Telltale's "The Walking Dead" Game, SPOILERS

[Totenkindly]

Dunno if anyone else played this, and I'll put spoilers in this opening post in the SPoiler tags in case someone just wants to look at the thread context.

I had it for awhile, but like with everything else, once I finally REALLY started playing, I ended up blowing through it.

Telltale has a decent setup -- they release five episodes per season. Currently Season 2, you can pay up front and then you just will automatically Steam download the episodes as they are released until the season is released. Once all the episodes are released, you can download a single game package -- and Steam sometimes discounts them. I probably only paid about $10 for Season 1, and I'd have be willing to pay the full $25 probably, based on the quality.

Frankly, the game is brutal. Your interactions with the other characters impact how they respond to you later in the plot. Often you will have to chose to make one person happy at the expense of another, and they do not forget. SOmetimes you can salvage things, sometimes you build some bad blood.

Some decisions you make have small impact, some decisions and comments you make can change the course of the game, determine who lives and dies, etc. Other times, you think you're making a big decision but it turns out you're all screwed anyway... just like in the TV show; you just didn't realize it yet.

Season 1, you play as an educated black guy, a convict named Lee who is on his way to jail when the zombie outbreak happens. The police car wrecks, Lee has to figure things out, and then decide what he wants to do. Early in his travels, he finds a little black girl named Clementine whose parents never came home, holed up in her house. Lee takes her under his wing and they bond -- he becomes her surrogate dad until he is able to locate her real parents and reunite them all, and she looks to Lee for encouragement and guidance.

You'll meet a few characters from the TV show... a slightly different version of Herschel, backstory for what happened to his stepson (?), Glenn's "pre-TV" story arc, etc. But almost all of them are new. All of them have very different personalities. Most have trouble getting along. Characters come and go. The body count is very high (at least 50%) by the end.

But it's a very emotional game. I became invested in the characters, trying to make things work... and especially in the relationship between Lee and Clem, which continues to grow throughout the game. It made it really hard when the story came to an end.

I'd only read this bit if you have already played or don't care to:

My "parental" feelings were just overwhelming for all this, and you can either play Lee as a jerk, but you can also be her dad as much as her real parents. You comfort her when she's hurting. You protect her from threats. You look out for her. You try to treat her with respect. You teach her how to shoot. You figure out how to keep her alive. You figure out how to strengthen and encourage and bolster her confidence so that she becomes this really strong but still human/sensitive little girl.

Then, after EVERYTHING you've been through together, it all goes to hell, she's kidnapped (partly because she was too trusting and so badly wants to find her parents), you need to find her... and you get bitten. Now you're on the clock.

Most of your friends die as you look for her. Eventually it's just you. You might have possibly chopped off your left hand at this point, to buy you more time. You find her, you have to fight for her, you save her... but you're dying. Lee is dying. You use the last of your strength to get her out of the zombie infestation in Savannah, and it's almost not enough. In the end, you have to handcuff yourself so that if you die and turn, you won't kill her. You watch her fight to keep herself alive, helping her as you can from the sidelines. Then you can either encourage her to leave you (so you'll die alone) or to shoot you, to make sure you don't hurt her.

It was pretty bad. It really is like taking care of one of your own children during a zombie outbreak... and being willing to suffer, bleed, maim yourself, and eventually die so that your child can make it out. I was actually crying during that last scene between Lee and Clem... not just that their relationship was ending because Lee was gonna die, but to see how strong Clem had become and how she was gonna be able to take care of herself or at least had a fighting chance, and feeling regret I couldn't do more for her and that now she was gonna be alone. It was like Lori saying goodbye to Carl all over again.

Clem makes it. The last scenes show her all alone out in the fields surrounding the season... and it turns out she's who you play as in Season 2.

It is just a really, really good game. Not just in the play value, but the emotions it triggers. The music's great too, especially coming up for Season 2.