That Walking Dead: Survival Instinct Trailer? Turns Out it's a Fan Edit...of Actual In-Game Footage

It really says something when the press was more eager to tear into the trailer than to do any footwork in verifying its authenticity.

It's an unfinished game and the footage was obviously meant for some other purpose. At this point, I have no idea how to judge it, so I'll withhold any comment on the game and simply shake my head at the journalists that fell for it.

Looks horribly bland. And I don't think the art direction will change for the final build.

@Hailinel said:

It really says something when the press was more eager to tear into the trailer than to do any footwork in verifying its authenticity.

It's an unfinished game and the footage was obviously meant for some other purpose. At this point, I have no idea how to judge it, so I'll withhold any comment on the game and simply shake my head at the journalists that fell for it.

This kind of worries me, actually. Judging by this article and a few other sources I saw, a lot of them said things like "I can't prove that it's fake, and there's no reason for me to, despite the trailer looking like shit. Everyone else posted it up, so why shouldn't I?"

Not to say that I wouldn't do the same, but it's a reminder that people can still think that it's okay to do things just because everyone else is doing it.

AHA! So when I said that it looked like a student made, cobbled-together mess, that's because.... it was a cobbled together, unprofessional mess made by an amateur.

Well, the game still looks like rubbish.

Call it somebody else's piece of shit if you want. It doesn't reduce the smell.

Always double check your sources, quite preferably with the source itself.

It's ok Alex, we forgive you, game still looks like shit so it's cool. Activision trying to ruin what TellTale has done? Probably.

That doesn't really fix the problem.

Anyone else sort of.. want it to fail? I realize that sounds terrible, but part of me doesn't want it to be really good cause I don't want it to take away from Telltale's sheer masterpiece.

@TehJedicake said:

Anyone else sort of.. want it to fail? I realize that sounds terrible, but part of me doesn't want it to be really good cause I don't want it to take away from Telltale's sheer masterpiece.

I don't think you need to worry about either of those things.

@TehJedicake said:

Anyone else sort of.. want it to fail? I realize that sounds terrible, but part of me doesn't want it to be really good cause I don't want it to take away from Telltale's sheer masterpiece.

Thats actually kind of a gross sentiment.

Presentation matters, is the thing to take away from this. Doesn't really change my opinion much... the environments still look simple but okay. All the other stuff, the AI, enemy graphics, and gameplay shown do not look remotely interesting. But it's more acceptable for it to look totally unfinished in 20 second clips than in a teaser trailer.

Not usually one for conspiracies, but it seems sort of like a stunt to defuse the long-expected backlash against the game prior to a real trailer.

Maybe this is just a new take on viral marketing. So far, it's doing fairly well for awareness at least. 2013 is off with a bang!

This is an ill convieved game that completely misses the point of the Walking Dead as a concept.

It has never been about killing zombies.

This doesn't change how I felt about the game at all. It wasn't that it looked bad, but that it looked like it missed the point so completely. The fact it's coming out after both Telltale's Walking Dead and ZombiU kind of begs the question why they're even bothering.

@Gundyguy said:

Does it really matter? It's gonna suck.

Edit: Excellent, stolen quest on second account.

Great way to get yourself banned bro.

You know, I remember thinking that The Walking Dead by Telltale would suck after Jurassic Park...BUT HEY GUESS I WAS FUCKING WRONG. But yeah, I'd be even more surprised if this turned out to be good...which I hope it will be.

Oh, a game about killing zombies, huh?

Count me out.

@NuclearMusic said:

Too bad they have a high standard to uphold now with the Walking Dead name. I feel bad for anyone but Telltale that is making a Walking Dead game.

A high standard? Choices that don't matter, bipolar characters, bad 'action' scenes, even worse game logic and a poor story is a high standard? Oh, how the video game industry has sunk even further.

I'm confused. So people are saying that they shouldn't have shown the game so early on, but... isn't that one of the reasons people love indie/community driven games, seeing it in its bare bones developing?

Hopefully this will spurn Activision to not actually release a bad game and make the game even better.

I don't care how this game turns out. The Walking Dead games should only be made by Telltale from now on. Screw Activision and their tone deaf approach to horror games. Let people with actual craft handle this stuff.

@Yadilie said:

@NuclearMusic said:

Too bad they have a high standard to uphold now with the Walking Dead name. I feel bad for anyone but Telltale that is making a Walking Dead game.

A high standard? Choices that don't matter, bipolar characters, bad 'action' scenes, even worse game logic and a poor story is a high standard? Oh, how the video game industry has sunk even further.

You'd prefer Activision's offering?

@Brendan said:

For a bunch of users that have seen a lot of content on the development of games at this point, I'm saddened by the harsh attitude towards the footage shown. I thought it was common knowledge in these parts that games don't really come together until the end of the development cycle, and with clearly so much left to do it's unfair to be so critical so early.

Generally you only show the most polished, refined parts of your game when it's still in development, so it doesn't bode well if that was the best they had to show off last week. Bioshock Infinite had awesome gameplay footage almost two years ago, whereas this game is less than a year until release.

Yeah guys, keep being optimistic about a Walking Dead fps.

And people wonder why PR for video games are always so reluctant to let too much info out about a game too early.

You get people jumping all over the game like they did here.

Don't feel bad, Alex. I've been looking for a reason to hate this game since it was announced. That fan-trailer was a reason. I'll find another one later this year.

