough brown-nosing? You feel a little sick that I adore something this much? Well… good. My work here is done.
So, if you haven’t bought any episodes of the Walking Dead, don’t… (What!?) No, seriously, there’s a disc release coming out soon that you should just wait for. But if you have bought any episodes then that’s good, if you didn’t like them, then I have nothing more to say to you. Except for, “I don’t like you.”
If you’re not interested in zombies, good stories, emotions, and intensity in your video games then steer clear of this title.
Story… yeah, I guess that was the longest intro in the history of history.
The game revolves around Lee Everett. (I’ve already summarized his back story in the episode one review. (Link’s at the bottom.)
Each episode is a continuation of the last, either taking place a couple months after the previous episode or, in the case of four to five, literally the second after the previous. And all the episodes end in cliff-hangers that make you want to shoot a hole through your Xbox because you know that you have to wait a month to see how it turns out. (Yeah, a month… that panned out pretty well.) Not meeting the deadline aside…
Episode two takes place three months after episode one and Lee and the Donkey Kong crew have finished securing the motel that they had found in the first episode. Episode 2 opens up with Lee and some guy who they picked up in that three month span named Mark out hunting for some din-din. They start off talking about the best places to score weed or something far less offensive, maybe pertaining to all the jerks in their group, when they hear a scream. They assume the scream is from Kenny, if you play the game right Kenny is your best friend. (He has a sweet moustache, you understand now?) Anyways, Lee and Marky-mark find the source of the screaming, they realize it’s not Kenny but is in fact… some guy. I don’t freaking know who, and neither does anybody else. This some guy has his foot caught in a bear-trap, and he keeps on yelling, attracting every zombie ever. This guy also has two other guys with him, Ben and Travis (I think, I didn’t bother remembering all the names.) Whatever, here Lee has a chance to really show the judges what he’s made of… by chopping the guys leg off, or leaving him there. If you choose to chop of this poor saps leg, Travis gets ate, if you don’t then this guy gets ate. Lee takes either Legless-Joe, or Travis (Who I think gets bit if you don’t save the bear-trap guy) back to the motel. There Kenny’s wife, Katjaa, tries to save him. While she’s busy tending to the wound you probably caused, Lilly (If you play the game right, you won’t be her best friend. She’s kind of a dink,) tasks Lee with feeding the group (See? Dink) The group consists of ten people, but you’re only given four PB&Js. Then you have to pick who you’re going to feed. You’ll obviously feed Clementine first, (Unless you enjoy seeing small girls suffer, you sick disgusting animal.) then you’ll probably feed Duck, he’s Kenny’s son, so that’s important. Go ahead and feed Lilly’s dad, he’s a douchebag and deserves to die, but at least be nice to the old man. And then try to give the last meal to Katjaa, when she refuses, take it for yourself… there you go, MLG STRATS! Anyways, once you get the hardest decision of your virtual life since being a male or female in a MMORPG (Do you want to look tough or sexy? It’s a really tough question.) Katjaa asks you to help her with Legoless over here. She tells Lee that he lost too much blood and died, then she goes on about her day, I couldn’t care less. These women… WAIT! IZZAT A ZAMBY? OH CRAP! Yes, turns out that when someone dies without having their brain destroyed, they come back with a serious taste for human flesh. So, you kill the legless zombie and ol’ helpful Benjamin lends a hand. He says that when it all started off his band class held up in a gym with their teacher, who got caught in th- (HIS NAME WAS MR. PARKER! OH MY GOSH! I FINALLY FREAKING REMEMBERED!) Ben tells Lee and his home-dogs (that was a little racist) that there was a girl there who didn’t want to live any more so she took some magic shrooms and died ina baffroom. Then she came back and infected the whole gym… Whoopsy doopsy. Then two guys show up and bring Lee to a farm. The end. Of the first little part, the rest takes place at the farm, which the group thinks could really benefit them.
