by gisambards » Sun Sep 23, 2018 5:02 pm
12. The Walking Dead: Michonne Just very boring, with no stand-out characters or moments.
11. Minecraft: Story Mode, Season 1 Everything Kleiner said is true, but I think there is a lot here kids will enjoy on its own merits, rather than just because it's referencing Minecraft. Also, it's all conveyed incredibly annoyingly through annoying characters, but I do actually really like the core conceit of the plot, wherein (spoilers for Minecraft Story Mode, if you care) the old band of heroes everyone looks up to lied about their accomplishments, and the guy you think is the bad guy is actually a forgotten ex-member of that group trying to prove the lie to the world. As I say, not well conveyed in the slightest, but a cool concept.
10. Game of Thrones I found Game of Thrones really boring, possibly because I don't really like the show. The overuse of actual GoT characters also makes it clear how little impact your choices can ever really have. GoT is probably the worst one at making you feel like your choices are having any sort of impact, which is particularly bizarre given that your choices actually can impact the story quite dramatically.
9. Guardians of the Galaxy Guardians is fine, but not as funny as Tales from the Borderlands, with less likable characters, and has no real dramatic resonance at all. It's also kind of disappointing that, like with Batman, they set it in an entirely alternate world so they can do what they want with the characters, but, unlike Batman, fail to do anything interesting with the characters.
8. Minecraft: Story Mode, Season 2 Minecraft Season 2 does a lot more with the concept - I think the concept of fighting a server admin being the same to them as fighting a god is actually pretty clever. It feels much more like it's just written for kids as opposed to pandering to them, and I think for something aimed at that age bracket is actually really well done: in particular, the bad guy can be annoying and his voice actor's awful but conceptually, for a kid, the concept of fighting someone omnipotent and some of the things he does would probably actually be pretty scary.
7. The Walking Dead: The New Frontier Another one that's really not great, but I really like the concept - it's a shame it's just not interestingly conveyed. It's something that's always bugged me is how little post-apocalyptic media seems to remember that these characters had actual lives and relationships before the apocalypse, so I think The New Frontier should get massive kudos for revolving around that concept. Also, I did think David, the boring main guy's brother, was actually really interesting as a portrayal of someone who TV and films tell us should be the hero of something like this, but in reality just isn't up to the task.
6. Batman Batman is a glitchy mess and the writing is generally fairly dull, with two of the three bad guys being very uninteresting. It does set up the interesting take they have on the Batman lore, though, which is explored best through their presentation of Two-Face (and I actually liked the revelations about Thomas Wayne, which were apparently very unpopular at the time). It's also generally fairly engaging. But genuinely loses points for the performance of the guy playing the Penguin, who is absolutely dreadful.
5. The Walking Dead, Season 1 The first season of TWD is great and still carries a lot of emotional resonance, and very important in terms of being their first foray into this genre (and probably being the game to most popularise the genre). But it does definitely feel like their first foray into the genre, and a lot of the kinks haven't been worked out. The actual quality of the writing is also patchy compared to the four games I would say are the really well-written ones (which are the next four on the list). Stand-outs are definitely Clementine and Kenny, particularly Kenny who I think is definitely the best character in the first season. I did actually find Dave Fennoy's performance as Lee off-putting at times, though: bizarrely, he does emotional stuff brilliantly but makes small talk (and particularly jokes) sound incredibly unnatural, which can make some of the more talky scenes feel weird.
4. The Walking Dead, Season 2 Season 2 has some major pacing issues, but I actually think it's the best written game Telltale have done in terms of dialogue, which is good because it's such a low-action game. I really liked the focus on group dynamics over zombie killing, and I think it is an improvement as an example of the genre over the first one, in that the choices you're making feel a lot less obvious in the impact they'll go on to have, which I actually prefer. Plus it conveys being a child in a group like that quite well, in that you'll sometimes be frustratingly not listened to regardless of what you do, and the entire final section is really powerful (particularly if you help Kenny but don't go with him, which I found was really nicely bittersweet).
3. The Wolf Among Us The Wolf Among Us is really strong all round, and immediately I think made massive improvements on the formula (I'm pretty sure TWAU was the second Telltale game of this type after TWD). It's emotional but also exciting, and the characters are nearly all interesting (and those that aren't don't take up too much time). Also probably does the best job of managing to give you a playable character with quite a clearly-defined personality, but being able to let you have a lot of choice in what he says or does without any of it feeling out-of-character, which is very impressive.
2. Tales from the Borderlands Tales from the Borderlands is just fantastic, for every reason Kleiner already said.
1. Batman: The Enemy Within I would argue that The Enemy Within should take the top spot just because, as I said before, I think if not for Telltale having collapsed this would have been their second-most important game after the original Walking Dead, representing the next stage in development of the genre. Similarly, it had issues one would hope would have been overcome by later games (for example, while it's incredible that there are two entirely alternate final episodes, I'd hope future games would have had that split be the culmination of all your choices, rather than a binary choice at the end of the penultimate episode), but like The Walking Dead it is in of itself brilliant as well, with massive improvements in literally every area over the first Batman game, and one of the few where you do get a real sense of how your relationship with other characters is changing based on your decisions throughout.