[SPOILERS]The Walking Dead Episode 3 REVIEW Thread

[Metiphis]

Originally Posted by WowMutt

Okay fair point! Let's try to consider the event's leading up to that point.

Ben is outside the motel for whatever reason, bandit's capture him, tell him to supply them with supplies or they'll attack the motel.

Why wouldnt Ben return and tell the group what happened?

Maybe fear that we'd be mad he got caught and toss him out? possibly!

Scared 17yo kid that made a huge mistake and should be given a second chance? Maybe. but let's also consider, his mistake, led to the event where a 8yo Duck was bitten and basically killed. Maybe Lee should let Kenny know why that raid happened and let him decide what to do about Ben!

If I were there (as Lee) I would be willing to talk to the group and even agree to spare Ben's life, for now! But if ANYTHING happens again that could even remotely point towards Ben, he's a gonner.

I wont pretend to have all the right answers to every situation, but I'll take a survival decision over a moral decision every time!

Dude in their reality, every mistake has a high potential to cost lives, no matter how small or severe. I'll take a kid that fucked up and is the wiser for it. You honestly think he'd do something like that ever again? You could just see the ulcers forming by looking at his twisted guilt racked face when he finally confessed. As far as I am concerned Ben is good kid albeit naive for his age. He's going to do everything he can to make things right, and I really hope he does, I am pulling for him.

[ZombieBlaster]

WORST EPISODE EVER!!!

I was so deeply attached with Carley and Katjaa and they will just end up in a stupid cause of death.

You may think I'm overreacting but my heart feels kinda heavy right now. I guess I just can't accept the truth that Carley and Kat are never coming back. ( SIGH )

There's no point for me to buy Episode 4 and 5 anymore because episode 3 is the end of my journey.

[martymcfly]

"The Walking Dead: Episode 3 – Long Road Ahead illustrates, more than any episode in the series so far, how it is the little moments – and what you read into them – that define the experience for each player. The occasional technical glitch – and release delays – can be forgiven. At this midway point in the story, players are defining just how far they would go to save themselves – or to protect the person who depends on them the most. No matter what happens, I know I will protect this little girl. Whatever gets thrown at us – cannibals, bandits, thieves, zombies – I will make sure she survives. Despite video games instilling into me for years that I need to survive to win, I would die for Clementine. Would you?"

http://alternativemagazineonline.co....road-ahead-pc/

[Gman5852]

Originally Posted by ZombieBlaster

WORST EPISODE EVER!!!

I was so deeply attached with Carley and Katjaa and they will just end up in a stupid cause of death.

You may think I'm overreacting but my heart feels kinda heavy right now. I guess I just can't accept the truth that Carley and Kat are never coming back. ( SIGH )

There's no point for me to buy Episode 4 and 5 anymore because episode 3 is the end of my journey.

So you are whining your favorite character died? You do realise that is how Walking Dead is? Robert Kirkman gleefully made an entire comic about the #1 fan favorite being beaten to death senselessly with a baseball bat. Watch that, and then tell me how bad you will feel.

[ThaabitArnub]

Originally Posted by Gman5852

So you are whining your favorite character died? You do realise that is how Walking Dead is? Robert Kirkman gleefully made an entire comic about the #1 fan favorite being beaten to death senselessly with a baseball bat. Watch that, and then tell me how bad you will feel.

Crazy, huh?

[Cyreen]

Originally Posted by ZombieBlaster

WORST EPISODE EVER!!!

That's a glowing review to the writers.

Originally Posted by ZombieBlaster

There's no point for me to buy Episode 4 and 5 anymore because episode 3 is the end of my journey.

Somehow I doubt that.

[lolovolley]

Really? I thought this one was lame. It never really gripped me as the other 2 did. Oh well.

[Isterio]

First let me get the negative comments out of the way:

1. The release was again quite late.
2. PC version players, who did pre-order did again have no advantage and were again served AFTER a console.
3. The download of the pc version was difficult. The connection was lost around 20 times and I had to start again and again downloading it.
4. Lilly shooting Carley seemed very manufactured. I didn't quite believe her sudden hate for her.
5. With Carley, Lilly and Katja gone there is only Clem left as a likeable character.
6. How did Clems radio work over such a long distance?

