Our decisions need to matter (***SPOILERS***)
First I would like to state that I have really enjoyed the Walking Dead games. My main problem, and concern is that our decisions are almost meaningless, and it increased so in the second game.
In the introduction booklet that came with the first game it states "The Walking Dead is a game where your choices matter". This statement at best is misleading, and at worst a complete lie.
No decision you makes really alters the outcome of the game. If you are given the choice of saving one person over another it is meaningless because they are going to die later. No matter what you do in the game it will end with the same survivors. When I first started playing I was excited with replaying the game to see how my choices alter the outcome. About half way through I realized the truth. This was a real let down.
So it's basically a movie that already has a script that you get to alter the dialogue a bit. Even that was taken away from us in the second game. In your choice to kill the zombie, or cut off Sarita's arm to save her, Kenny's response is the same. He treats clementine badly. Again you don't have a choice of saving her. Cut off her arm, she dies, kill the zombie she dies. Same thing with Sarah. You save her earlier, she dies later. Your choice to save her earlier didn't matter. Or with Doug/Carley. You saved one of them but they die later, in the same way.
So when your choice effects if someone lives, or dies. Or if you have to pick one person over another, it's actually a spoiler. That person is going to die later. This game is fun, and I will buy the next installment but this game could be so much better. If our decisions actually effected the outcome of the game it would be so awesome. We could have the ability to go back over, and over to see the alternate endings, and gameplay.
I doubt anyone from telltale will get this but if they do I really hope they consider it. I know it will require more money to do but can assure you that at least this fan will pay more for it if I know my decisions really do matter.
Comments
I guess telltale thinks that making the game that way makes it realistic.
I do agree with you that the choices do matter, what's the point in having them if they don't affect your gameplay?
The thing about a game that is tailored is that it is more linear. Although we want the story to be different through our choices, in the end, it will be the same for all of us.
I disagree. In season 1 it was a good balance of decisions mattering but in life certain things will always happen. For example, Sparing Ben mattered. Stealing from the car really changes people's opinions of you and Carlie and Ben really alter the dialogue. But in season 2 I do believe a lot of our decisions are pretty meaningless and people's opinions of us never change.
Yes in the first installment our decisions really do alter the dialogue, which was good. Sparing Ben felt good, but he still died later. Like I said before. If you save someone it's a spoiler they are going to die later. I don't like that, it takes away from the story knowing it. Even if they say had it so the person leaves the group to find family. That will mean your decision did matter, and we will end with the same people. They don't do that. The person dies regardless of your choice.
I agree with this. There's only so far they can go with branching pathways due to the complexity of them, so things will by necessity always be mostly linear, with the same major points still occurring, like people that die always dying eventually. That's where good illusion of choice comes in though, S1 had it, this one does not. I did something morally questionable? I want to hear about it from people, and for longer than that immediate scene, I want to be able to go/not go somewhere with this person or that person or have a significant conversation or something that I wouldn't have been able to if I'd chosen differently.
This person becomes a determinant character? Actually continue to give them some development of their issues and dialogue that makes me still feel a part of the group and the dynamic. Let them open a new pathway to an upcoming event, let them be able to make something harder or easier for us to accomplish by virtue of their still being alive. Saving Carley over Doug gave us the opportunity to talk about Lee's thoughts on his past, what the group would think, and decide who we did or didn't think we should tell about it. That is making your choice count, even though she still dies later. Same with whether Ben died at Crawford or in the alley. When he lives he gets a chance to make up to Clementine for abandoning her and Kenny gets a more personal, heroic demise (or seeming demise) for saving the kid responsible for his family's deaths.
And if they die, have the characters actually seem to give a damn, especially those that were close to them. We care more easily when the character's care, and when death means something more than getting people out of the way for the next plot point. I'm rambling, but it is so frustrating how nothing means much or has an impact beyond a scene or two. Such a major flaw of this season.
I honestly couldn't agree more. I feel like characters bringing up our past choices in dialogue isn't enough. I love Telltale and will always buy their games because the writing is above all the rest regardless IMO. But please don't tell us that our choices are meaningful and that they matter. When clearly they don't have a major affect.The same characters will be in the final episode just like everyone else. No matter what choices we make. We'll all have the same ending regardless of out past choices. Unless it's a choice like the end of season 1. Which is 50 - 50 but past choices once again had little affect. Please Telltale if you make a season 3. Which I hope you do. Please correct this. Take more time on the game if it's needed just make our choices count for something :-)
The choices matter on how they affect your relationships with other characters. For example, back in season 1 if you were mean to Kenny or Lily, they can leave to die. Like helping Kenny kill Larry, when Andy is trying to kill Lee, Lee will call Lily's help, if you killed Larry Lily won't help, if you tried to save Larry, Lily will shoot Andy. Another example is if you save Doug instead of Carley, you don't get a chance to tell the group about Lee's past.
