Less Episodes, Meatier games.

edited April 2012 in General Chat
In general, I think Telltale should decrease the amount of episodes in a series, but beef up the content within them.

Discuss?

Comments

  • edited April 2012
    Why? Isn't there enough content in them?
  • edited April 2012
    I wouldn't care either way so long as the games were actually games rather than glorified quick-time events.
  • edited April 2012
    Since most of Telltale's games are point and click, I'm using that as my reference point. For example, the original Monkey Island games had tonnes of characters in tonnes of locations and a black hole in Guybrush's pocket to serve as an inventory.

    Now, because of the smaller game sizes and more confined location choice, it gets harder to have that many characters or items or locations. The latter especially I feel falters sometime in Telltale games in order to serve the game.

    But, when playing Hector, it felt much bigger and meatier, even with the less amount of episodes.

    The content is at about 70% of what I'd like it to be, so yeah, I'd beef it up. The scripts, and the actual content we do get? Great. I wouldn't change that, I just want more. Shortening the amount of episodes to beef them up is a great way to do it. TV shows (especially from the UK) do that often to help reign in the spiral and have tighter, more expansive stories.
  • edited April 2012
    I wouldn't care either way so long as the games were actually games rather than glorified quick-time events.
    this.
  • edited April 2012
    stuxmusic wrote: »
    In general, I think Telltale should decrease the amount of episodes in a series, but beef up the content within them.

    Discuss?
    Yes.
    FrankT wrote: »
    Why? Isn't there enough content in them?
    No.
    I wouldn't care either way so long as the games were actually games rather than glorified quick-time events.
    Half-yes.
  • edited April 2012
    If they keep making episodes as good as the first Walking Dead one then I'll be happy. Any improvements to that would just be a bonus. There is a lot to be said for quality over quantity.
  • edited April 2012
    QTE's are forgivable if everything else is good.

    I wouldn't mind 3 really long episodes, (sort of like a 3 parter special). Change the pace up a bit, might get some more meat on the bone in terms of gameplay/puzzle design.
  • edited April 2012
    The smaller sizes have more something to do with the actual FILE sizes rather than the sizes of the episodes themselves.

    Remember that Tales of Monkey Island had to be compressed a lot in order for it to fit within 40 MB on WiiWare. More content means less space for actual dialog and crap. Even with high compression, you can only compress so much.
  • edited April 2012
    Well, Telltale haven't done anything on the Wii since Tales, so I'm guessing that's not really a major factor any more.
  • JenniferJennifer Moderator
    edited April 2012
    Well, Telltale haven't done anything on the Wii since Tales, so I'm guessing that's not really a major factor any more.
    Back to the Future: The Game got a Wii port, but it was to disc. So, i agree, I don't think the Wiiware file limits are a problem any more.
  • edited April 2012
    There's no real reason to make the games so small. If you're going to download one episode of a game, it's more than likely you'll download another. So it doesn't matter the file size because people will still get the same amount at some rate.

    With the walking dead games, I get the impression that you'll be building up to having the entire game, due to the choices in one game affecting another. So again, file sizes make no difference there.

    What's also true is that you used to be able to buy separate episodes of telltale games, but now you buy a season pass. So again, not much point in spreading it over longer.

    The only reason I can see to spread games out so long, with releases once a month, is to keep Telltale in the public eye. The more episodes you have, the more reviews, the more coverage. It's the only reason I can see.
  • edited April 2012
    stuxmusic wrote: »
    It's the only reason I can see.
    So, why do networks produce TV shows, instead of just releasing one 10 hour movie?
  • edited April 2012
    1) So they can air it over a prolonged period of time.
    2) To enable them to make connected stories that differ in tone.
    3) To give them enough time to actually make 20+ episodes.
  • edited April 2012
    Actually, it's to keep you tuned in as much as possible to sell commercial time. Networks don't give a shit about your favourite shows, they just care if you change the channel. Some shows could very well be watched marathon style, but most cannot.

    This is where episodic games lie. It gives the developer the ability to stop and start the story while letting time pass, essentially skipping the boring parts in between. To get the same feeling from a movie, imagine every 15-20min a screen popping up "10 days later", "30min later", "1 month later", throughout the entire film. It removes any investment you currently have in the characters and story while you're playing catch up. While the more recent TTG releases have been more fluid, if you pop in an older episodic title and run through it, you feel removed from the story in between each episode. They were really counting on you putting down the game back then.

    I guess I have to admit BttF and JP were more successful in that regard. To contrast the recent releases, pop in S&M season 1. Every episode started "okay this is what happened, this is what's going on now, this is what's changed...GO". In terms of television, each episode of the games felt like a new season of a modern TV show. Oddly enough, this was actually quite common in the older days of television and the days of radio serials.
  • edited April 2012
    Also, TV shows are the way they are largely because of the choices made by the producers and distributors (ie. TV stations), not because TV show developers think having ~23 minute or ~46 minute durations per episode is nifty.

    What I mean is, TTG makes their games the way they want to by their own choice (especially since they distribute their own games), so it's not the same as why TV shows are the length that they are.
  • edited April 2012
    Well, there are TV shows that don't really fall into normal TV-show standards... like Columbo - a TV-show every episode of which was movie-length.
  • JenniferJennifer Moderator
    edited April 2012
    3) To give them enough time to actually make 20+ episodes.
    In the US maybe, in other places like the UK, what would be considered a short season in the US (ie: 13 episodes) is considered the usual. A television program having only 5 episodes in a series in the UK is not unheard of.
  • edited April 2012
    Jennifer wrote: »
    In the US maybe, in other places like the UK, what would be considered a short season in the US (ie: 13 episodes) is considered the usual. A television program having only 5 episodes in a series in the UK is not unheard of.

    They are usually 40min-1hour shows though.
    (Some have been even longer then that! Especially murder mystery series! XD)

    Hah. We even have 3 90 minute length shows as well like Sherlock.

    (3 90min episodes per season)

    I guess we are more flexible when it comes to scheduling.
  • edited April 2012
    Yeah, BBC especially (since they don't have to cater to advertisers). Also, if Telltale make these decisions themselves then they would obviously do it to keep themselves in the public eye. Games take a long time to make, you can release about 2 games a year if you're lucky, five episodes in a series released monthly keeps your name on game websites for 10 months out of a year. While I'd want 3 episodes max with the stories evened out and beefed up, I can understand why they don't do that for their games. But as well as that, I'd be happy if the the games were released on a disk in shops, and again, I can understand them not doing that too.

    What would be neat is to somehow combine all the episodes into one full game for the dvd release. Having to finish an episode, watch a trailer, close it down, open the next episode and get a re-cap isn't really the best way to go about it at that stage.
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