That said, I would like to state that TTG did in my opinion once more a great job with the game itself. Here are my thoughts about episode 3:

1. Depris? „Hmmmmmmmmmmmm“
2. It was good to kill off Duck. He was a strange element in the mix and simply annoying. His stupidity and good mood were a bit displaced in a world like this. It had a nice touch though that TTG made him more likeable with the whole mystery puzzle. Like this I almost felt sad for him. Let's hope there are no bugs in heaven.
3. The suicide of Katja (why double „a“ at the end ?) was surprising. I liked her because she was quite reasonable and helpful. Anyway, surprises like this are good.
4. The flirt with Carley on the balcony and the running gag with the batteries were fun. „You're small!“. Yes, she had to go because it would have been too complicated to keep both characters at the same time, but it's sad to lose the best character next to Clem There will be something missing in the future episodes. Let's hope there are no devices needing batteries in heaven.
5. The dream about Clementine being a walker must have been taken from the forums here Respect! The fear about close people becoming one of them must be present in ones mind all the time and cause a lot of stress. I liked that sequence!
6. Using a train as a way of transport seems to be quite a refreshing idea to me. Nicely done. But I somehow doubt that it would still work after such a long time.
7. The action scene with shooting bandits and walkers was a welcomed change in gameplay. It gets a bit boring just hitting walkers in the head with some random stuff.
8. Teaching Clementine to survive is a nice development. It might be cruel to force a kid to grow up like that, but it's probably best to highten the chances of survival. I would have cut her hair even more though. Making her look like a boy might be a smart thing to do considering rapers etc.

Suggestions:
1. Make Lee find a letter from Carley in one of his pockets. Depending on the relationship the content could be some kind of love confession or a warning or something (In case I don't make it...). It would be nice to hear the voice actor read the letter one last time. That would be a better goodbye, than Lee more or less just ignoring her death.
2. Please implement more scenes, where Lee needs to shoot walkers or people. Maybe you could make it more tactical, if Lee would have limited bullets and would have to make the people fight the walkers and then just makes sure that both sides loose.
3. Please implement a lot of team puzzles with Clementine. Cut the interactions with the other characters and focus more on Clem. The other surviving people aren't interesting to me anymore. Omar and Claire or Christa or whatever don't seem appealing to me.
4. Lee could be teaching Clem a lot of small things like lighting a fire or how to best get rid of a walker in different situations. Maybe he could explain diversions and how to use walkers against bad living people. „A walker is a force of nature. It has no intelligence and just acts on the instinct to feed. It is a huge danger, but it's possible to control them by using baites, diversions and noise. Once you might encounter bad people and because they're stronger, you might need to use the walkers against them. So try to learn how they behave and what they react to. You're sharpest weapon is your mind, Clementine“
5. Lee should make Clem a useful gift. Instead of just giving her food and caps and hoodies, he should give her a knife and explain how to use it as a tool and as a weapon. If not as a weapon, then a Swiss army knife might be nice. She could use the screwdriver to open stuff. Having a little McGuyver might be useful.

[stoney79]

Originally Posted by Gman5852

fan favorite being beaten to death senselessly with a baseball bat

i almost cried

[ItsMeArmani]

Originally Posted by ZombieBlaster

WORST EPISODE EVER!!!

I was so deeply attached with Carley and Katjaa and they will just end up in a stupid cause of death.

You may think I'm overreacting but my heart feels kinda heavy right now. I guess I just can't accept the truth that Carley and Kat are never coming back. ( SIGH )

There's no point for me to buy Episode 4 and 5 anymore because episode 3 is the end of my journey.

You'll buy it, 100 percent guaranteed.

[Viner16]

Originally Posted by stoney79

i almost cried

It's the Walking Dead...
more appropiately known as "Your Favourite Character Will Die."

[zgamer]

My review of Episode 3:

Pros

- Still great artistic design work. Character models are still distinct and expressive, the color palette is vibrant and cel shading really compliments the story.

- Strong voice work throughout. A couple rough line deliveries in few moments (nothing serious but a couple patches), but on a whole every actor worked excellently.

- Some intense dramatic moments! Honestly, if you don't get a stone dropped in your gut at some of the moments here, something is wrong with you.

- A bit more gameplay variety. The little shooting gallery with the bandits was quite amusing!

- Made me actually change my opinion on Kenny. Great work on the developers part.

- The music sounded better this time around. Still very much computer programmed, but it had more distinctly good tunes!

Cons

- Chuck is alright for being the magical hobo, but seriously do not like Omid and especially Christa. Omid is a bumbling moron and Christa is just a judgmental, snappy, cold jerk. Sure we've had characters we've loved to hate in the past (Larry, Duck, etc), but they still had qualities we liked before they tried to redeem them. Even with the "Christa may be pregnant" hints, her attitude and behavior has not shown anything to make me care even a bit for her safety. They better find a way to quickly make them likable or write them off because they are on the top of my least favorite characters list.

- The fact Chuck is the magical hobo. He's not a bad character as much as just a fairly convenient character. He is introduced with little fanfare, everyone already likes him immediately, he speaks the words of wisdom to protect Clementine and always has the cheerful attitude. It's not bad he does those things, but it feels like he needed a bit more...I dunno, something different to develop his character a bit more.

- The ending kind of just petered out. After such intense climaxes in the middle, the end sequence paled in comparison. Even more so when you realize the "big choice" really does not make a lot of difference.