But Andy still ends the same way.
Telling about the past didn't matter that much because they won't leave you behind.
It always end the same the only thing that change is a little bit dialog and how they like or hate you.
It's not like one choice will completely change events that happen in the game, 85% of this game is talking to people.
I replayed it as the evil version of me and they only hate me... But they still play as my slaves and they will no matter what help me to find Clementine and Clementine still see me as her dad figure
Oh look. A rant.
Its really bloody pretentious how they've kept the X will remember that alerts despite it not mattering at all. Its a cheap way to make you think they are doing something when they arent.
They just seem like lame tweets the characers are making, X thinks Z is an idiot X had Y for breakfast X killed 2 zombies el oh el X uploaded selfie with zombie
Oh look, a forum about the subject hes talking about! Hehe, only complete and utter idiots wouldn't know that.
Yeah I agree that it sucks when you save a character it only means they'll die later. It'd be nice like you said to have them maybe survive and just leave the group, be it with family or friends like you said or there's so many more options. Maybe they disagree with one of your decisions or someone else's and they want to leave because of that. Maybe they feel it's better to go solo. Maybe someone who would have left solo instead takes a partner (such as Jane could have had sex with Nick and left with him instead if he's alive). Maybe they come across another group and just rather go with them. They could also decide to betray you down the line and you have to kill them that way or they just end up robbing you, running away with another group, etc.
There is SO MUCH more you can do with a determinate character besides just kill them. I'd like to see Telltale get more creative with this. I get you kinda have to write them off to keep the story straight and not get out of hand as far as continuity goes but there's more than one way to write off a character.
They used to matter. In Season 1, they mattered in how people reacted to you. You could become an ally of Kenny or an ally of Lilly and that choice would be reflected in dialogue from the beginning of the series to the very end. You could be abusive and cruel towards people or friendly and supportive towards them and you would find dialogue changing as a consequence.
Now? Blackmail Rebbeca or don't, she's going to treat you in exactly the same way. Be rude and aggressive to Carlos or apologize for 'manipulating' his daughter and he'll still ask you to watch after Sarah in Episode 2. Trust Bonnie in Episode 3 or don't and she'll have the exact same dialogue later.
And on and on. This series was never big on actual 'choice', but Season 2 doesn't even give much of a crap about the relationships you build through those choices. They've taken a step back from where they were, basically.
I totally understand how you feel. I've been feeling like certain choices you make lately haven't mattered either (case in point, Arvo in Episode 4). Although in regards to saving people only to have them die later, I feel that's just TWD's style. I never read the comic, but my boyfriend said pretty much EVERYONE dies. It is just unavoidable and no one is guaranteed safety (including our main character, Lee, back in Season 1). I guess they're just keeping that up in the game?
I get wanting to stick with the view of the comics in which no one is safe. Honestly the only thing that annoys me is it's kinda pointless trying to save people in this game at this point. The characters you save don't make any contribution to anything in later episodes after you save them. They just seem to be in the background. Yet in earlier episodes they had a big part to play and were always involved in some way.
Using Nick as example. He had a big role to play in episode one and two. They developed his character throughout episode 2. And he has the possibility to die at the end of episode 2. He was still alive in episode 3 and some of 4 for me.(like many others) But he was pretty much a zombie and a completely nothing character(Lacking depth) in episode three and four. What telltale seem to do is give characters who have the possibility of death in an earlier episode, like Nick. No role or purpose after you save them. (Other than death)That's the annoying thing about those choices. Sorry for the long reply :-)
Imagine if they even listened for Episode 5, and gave us a determinant character toward the very end of the game. Imagine if they let us carry that determinant character into Season 3 as an NPC.
In Mass Effect, you could choose Ashley or Kaidan in Mass Effect 1, and the character you chose appeared through 2 more games. One of the things that Mass Effect did pretty well.
It would be great to be able to choose Luke or Kenny at the end of this season. One of them dies, and we get to spend the next game with the other one, not as a determinat --> will die later character, but as a real character that can potentially last through the entire game.
A game that preaches choice and consequence simply cannot be this linear and predetermined. And should not spoil its own future by letting you know that a character is determinant and therefore must die soon.
I agree 100%. Oh we can only dream!!
That's what I'm talking about. Would make walking dead one of the best games created up to this point imo.