New gameplay in season 2?

[JulianAR]

I know you are all familiar with and love TWD as it is, but I also partially agree with those who say that this game was more like an interactive movie than a game.

It blew my mind that this game beat out games like Dishonored and Halo 4 for game of the year. But when I thought about it, it really deserved the win, no matter what the reason. So how strong do you guys think this game could get if season 2 showed an actual increase in "game" like features?

Without straying from the initial, well set-up point-and-click gameplay with scene-to-scene activity, what if Telltale were to give us some slightly more complex options? It might even help *gasp* change the outcome of our decisions! Or at least help strengthen the illusion of choice.

For example, during the game we switch to a scene that takes place in a wide open area, like a city or a field. In the middle of it, such as when we stopped to roam around and solve puzzles with Lee in season one, we can roam around in a much wider area. Not only that, but say we're traversing this area alone, or with Clementine if she's still a little girl we need to protect. In this wide-roaming area, we can be given the option to wield and use a gun. Switching from interacting with or without a gun can change our interaction options, so we can click on the option of a phone in the middle of a street without a gun to use it, or switch to a gun and click on the option of a zombie head to interact with it with a bullet. At the end of the scene, when we've eliminated all zombies and solved all the puzzles, things like how many bullets you have left effect the outcome of the story just as much as dialogue options do. Most importantly though, again, if Clementine is a little girl we still have to protect, we can probably feel an even stronger connection to Clem if we protect her with our own skill and ability!

TL;DR, Wide open areas and active threats that can be approached multiple ways might strengthen the gameplay in TTWD if they can properly meld it with the story tailoring, but also limit this gameplay to a single, maybe two scenes, and everything else is strictly TTWD classic gameplay.

P.S. I just thought of this, but I would also love to see characters move around and be active a bit themselves while we're exploring instead of just standing or sitting around like lumps on a log.

Thoughts?

[Kiel555]

I was thinking TTG could silence the "choice does not matter" crowd by altering their game download episodes. For example, when you buy the game you get 5 episodes but based on your choices the 5 episodes that are downloaded to your computer are different form others who made different choices. Each episode costs $5 so if you want them all (could be upwards of 32 episodes) go for it.

So, if you saved Carley in episode 1 then episode 2 has Carley and the Doug branch is closed unless you start a new game and buy the episode with Doug. In this way it's possible that the Carley branch takes you to Ft. Benning while the Doug branch takes you to Savannah. The story could then change again depending if you left Lilly or had her get back in the RV. So forth and so on. One person could ultimately have a story that takes them to Woodbury while another lands on an island near the Florida Keys. Of course, Lee still dies at the end of e5 but you get the idea.

I liked the game as is but I only had one playthrough with no rewinds. To me the choices mattered and the story was enjoyable. I was happily unaware of what would happen if I selected the other choices/dialogue options. But I can see how others wanted to see that choosing something else changed the story radically. That's not what this game is but does not mean it can't be that for season 2.

[thestalkinghead]

Originally Posted by Kiel555

I was thinking TTG could silence the "choice does not matter" crowd by altering their game download episodes. For example, when you buy the game you get 5 episodes but based on your choices the 5 episodes that are downloaded to your computer are different form others who made different choices. Each episode costs $5 so if you want them all (could be upwards of 32 episodes) go for it.

So, if you saved Carley in episode 1 then episode 2 has Carley and the Doug branch is closed unless you start a new game and buy the episode with Doug. In this way it's possible that the Carley branch takes you to Ft. Benning while the Doug branch takes you to Savannah. The story could then change again depending if you left Lilly or had her get back in the RV. So forth and so on. One person could ultimately have a story that takes them to Woodbury while another lands on an island near the Florida Keys. Of course, Lee still dies at the end of e5 but you get the idea.

I liked the game as is but I only had one playthrough with no rewinds. To me the choices mattered and the story was enjoyable. I was happily unaware of what would happen if I selected the other choices/dialogue options. But I can see how others wanted to see that choosing something else changed the story radically. That's not what this game is but does not mean it can't be that for season 2.

$160 for the entire game F*ck that, that sounds like DLC at it's worst

[JulianAR]

Originally Posted by Kiel555

I was thinking TTG could silence the "choice does not matter" crowd by altering their game download episodes. For example, when you buy the game you get 5 episodes but based on your choices the 5 episodes that are downloaded to your computer are different form others who made different choices. Each episode costs $5 so if you want them all (could be upwards of 32 episodes) go for it.

So, if you saved Carley in episode 1 then episode 2 has Carley and the Doug branch is closed unless you start a new game and buy the episode with Doug. In this way it's possible that the Carley branch takes you to Ft. Benning while the Doug branch takes you to Savannah. The story could then change again depending if you left Lilly or had her get back in the RV. So forth and so on. One person could ultimately have a story that takes them to Woodbury while another lands on an island near the Florida Keys. Of course, Lee still dies at the end of e5 but you get the idea.