Well that was a weird turn of events.

@Zaxex said:

@Yadilie said:

@NuclearMusic said:

Too bad they have a high standard to uphold now with the Walking Dead name. I feel bad for anyone but Telltale that is making a Walking Dead game.

A high standard? Choices that don't matter, bipolar characters, bad 'action' scenes, even worse game logic and a poor story is a high standard? Oh, how the video game industry has sunk even further.

You'd prefer Activision's offering?

What does Activision have to do with how poorly made The Walking Dead is?

Hey guys, anyone want a poor man's Dead Island!!?!???

Guys????

Why would Activision even show the footage if it looks so shitty? The fan editing didn't make it shitty, the game itself looks shitty.

Damage control?

Regardless, game looks horrible.

It looks impressive as a Source engine mod. So no, it's not impressive.

Despite being fan made, the footage was still cobbled together from actual gameplay. And really it's the gameplay that is the problem, not the graphics nor the fact that it is not an official trailer

Nice damage control, no we aren't making a bad zombie mod for COD its just the way the fan (fired employee) edited the trailer!

They need to pull some miracle shit to save this game.

I find it hard to believe that activision put this footage out without knowing someone would get their hands on it and edit it to show only the gameplay. I wouldn't even be surprised if the "fan" was someone from the PR team who wanted to do a litmus test on the game.

Regardless, an un-edited trailer with gameplay is the closest thing to playing the actual game when it was in that state, so deeming it garbage base on in-game footage is fair regardless of where the footage came from.

I mean... sure. It was a fan edit. That explains the editing. But if the game isn't ready to be shown... then it ain't ready. So much comes together at the last min anyway.

That being said... no interest in a Walking Dead FPS. I'll just play the adventure game over.

No amount of video editing can fix that god-awful looking gameplay.

yeah I recognized the "unfinished gameplay" footage from the IGN interview not too long ago and the trailer just kinda sucked as a trailer so it ended up feeling amateurish. I am still getting the game anyway. not just because its a walking dead game.... but because it is a first person survival game as opposed to a first person shooter.... from what was said in the interview (in my own words) "play it like a FPshooter you die alot." thats what I want

The graphics look sub par, but I'm hoping the gaming is fun. A more stealth oriented zombie game would be awesome.

Good on Alex for pointing out that this looks like this game is going to suck short of a total tear-down-and-start-over job. We should've all learned the lesson that bad "betas" and crappy showings are virtual guarantees of a bad game to follow long before Too Human, and that was like six years ago now.

It's sort of a shame though. This was a game that could've really brought the DayZ style zombie survival game to people without the time to master it or The War Z.

@Yadilie said:

@Zaxex said:

@Yadilie said:

@NuclearMusic said:

Too bad they have a high standard to uphold now with the Walking Dead name. I feel bad for anyone but Telltale that is making a Walking Dead game.

A high standard? Choices that don't matter, bipolar characters, bad 'action' scenes, even worse game logic and a poor story is a high standard? Oh, how the video game industry has sunk even further.

You'd prefer Activision's offering?

What does Activision have to do with how poorly made The Walking Dead is?

Standards aren't determined by one persons opinion. You disliked the game and you have legitimate reasons for it. But face facts. Several respected gaming outlets have been eating up Telltales Walking Dead and in love with it. It's been on multiple Game of the Year lists, and tons of gamers are loving it. That IS a high standard to live up to.

I know tons of people who also dislike the game. But they do so with respect to the fact that they simply do not like that genre. It is no different than picking up and playing Skyrim and then saying "this game sucks because I hate open world games where you don't have a narrative drive." Personal taste in this regard plays a huge role. Look at the Giant Bomb cast, all of them have differing tastes in games. Yet in most cases they can appreciate and respect why someone else likes a game. They can also understand it. Jeff was never big on Resident Evil 4 for example, despite the fact that he understands why people think it is good.

In the case of the Walking Dead, regardless of personal opinions it is still a bold game in terms of narrative that emotionally gripped tons of players. Others like yourself were bothered by the pseudo adventure game style and quick time event action scenes, and the story didn't grip you at all. But as stated earlier, to each his own.

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) nice shit

parangaricutirimicuaro

@dancingpolkabear said:

@RobertOrri said:

Good lord, that IGN host is so annoying.

He's been on the bombcast before

He also recently got diagnosed with cancer.

The reason the internet was tricked was not because of the trailer, but because of click first/fact check second reporting. Frankly, I was disappointed that Giantbomb got duped. I stopped regularly going to Kotaku, Joystiq, etc. because there was little thought behind their stories/writing. Thankfully, I've been with Giantbomb long enough to know what happened here was an aberration. Guys, just be more careful in the future.

I'm not exactly getting my hopes up for the whole idea of The Walking Dead as an FPS in the first place. The strength of the franchise has always been spectacularly well-written storytelling. Telltale's attempt hit it off because the game largely makes the "gameplay" a secondary consideration and the tale of a vividly realized cast of characters takes center stage. It's not the zombie killing that makes Walking Dead special, and that's what an FPS is going to put the focus on.

But they can still make a great game out of it with some effort. I just can't imagine an FPS really playing on the strengths of the franchise.

It was less how the trailer was edited and more to do with the fact that the game itself looks far far from finished and to be honest, pretty abysmal. Hopefully they get time to work on improving it.