What Endings are Possible for Episode 5?
Since we know that the choices you're making will have only a very limited effect, allowing only for last minute changes, how can TTG nonethess try to generate different endings based on some of the choices you've made?
In another thread....
Some combination of these two seems inevitable, although adding in the way Deus Ex handled its ending would be just fine, where depending on what you emphasized, you closed with one of three 45 second cutscenes. With TWD game they could sum mathematically, and would end things on the order of:
a) "Your inability to make clearcut moral choices results in Clem's death. The St. Johns have been following you at a distance and your decision not the kill them in E2 allow them to take their ultimate revenge. You will forever carry your sorrow, alone, into the sunset of the ZA."
b) "Your attempts to shield Clem from the realities of the ZA have rendered her unable to recognize danger and fully defend herself. As a result she has just been bitten a zombie and your choices are now to i) shoot her, or ii) watch her turn."
c) "Your willingness to show Clem exactly what it takes to survive allows her to kill the final zombie on the dock and let both of you escape safely to sea. Bravo!"
In another thread....
TheWildcard wrote: »I see this game branching....But in the last episode. I figure they will take one of two routes for the split...
1 They will simply have a number of decisions that split the game at that point regardless of what you have done previously.
2 They will pretend to make your choices matter by tallying up your choices and grading them. This will create branches for "you are a jerk", "you just let things happen around you", "you tried to play hero", and so on.
Some combination of these two seems inevitable, although adding in the way Deus Ex handled its ending would be just fine, where depending on what you emphasized, you closed with one of three 45 second cutscenes. With TWD game they could sum mathematically, and would end things on the order of:
a) "Your inability to make clearcut moral choices results in Clem's death. The St. Johns have been following you at a distance and your decision not the kill them in E2 allow them to take their ultimate revenge. You will forever carry your sorrow, alone, into the sunset of the ZA."
b) "Your attempts to shield Clem from the realities of the ZA have rendered her unable to recognize danger and fully defend herself. As a result she has just been bitten a zombie and your choices are now to i) shoot her, or ii) watch her turn."
c) "Your willingness to show Clem exactly what it takes to survive allows her to kill the final zombie on the dock and let both of you escape safely to sea. Bravo!"
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Comments
Good point, but I don't think it's impossible to eat your cake and have it, too, by having multiple endings some of which Clem and Lee don't survive, then starting up next season as if the player had chosen the ending where both do survive.
After we hear that, maybe we'll decide you're one of the St. Johns' cousins.
Something less predictable...
The group is trapped.... walkers approach... cut to black and the Walking Dead logo shown across the screen.
Leave it a cliffhanger
Odd, but remember the gameplay on that little motion comic game on the AMC website a while back, where you play Shane and he goes both to a house, then to the police station? That was more satisfying and better done. You remember the train station fiasco where no one could intuit how to pick up the weapon? Ouch.
Still, I give TTG credit for solid voice acting, and the facial expressions on the characters are very good, very evocative.
Btw, the gameplay mechanics for zombie attacks are simple, but effective. You're on a timer and have to hit the moving target. Nothing new, but it's extremely appropriate and reasonably challenging for a quickly put together game. All-in-all a nice job with a variety of endings possible depending on the choices you make.
I don't want to eat him or anything, I'd just like to see less people survive the zombie apocalypse. Or at the very least main him. It always seems like the protagonist survives when everyone around him dies, like the Grim Reaper has an invisible "do not touch" sign around the protagonist's neck preventing any real harm from coming to them. I'd hate Lee to survive unscathed after almost literally everyone he has met and gotten close to has died horribly.
It may have happened but I've never heard of it. I suppose you could also have a game where you rotate through protagonists, moving on from one body to the next as each dies. The closest to that I'm aware of was a tv series called Dollhouse, or The Dollhouse. The problem with that is, as people, we get attached to the character we're playing. If you sever that attachment, one strong motive for playing--the enjoyment of that attachment and identification--disappears.
Film might be a better medium in which to portray the death of a protagonist. Noir and weepy romances often end in the death of the lead character. It would be interesting to have the choice at the end of TWD-the game--where you can save yourself while Clem dies, or you sacrifice yourself and, as the screen goes dark and you turn, you see Clem board the escape ship and leave port.
TTG won't go that route, but it would make for some great discussions.
No, I want to see him die as well just to ensure a fresh set of players for Season 2. And I want my conscience inside my head this time
I'm certain there will be an ending where Lee dies and one where he lives. We've gotten attached to the other characters as well, and their fates have been pretty grisly for the most part. I'm not saying I'll be perched on the nearest rooftop in Savvanah with a rifle, waiting for Lee to walk into my sights, but if TTG can pull off a good death for Lee, I'd throw my money at the screen for season 2 (more so than I am likely to already). That doesn't mean I want the main person in season 2 to die though, because once TTG uses the "protagonist dies" card they really can't use it again and be original. Maybe the guy in Season 2 will bite it? Lee surviving seems to be the likely route though, as the devs said that your choices in Season 1 will matter in season 2.
The only one who maybe gets out (to die in Season 2) is Clem if Lee teaches her to survive. All of Clem's training leads to a point where she either can't cope or uses her training to survive. It could be anything, but maybe she shoots a dying Lee in the head (as he tells her it's ok), then loots his corpse for change and candy bars. If she can do that, she loses her humanity, but gets a reprieve, because now she has what it takes to survive. Players are left unsure whether the best ending is when Clem survives as a monster or when she dies with Lee as a human.
In Season 2 Clem (if she survives) is a hidden antagonist who the new survivors take in. She finds a way to kill one of the weaker ones (if she's not alive, someone else kills that person). She gets away with it for a while, but eventually there's a confrontation and the new survivors kill her so that Telltale doesn't have to keep writing for an optional character. It shows that doing what seems like the right thing (taking in a girl and teaching her to defend herself and survive) can result in unexpected evil.
Lee was a murderer, and his legacy in Clem is murder. Another happy ending!
I suspect that Clementine's story will end in season 1 and the varying endings will be primarily about her.Dead/alive,safe/unsafe,happy/sad and reunited with parents or not. I can see scenarios with Lee dying but it may be similar to Mass effect 2 which means that your save doesn't carry over to season 2. I also don't expect a vast amount of variation but personally it doesn't really bother me that much.
Then boom, living in a safe zone dealing with things like Shane had to deal with in the TV show, Getting Clem some medical treatment or an Otis like scene where you've got the choice to leave another scavenger of the safe zone behind. (You either leave him or he just dies via volunteering to cover you.) Lee finds love in the safe zone which all culminates into Kenny becoming extremely jealous, leading to another confrontation between the two.
I could go more in depth but nah coz this is unlikely to happen.
I think TTG will follow Kirkman in stating that 'no one is safe' and maybe killing Lee off at the end of Series 2 or 3. At which point we will have already been introduced to a new character who we then take control of.