I liked the game as is but I only had one playthrough with no rewinds. To me the choices mattered and the story was enjoyable. I was happily unaware of what would happen if I selected the other choices/dialogue options. But I can see how others wanted to see that choosing something else changed the story radically. That's not what this game is but does not mean it can't be that for season 2.

Yeah, that would be... really expensive. There's a smarter way to go about something like that, I think.

[Arcanine]

If it ain't broke...

[owner070]

New gameplay ?? naah i dont like it, like in Black ops 2 Find intels and shit, aint nobody got time fo that. Just dont put secret things in it like eastrr eggs, or the amount of bullets that will affect the end of the story and you have to find some bullets thats bullshit. Just let it stay how it is now.

[Ghositex]

Originally Posted by owner070

New gameplay ?? naah i dont like it, like in Black ops 2 Find intels and shit, aint nobody got time fo that. Just dont put secret things in it like eastrr eggs, or the amount of bullets that will affect the end of the story and you have to find some bullets thats bullshit. Just let it stay how it is now.

The gameplay does need some improvement, in my opinion, but I wouldn't really mind if it didn't change in Season two. I didn't really like that idea, either, but I haven't really got any ideas when it comes to gameplay, lol.

[Apache00]

Originally Posted by Kiel555

I was thinking TTG could silence the "choice does not matter" crowd by altering their game download episodes. For example, when you buy the game you get 5 episodes but based on your choices the 5 episodes that are downloaded to your computer are different form others who made different choices. Each episode costs $5 so if you want them all (could be upwards of 32 episodes) go for it.

So, if you saved Carley in episode 1 then episode 2 has Carley and the Doug branch is closed unless you start a new game and buy the episode with Doug. In this way it's possible that the Carley branch takes you to Ft. Benning while the Doug branch takes you to Savannah. The story could then change again depending if you left Lilly or had her get back in the RV. So forth and so on. One person could ultimately have a story that takes them to Woodbury while another lands on an island near the Florida Keys. Of course, Lee still dies at the end of e5 but you get the idea.

I liked the game as is but I only had one playthrough with no rewinds. To me the choices mattered and the story was enjoyable. I was happily unaware of what would happen if I selected the other choices/dialogue options. But I can see how others wanted to see that choosing something else changed the story radically. That's not what this game is but does not mean it can't be that for season 2.

this won't work in practice imagine there are 3 important decisions with 2 options each which would change the story in episode 1. then you need 2^3 episodes 2. same for episode 2, then you need 2^6 (64) versions of ep 3
additionally most players wouldnt buy 2 alternative stories (unless the second one is much cheeper), so ttg wont make much profit for these efforts. the will to play the game again would be still weak. now you will see the same again and then you would have to pay again, you could as well buy a new game then.

anyway, i'd really like that season 2 has some much different ways how the story can end. the gameplay in season 1 is ok imo, but not as good as in other games (like heavy rain, dead island, resident evil). but please dont make a shooter, there are enough of them

[dubesor]

there will be minor twists in the gameplay-section, nothing completely new tho. Like they implemented the FPS-ish aiming of Gun later instead of simply clicking circles.

[CharmingBirch]

Originally Posted by Arcanine

If it ain't broke...

Best post yet.

I like that it plays as an interactive movie. There's nothing lacking to me.

[Kiel555]

Originally Posted by thestalkinghead

$160 for the entire game F*ck that, that sounds like DLC at it's worst

Originally Posted by JulianAR

Yeah, that would be... really expensive. There's a smarter way to go about something like that, I think.

Keep in mind that one complete story only costs $25. Costs start going up if you want to explore what happens with the other options that are available. If you say wanted to go to Ft. Benning AND go to the Keys then download those other DLC's. Otherwise just stick with one path and have a great story.

Unless I misunderstood, when playing the game there is a demand that other choices alter the game significantly. You want your choices to change the world as it were. So, based on your choices you get a different episode. At the end of the story, your computer has 5 episodes and you paid $25 and your choices really affected the game.

Now, only if you want to experience what happened in the "other" choices is it time to shell out more money.

[Ghositex]

So, poor people wouldn't be able to replay the game :P

[Juanique99]

What I would like to see in season two will be some technical improvements while maintaining the same gameplay.

- Remove the invisible walls. I hated when Lee just couldn't walk to an area because of an invisible wall that limited the walkable area. I would really like to see more space for walking with actual physical or at reasonable limits.
- Increased texture resolution. While I really loved the visual style of the game, it was kind of disappointing when a close up to a zombie would show their skin as a bunch of blurry pixels.
- Improve the FPS parts so it would feel more like modern FPS games. When I was shooting zombies, I felt that I could just click anywhere on the screen and the zombies would just die. Being a Left 4 Dead fan, I would have love it if it felt a little bit more like that.