- Um...that stinger better be the boring parts of Episode 4 because it did not really do anything to excite me or intrigue me. Yes we get to investigate the radio man, but it didn't resonate in the teaser. Hopefully a lot of that changes.

- Still some stiff character animations and framerate errors. Just the fault of an old engine.

- Just a fan rage here....come on, Carley/Doug could have lasted one more episode. It was definitely a shock, but it seemed a bit forced in the logic leading to Lilly shooting Carley at least. At least Doug died saving Ben (who I now hate and hope they write some likable things too because he needs to repent for killing my woman!). This isn't so much a complaint to the writing as much as just a desire that they could have lasted at least to the next episode or to the end of this one to make it feel like the choice mattered more.

------------

Overall: 8.5

Not my favorite episode, but still has many good things about it. Still strong writing, acting, art and storytelling. The ending stumbled a bit (mostly compared to the last two episodes' great endings) and there were some of the usual problems that we are just going to have to accept. I look forward to Episode 4 regardless.

Note to Telltale: Actually give us alternate endings!!!! Don't do the dick Bioware move of just shoehorning us into one rote ending disguised as more. Make the endings (yes, endings not ending) distinct. Perhaps Lee dies and Clem lives. Perhaps Clem dies and Lee lives. Perhaps both of them survive but at the expense of everyone else in the group (after all the two of them have gone through, I would not mind a tiny bit of hope as an ending option). I don't mind what the endings are, but PLEASE DO NOT JUST WRITE THE "HERO HAS TO DIE OR IT IS NOT A GOOD STORY" ENDING AND NOTHING ELSE!!!! I am so sick of those because they RARELY EVER PAY OFF!

[dakun]

Hello everybody,

I'm new here and just had to register after that last episode.. it was simply mind-blowing.
Also very interesting opinions here, i find myself agreeing with many of you which is interesting considering the amount of controversial stuff that happened. (usually leads to crazy arguments in other game forums)

First of all some of my decision this episode:

- Killed the woman in the beginning
- Told everyone about my past
- Took Lilly with me after she killed Carley
- Killed Duck myself

Now my impression:
So first of all, this episode made me absolutely hate Ben. I mean he’s responsible for absolutely EVERYTHING bad that happened this episode.
- Lilly would never go paranoid and shoot Carley if it wasn’t for him hiding the truth
- If he told the group about the bandits at the motel they could plan out how they are going to continue while keeping the bandits at distance with the supplies.
- All this would mean no bandit attack and no zombies coming to bite Duck
- They wouldn’t have to leave in haste and could take supplies with them if they decided they had enough of the bandit threat.

It is only fitting that during the end-phase of this episode the new character, Christa, would say that they only survived because they are a small group. At this point I’d jump on the opportunity to leave the group with Clem, be her mentor making her a badass character.

Coming to Kenny.. at this point he’s a lose canon, and he once again refused to save me when I was trapped under the door in the beginning. I am sympathetic to his situation with his family falling apart, but he was never a team player and at this point I’m not one either. Not with him anyway.
And it was just obvious that he’d be in denial with his son dying, yet had no problems killing Lilly’s dad who wasn’t even bitten and had a chance of living.

To the 3 new characters.. They are interesting but we don’t know enough about them to judge.. Christa and Odim seem nice (Odim probably saved my life while working at the Truck) but I have the feeling there will be a twist.. Especially since Christa didn’t seem appreciate me wanting to know more about them.

I love the character development of Clementine and Lee.. Especially the whole thing with training her and cutting her hair really touched me.

The preview to episode 4 has me worried though looks like Clementine made a huge mistake by secretly having contact with people. Also am I wrong in assuming Lee has been held a prisoner of some kind?? (when he yells to the guy in the shadow that he’ll kill him)

Anyway, I can’t wait for episode 4 and 5..

Message to Telltale.. please make this a multi-season game series.. this world has so much potential for awesome stories.

[racerr]

hey im sorry to ask so stupidly like this, but ive been reading this thread and im really curious is there a way to save Carley? I didnt found a straight answer to this question, but it seems to me like theres no way to save her. So thanks for the answer

[chavezjigg]

First of all i loved this episode lots of drama, twists and suspense to keep you on the edge of you're seat! Not to many game glitches to ruin the experience for me and looking forward to episode 4 "around every corner."

The only thing that got me was the very dark and depressing twists and story. Me and many fans were very upset about the death of Carly/Doug i knew they would eventually have to leave but the shock was unsettling and left a bad taste in my mouth. I know i sound silly but Carly and Doug were mine and many others favorite characters so it was unfortunate for them to go. Also in episode 3 the relationship between Lee and Carly was actually very sweet and cool and i wondered what would happen with them two.

