The Walking Dead game

This weekend was a long weekend in my part of the world and it just so happens that it very nicely coincided with the release of Episode 3 of The Walking Dead video game. For those who aren’t familiar, The Walking Dead is originally an ongoing series of comics that depicts the harsh realities of life in a world infested by zombies and deprived of the majority of societal basics that we take for granted today. The comics have been adapted and modified into an ongoing television series as well as into these video games which differ from traditional video games by being shorter in length and released in episodes. Each episode can be completed in a few hours and Episode 3 is no different as I completed it in a few hours on Saturday. The plot of the video games revolves around the main character, Lee, as he travels with a group of survivors in search of food and shelter whilst trying to survive in a world gone mad. The player controls Lee as he interacts with other characters and as he performs in-game actions. The controls are very simplistic with interactions taking the form of simple conversation choices and actions being carried out through button presses or point and click mouse actions. With such simple game play, the main attraction of this game is without a doubt the story telling, and in fact, I would I rather think of this as an interactive story in the form of a video game. From the first moments of the first episode I was drawn into Lee’s character and began to form a real emotional attachment with various in-game characters. As the game progressed I had to make decisions and choose actions which strengthened those emotions, and I soon came to the realization that I was actually making Lee act in certain ways because I cared about how other characters would react or how their opinions of me would change. This was really cool. For those used to playing video games, especially those who play role playing games, this form of interactive story telling is nothing new. However, for me I’m still amazed.

It’s been a long time since I’ve become quite so immersed in the characters and story line of a game although this probably has more to do with the fact that I don’t play that many games. That being said, the story line still plays a very important role and the story line of this game is indeed very strong. There are two more episodes and I'm looking forward to seeing what comes next.