EPISODE 3! Takes place one week after episode two. And has the survivors holed up in the motor inn. It’s still the Motel, just a different name. Lilly tells Lee that she noticed some of their supplies are missing, Lee either flips out or keeps his cool, depending on your play style. Lilly asks Lee to investigate. There’s nothing you can do to not investigate, it’s one of those mandatory story type deals. Here, you get a little funny bonus; you can enlist the help of Duck, Kenny’s son. (Duck is a really stupid name.) Duck will help you find clues and provide some chuckle-worthy dialogue, it’s the only genuinely light-hearted moment in the series. Duck doesn’t provide much use, in fact he kind of gets in the way, but it’s worth it just to feel a little better about your situation. Through thorough investigation (looking through people underwear doesn’t count.)You find out that someone in the group has been sneaking supplies into an air-conditioning duct on the outside of the Motel. That doesn’t sit well with Lee and he calls the group together to question them about who the crap has been taking all the candy. Just then some bandits show up… yay. The bandits reveal that they had a deal with the group, but since they didn’t get their Nutty-Buddies, the deal is off. They start shooting at the Motel instantly, no diplomacy in the apocalypse. (That’s a good band name.(That’s a copyright now. If you name your band “No Diplomacy in the Apocalypse I will sue you.) Anyways, some Walkers (That’s what they call the zombies, I kind of like that name a little more than zombies.) break down the gate and start munching up on people. Kenny books it to his recreational vehicle and tries to start it. You get some FPS action (not really) and then Kenny starts the RV. Everybody goes inside. Someone might have died, I can’t freaking remember. Lilly starts cracking down on Ben and Carley/Doug. (Who the second person is depends on who you saved in the first episode. I chose Carley, because Doug is a nerd and Carley is pretty.) So, Carley defends Ben and Lilly gets real mad. Kenny drives over a Walker, causing it to get stuck under the RV. Kenny has to stop the RV to get it out of there. Once it’s stopped, Lilly orders everybody out so she can figure out who the crap did it, Carley ain’t budging, Ben ain’t budging, Lee aint’ budging, Kenny budges a little but that’s because he’s trying to get a Walker out from underneath his sick ride and doesn’t really care about what’s happening with the other members. After some (much) arguing one character busts a cap in a nother characters head… And Mico went into some blind rage, turned off his Xbox, and jumped out a window. Then Lee told this jerk to stay behind, she didn’t like that, but she has to deal. (I might have made Lee tell her to stay behind. There was no “Stab her in the mouth” option.) Then the rest get into the RV. Clem asks Lee about what happened, and I spiral into a deep pit of depression, (telling an eight year old what happened is surprisingly harder than you would think. (But you could just lie to her, you heartless fiend.)
Episode 4 takes place the day after episode 3, and it might be my favorite because of who you meet. Anyways, Lee and his drastically smaller group end up in Savannah after their train ride. (They found a train in episode three, pretend I mentioned it.) Then someone rings a bell in the nearest church and every Walker in the neighborhood just has to see what all the commotion is about. The group escapes to a house and then Lee, Ben and Kenny go inside to clear it out. Kenny and Ben head upstairs and ask Lee to check out all the rooms downstairs. Lee finishes checking the rooms and Ben coms down asking for help. Ben tells Lee that Kenny’s been up in the attic for a really long time. It only took me like thirty seconds to check the house, so Ben’s just being a paranoid-Polly. Lee heads up to check on Kenny, and probably the most shocking moment in video game history takes place in this very scene. I’m not going to tell you what happens. But it involves a unicorn. So Lee starts digging a grave then he sees some pervert staring at him on the other side of the fence. And Mico partakes in a jump scare. Seriously, he just freaking shows up. Lee gets pretty mad and yells at the guy who runs away like a little baby. Once I finished cleaning my pants, Kenny tells Lee that he’s going to search the coast for a boat. Lee goes with him and the two make it to the coast, I guess. Kenny finds a piece of crap boat and tells Lee to look around for something to help them out. Then you find the most terrifying image in video game history, and I’ll tell you, it’s a literal wall of dead bodies, and some undead bodies on spikes. Not terrifying enough for ya? Kenny tells Lee that that’s not good enough and he needs to look through one of those coin operated zoomy devices. What are they called? I don’t freaking care. After looking around at everything in your view for a bit, Lee sees someone climbing down a nearby building. Kenny and Lee hide while the masked survivor loots a newsstand. Lee decides to get a jump on this individual. But the ninja-like figure disappears and gets the jump on Lee. And I totally got it handed to me. (if you’re quick you can win the fight, I however, am obviously stupid and lost.) So, Clementine shows up right as Lee’s about to get a cap busted in his mouth, the survivor shows mercy towards Lee because he has a kid with him. The survivor reveals herself and says she’s Molly. There, now I got a crush. Then a whole bunch of Walkers show up and Lee gets separated from the other three and is forced into the sewer. (They somehow found a way to sneak in a sewer level.) That’s the most plot that I can give you. I can tell you that the ending of this episode kept me up at night, just from sheer worry and awe.
Episode 5 takes place at least thirty milliseconds after episode 4 and I can’t tell you anything about it because it’s got heavy spoilers, (Heavier than my usual amount.)
At the end of your zombie riddled day, the Walking Dead game is a solid experience that’s definitely worth your time… depending on your outlook on life, death and the somewhere in between. Do I have any flaws? No. Does the game have any flaws? Yeah, sometimes the controls can get a little sluggish. Sometimes characters act like there’s nothing in their hands, so when they’re holding like a shovel or something they might cross their arms or point at something nearby with the shovel magically stuck to the palm of their hand. And that’s about it.
If I had to rate this game I would say…
Walking Dead = Very Yes
That means you should buy it. Oh, you got that? Ok, just checking.