But who knows in my game i heard Carly moaning whilst shot and it looked like the bullet only skimmed her face maybe leaving her unconscious. It would be amazing if Doug or Carly come back for these reasons. I do hope that telltale games do this plot twist because us fans would be amazed to see the characters back. Who knows maybe they are dead but i can only hope they will come back again for the reason i left before...

[Valik08]

I doubt it. But there is this small hope back character . Telltale listening to the opinions of fans.I would like to see the return Duck / Carly in the second season)

[thestalkinghead]

i think episode 3 is great, i can now defiantly say that there is no possible combination of decisions that can be seen as the obvious "best choice" it kind of sucks that there are only 3 people left from the original (Lee, Clementine and Kenny) so its sort of like we will be starting a new story in episode 4.
but the way we lost the people from our group makes it worth it (Doug not so much) the way lilly went crazy reminded me of larry when he thought duck was bitten, and when she killed Doug i actually thought it was sort of panic fire and i let her back in the RV (Doug's death didn't matter much) but on my carley save i was shocked i literally gasped out loud, i thought i had won, the argument was over, then carley had to have the last word, i expected a comeback not a gun shot, OMG wow Lilly is an evil bitch, she ain't coming in my rv.

the disappointing thing is that doug is now the most useless character and i would never want him in my group again, carley gets a hint at a love interest, tells lee to admit his past to everyone and gets a super shocking ending, doug gets some bells and a grey area panic shot "don't know who's fault it was" ending, poor Doug.

even though once duck is bitten the whole duck part is sort of predictable (i didnt predict katjaa) i like how you can choose to be up front about the duck situation or just constantly ignore it until you have to deal with it, i chose to do it myself and that was a pretty heavy mouse click

as for the new characters, i like homeless dude, but he is basically a cartoon homeless guy (maybe he is a master villain in disguise) but omid and cristina seem to be more complications, and what happened with Lee and omid? is the way Lee treats him comedy or is Lee cracking?, not asking him but sort of threatening him to dangle over the edge and cut the tanker and pushing him off the bridge no "together" option, i don't know whether it was out of place quirky comedy or Lee cracking.
cristina seems like a survivor and a bit of a carley 2.0 but her loyalty is with an injured omid so she is complicated.

i wish i could have handled the ben situation in a more understanding way, once he admitted what he had done i wanted to tell him that "it's ok, you may have keeped us alive for the past few weeks", but i wish he had told me so i didn't stop his drop off and make every bad thing that happened happen, but all i could do was be mad and teach him a lesson to keep his mistakes secret (possible future bite lie).
i liked the more puzzle'y elements in the game and as always i enjoyed the parts with Clementine

[KMatt]

There is no way Carley or Doug are coming back.

Carley/Doug were left by the side of the road. Therefore they are on foot approx 2-3 hours car drive away (the incident happened at night and it was early morning when they got to the train) + 2 hours by train (as Lee mentioned to the two new guys at the bridge) so they are probably a few hundred miles apart.

With half a head missing and hundreds of walkers between them, does anyone really think they will happen to stumble across each other again?

[Drake Sigar]

Originally Posted by ZombieBlaster

WORST EPISODE EVER!!!

I was so deeply attached with Carley and Katjaa and they will just end up in a stupid cause of death.

You may think I'm overreacting but my heart feels kinda heavy right now. I guess I just can't accept the truth that Carley and Kat are never coming back. ( SIGH )

There's no point for me to buy Episode 4 and 5 anymore because episode 3 is the end of my journey.

I didn't stop watching/reading Game of Thrones just because Sean Bean died. And Sean Bean is my soul mate, he just doesn't know it yet.

Episode three was good. I felt it was trying to 'break' me though, and TellTale's excellent writing challenged everything I thought I knew - how to treat Clem, who I could count on, my judging of characters like Kenny and Duck... It was quite an emotionally draining experience.

[Vainamoinen]

Originally Posted by Isterio

3. The download of the pc version was difficult. The connection was lost around 20 times and I had to start again and again downloading it.
4. Lilly shooting Carley seemed very manufactured. I didn't quite believe her sudden hate for her.

(3) Yeah, I had problems as well. Judging from the size, I should have dl'd this episode in 15 minutes tops - instead, I sat in front of my computer for 90+ minutes with all the lost connections. I hope they're bringing the direct episode file download back for future games, or at least have mechanics that let us do something else while the download attempts in the background. This is the minimal freedom a PC player expects.

(4) Lilly just popped. This was rather explicitly foreshadowed, she just couldn't take it any more, so she just fired on someone, anyone who threatened her authority or gave her grounds for suspecting conspiracy. I find severe mental instability to be about the only possible explanation for her actions in the comic, so this is as canon as it gets (Should Kirkman, as expected, declare the Lilly in the game non-canon or "a different Lilly", I am rather sure that his own novelized version of the character will bear tons less believability). Lilly is wacko, she couldn't take the new world she lives in.