[Playing…] The Walking Dead

While we wait for the return of The Walking Dead after the Christmas break, every zombie fan has their tricks to calm the monkey about the undead genre. In my case, I've been mashing keys on the fun The Typing of Dead Overkill and on the other hand, I have decided to try a little gem that I had been waiting for for some time, The Walking Dead Season One. No, I'm not talking about the mediocre Survival Instinct, this time I have opted for the first season of Telltale, a video game that relies on a harsh and violent plot as its main claims.

Telltale Games is a somewhat irregular company, to date it has published titles that simply scraped the pass. I still remember his very boring version of Back to the Future either Jurassic Park: The Game among others, that honestly there was nowhere to grab them. It was not until 2012, with the publication of The Walking Dead, when they have finally released something interesting and worth recommending.

Before starting a note. In a title like this, making references to specific parts of the title simply destroys the experience, therefore This text is free of possible spoilers.

If there is something that has caught my attention The Walking Dead It's your script. The television series, at least in its first seasons, was somewhat modest in terms of showing violent and explicit situations. In the case of the video game, this is not the case, practically from the first minutes, it presents a world in which the zombies have no mercy, where you are the one who has to get your hands dirty, making extremely complicated decisions to survive and creating moments that are practically engraved in your retina due to their cruelty and harshness. The final result is an adult story, sour, full of realism, very far from that happy ending that Hollywood has so badly accustomed us to.

Following a structure more typical of a television series than a video game, The title is divided into five episodes plus an additional sixth in the form of DLC. Its model is quite similar to what Alan Wake offered when it was released. The video game successfully emulates the television format, thanks to a presentation in the form of chapters that allows the narrative to be developed in a different and striking way.  The episodes have a duration of approximately two and a half hours each. Completing the title in its entirety can take approximately 12 hours.

Another strong point is its characters. In this case I am not only referring to the protagonists but to the entire cast. In Telltale's proposal, none of them leave you indifferent, you may like them more or less but they all leave their mark. Among them we must highlight Lee Everett and Clementine the main duo, since protecting little Clementine will become the main motivation for Lee to advance in the plot, and in the long run, their relationship will become more and more complex and close, giving us truly emotional moments. If you have played The Last of Us Surely at more than one point they will remind you of Joel and Ellie. In addition, the title has some interesting cameos, since we can visit Hershel on his farm or team up with Gleen.

In the playable section the title is quite disappointing, has mechanics that do not quite find a style that defines it, approaching what could be a graphic adventure with many limitations. Practically the actions are reduced to interacting with the scenery, collecting some objects, quicktime events (in the scenes) and dialogue. The puzzles are few and very easy to solve, in most cases they only require the use of one of the few objects you have in your inventory or finding the solution to a small puzzle.

The most notable thing about this section is the decision system. The video game presents several options to choose from in a limited time with their corresponding repercussions in the following episodes. It should be noted that these elections are framed in a false sense of freedom, since in truth they are not as important or vital as they seem. These moments have a certain impact on some events, but since it is a linear plot, there will be points in the story that cannot be modified and that will remain as they are regardless of the actions we take to avoid them. Therefore, it is best to play the title once from start to finish so as not to lose that initial feeling.

The title has a graphic finish that complies but does not stand out. Opting for the cellsading style is a good decision, this movement brings the narrative closer to the style of the graphic novel, although from my point of view they do not manage to fully exploit it. It would have been interesting if they had introduced a presentation closer to the comic, an example of this would be the notable Precipice of Darkness, With these resources they managed to enhance The plot further streamlined the narrative, allowing multiple scenes to be developed in a single image.

The game is not dubbed, in my case, I tend to always be in favor of the original version, but a well-done dubbing into Spanish would not have been amiss to speed up understanding and quick decision-making. That a game is not dubbed is usually not a problem, unless the translation of the texts is painful and on top of that they are not in neutral Spanish. So when you play  The Walking Dead It will be common to find words typical of Latin Spanish. Furthermore, on many occasions a literal translation has been made or taken out of its original context, posing a serious problem in understanding the real meaning of the sentence.

The Walking Dead is a cinematographic experience that every fan of the popular television series or fan of the zombie genre should give it a chance, although only to enjoy a well-told story and with characters that transmit real emotions.