i think there are two groups of people here

the 1st group are see the walking dead as a great (if not the best emotional connecting story written in video games) story that uses the interactive that is inherent to video games and make the experience 30 times greater and more effective

the 2nd group are people who do not see this due to them valuing game play over story any day and see the "game play" of the walking dead to be lack luster (from and action and movement point of view) and so does not consider this to be that great

Neither party is full right (and to tell the truth i fall heavily into the 1st one), but i think in the future we will see more story based "games" but not at the expense of amazing AAA game play focus games, which would be amazing having both "fun" entertainment from games and "drama" or "story" entertainment being part of this industry

Hmm, I played the first two episodes as they both came out and they were still relatively under the radar and I enjoyed them, a lot. Are they the best things to happen in gaming recently? No, not at all, but Telltale proved that classic storytelling is just as nerve-wracking and exciting as full on shooters.

@Tannin said:

i think there are two groups of people here

the 1st group are see the walking dead as a great (if not the best emotional connecting story written in video games) story that uses the interactive that is inherent to video games and make the experience 30 times greater and more effective

the 2nd group are people who do not see this due to them valuing game play over story any day and see the "game play" of the walking dead to be lack luster (from and action and movement point of view) and so does not consider this to be that great

Neither party is full right (and to tell the truth i fall heavily into the 1st one), but i think in the future we will see more story based "games" but not at the expense of amazing AAA game play focus games, which would be amazing having both "fun" entertainment from games and "drama" or "story" entertainment being part of this industry

I am afraid you are probably generalizing too much.

I value stories in games VERY highly. I have played games that I thought had total trash gameplay purely for the story and I enjoyed those games, Deadly Premonition anyone? TWD story is completely over rated. It is hardly the "most emotional experience" I have ever had with a video game and while I haven't finished the final episode yet the game has yet to make me even raise an eyebrow in shock or surprise to any plot twist. When Kenny dropped the cinder block my reaction was literally "That was a little over kill wasn't it? Couldn't you have kicked him in the head or something?" Because when he did it I was absolutely not surprised. The character in question was a douche, Kenny is a douche, it doesn't take a genius to connect the dots.

This is hardly the first story based game to ever be released, it isn't even that great when compared to classic adventure games like The Longest Journey, Grim Fandango, or Monkey Island. In fact part of the whole reason I don't like TWD that much is that it isn't even an adventure game. It is a visual novel. Throwing in a scripted sequence every 20 minutes that takes me 5-10 minutes to get a radio working because the cast of the game is monumentally stupid and lazy and won't find their own batteries is the most derivative and crappy of adventure game mechanics and I don't think the bare minimum inclusion of the least common denominator gameplay qualifies it for the genre.

@Karkarov:

@Karkarov said:

I am afraid you are probably generalizing too much.

I am sorry if you felt that I was generalizing too much. Which I will admit i was doing because if you are not you end up with too many groups and there is no way to look at the situation fully

@Karkarov said:

I value stories in games VERY highly. I have played games that I thought had total trash gameplay purely for the story and I enjoyed those games, Deadly Premonition anyone?

You and me are the same here we both value story, but I have not played (or heard of until recently) Deadly Premonition, and think that issue there is it did not become “mainstream” which is the important part of the walking dead and it’s legacy to gaming.

@Karkarov said:

TWD story is completely over rated. It is hardly the "most emotional experience" I have ever had with a video game and while I haven't finished the final episode yet the game has yet to make me even raise an eyebrow in shock or surprise to any plot twist. When Kenny dropped the cinder block my reaction was literally "That was a little over kill wasn't it? Couldn't you have kicked him in the head or something?" Because when he did it I was absolutely not surprised. The character in question was a douche, Kenny is a douche, it doesn't take a genius to connect the dots.

Question, what is the "most emotional experience" you have ever had with a video game? And what ep are you up to?

Also I think that no matter what you think of the story of TWD it is a great step forward that a game story can not only sell but be considered by many to be GOTY martial. And see your feeling towards Kenny almost prove that more over, that you have this feeling towards this character.

@Karkarov said:

This is hardly the first story based game to ever be released, it isn't even that great when compared to classic adventure games like The Longest Journey, Grim Fandango, or Monkey Island. In fact part of the whole reason I don't like TWD that much is that it isn't even an adventure game. It is a visual novel. Throwing in a scripted sequence every 20 minutes that takes me 5-10 minutes to get a radio working because the cast of the game is monumentally stupid and lazy and won't find their own batteries is the most derivative and crappy of adventure game mechanics and I don't think the bare minimum inclusion of the least common denominator gameplay qualifies it for the genre.

Never said it was the 1 story based game and having both played and loved monkey island and grim fandango and they have great stories that are great for a different reason to TWD. I would never call TWD an adventure game, but that isn’t what it is trying to be, it is trying to tell a story.

Then we come back to gameplay, you don’t like the walking dead cause of its gamplay, which is my 2 group, as I said “see the "game play" of the walking dead to be lack luster (from and action and movement point of view) and so does not consider this to be that great”

@Tannin said:

Then we come back to gameplay, you don’t like the walking dead cause of its gamplay, which is my 2 group, as I said “see the "game play" of the walking dead to be lack luster (from and action and movement point of view) and so does not consider this to be that great”

It has to have gameplay before you can not like the gameplay. It has no gameplay because it isn't a game, it is a visual novel. I also don't really care for it's story, so no I am not a part of any group you refer to. Which was the whole point of my post. I just think it is over rated and not very good on pretty much all fronts.

I liked it a lot. It was certainly different...it had a feel of a game from back in the day to me. I think a lot of the praise is deserved because it is just a bit of a different game.

As far as the OPs comment that many things felt predictable..yes. But that wasn't bad. I choose to immerse myself into the story and felt the building dread about some of these events. Some seemed so obvious, that I found myself wondering if the actually would be true, or it was a bit of bait and switch.

I don't see myself replaying this though...the best part was the unknown effect of my decisions For example, in episode 2..choosing how to distribute the food was an agonizing process for me. As it would be IRL. Seeing how some of the events played out made me realize that some events I focused closely on weren't really that important..but thats a good thing too. Often in life, we aren't hyper attuned the most important events.

I'm playing it right now and as a result not reading other posts here for fear of spoilers (I'm playing through episode 4). I'm really loving don't feel it'd over-hyped at all but the hype I think comes from the media playing up the amazingness of the game as a story but not mentioning the clunky-ish way it plays or the for the most part fairly easy puzzles. It is an interactive story which you get really deeply involved in with the story and characters.

Overrated = Other people like this thing more than I do and I don't think they should because it doesn't quite match up to my experience. Also forgetting that everybody has differing opinions and things that would resonate more to them on a more personal level. However I have to try to bring some objectivity to these completely subjective mediums so I can feel "right" about my opinion while making everyone else out to be "wrong". That way I'll feel better about myself not feeling as strongly for the thing in question because of course I feel the need for my opinion to be justified.

I hate the term overrated.