I guess I'm just saying that there are some cool stuff about AAA games that maybe could be carried over to adventure games. Telltale did a great job with characters, story, audio and visual style. Other companies have done a great jobs with graphics and sense of immersion, I would like to see a game that can take the best of both worlds. I think usually it's a matter of money, but now that TWD is such a big hit, maybe it can be done.

EDIT: I just remembered something I thought when I was playing episode 4. When you first enter the house, you're told that you have to check if the first floor was safe, and you go around checking doors. I thought it would be cool if you could sometimes "fail" (really fail as a the player, not just as part of the story) on the tasks that were given to you. Maybe if you didn't check a specific window, a zombie might come up, and maybe that could cause someone to die and make a specific puzzle harder in the future or something.

Most of the control you have on the game is based on decisions and then you have to live with the consequences. I would like to see the story not only influenced by decisions, but also by success/failure to accomplish things.

[plaqueconspiracy]

If the next season somehow isn't a point-and-click adventure game I'll quit. It needs to be that, obviously.

But there's always room for an improvement. I think the sometime jerky animations should be redone.

But more importantly... There should be more mini-games. More things to do.

BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY. More dialogue.


More dialogue. More talk. More backstory. More character involvement.

[Tyrant]

More dialogue options, definitely.

[plaqueconspiracy]

Originally Posted by Tyrant

More dialogue options, definitely.

Now it's more like

*Choose dialogue option*
*Lee talks*
*Person talks*
*Lee answers something predetermined*
*Person talks*
*Lee answers*
*Person talks*
*Lee answers*
*"SEE YA."*


What if they let the player chose each response? Would it be too messy to work? It would be a whole lotta more work for the voice actors but I would certainly not mind more.

But anyway, it's good the way it is now too but it REALLY needs MORE dialogue. Not only the very important bits but also more of the regular "What do you think about all this?" chat about recent happenings in the game.

More about pre-apocalypse stuff. More about the characters themselves and their backgrounds.

"Relationship-statuses" for all characters. If you befriend someone you can take part of their thoughts and perhaps secrets... Like you could get friendly and unfriendly responses from Ben. If you're not friendly towards him you won't get to hear about what he has to say or some could-be-vital-information he has to share. If you're friends with Ben but at the same time friends with Kenny, Ben might not want to tell you his thoughts or secrects because he doesn't want Kenny to know and etc.

Not to turn this game in to some kind of Sims game but just... more involvement with the characters. More features.

Side-quests that you don't really have to do like finding a battery for someone... Like repairing the swing on St. John's farm. It might give you a reward later on. Different dialogue options.


and BRAINSTORMING IN THIS BITCH and I will probably change my mind about some of this stuff when I read it later

[Kiel555]

Originally Posted by Ghositex

So, poor people wouldn't be able to replay the game :P

You mean the middle class right . The poor and rich are doing just fine.

[Ghositex]

Originally Posted by Kiel555

You mean the middle class right . The poor and rich are doing just fine.

umm.. Sure, yeah, why not.

[thestalkinghead]

Originally Posted by Kiel555

Keep in mind that one complete story only costs $25. Costs start going up if you want to explore what happens with the other options that are available. If you say wanted to go to Ft. Benning AND go to the Keys then download those other DLC's. Otherwise just stick with one path and have a great story.

Unless I misunderstood, when playing the game there is a demand that other choices alter the game significantly. You want your choices to change the world as it were. So, based on your choices you get a different episode. At the end of the story, your computer has 5 episodes and you paid $25 and your choices really affected the game.

Now, only if you want to experience what happened in the "other" choices is it time to shell out more money.

i wouldn't see it as a complete game for $25 i would see it as part of the game for $25 and the whole game for $160, and if that hardened all the good will for telltale i had would be gone, bridges would be burned (or nuked) and i wouldn't buy the game.

the other choices are part of the game, if they were DLC i would seriously be hating on telltale not thinking what they had done was amazing.

[Kiel555]

Originally Posted by thestalkinghead

i wouldn't see it as a complete game for $25 i would see it as part of the game for $25 and the whole game for $160, and if that hardened all the good will for telltale i had would be gone, bridges would be burned (or nuked) and i wouldn't buy the game.

the other choices are part of the game, if they were DLC i would seriously be hating on telltale not thinking what they had done was amazing.

Well, that is a LOT of choices that really affect the way your game plays out. If this solution works but now the cost is an issue then just reduce choice. Say only 4 choices really alter the story significantly, as opposed to which characters now like or dislike you, now a complete story play through with choices that really change the story costs $25 and a "complete" game with 4 DLC's now sets you back another $20. Now a "complete" game costs $45 that's a lot easier on the pocket book.