The Walking Dead: The Telltale Definitive Series PC Review

The Walking Dead: The Telltale Series skyrocketed Telltales Games into one of the most beloved game development studios. The studio would eventually close due to mismanagement but thanks to Skybound, the series would reach its end. With The Walking Dead: The Telltale Definitive Edition telling Clementine's entire story from her early childhood days meeting Lee to becoming a mother and guardian to an orphan child. The package also contains the season 2's prequel, 400 Days, and the spinoff series The Walking Dead: Michonne, but Clementine's journey is the star of this package. A journey full of difficult decisions and emotionally traumatizing moments that will mold Clementine into either a harden or empathetic survivor. If you missed out on The Walking Dead: The Telltale Series now is your chance to experience this acclaimed franchise in one place.

The Walking Dead: The Telltale Definitive Series includes all 4 major seasons of The Walking Dead: The Telltale Series along with the spinoff titles 400 Days and The Walking Dead: Michonne. 400 Days takes place before the events of Season 2 of The Walking Dead: The Telltale Series and stars a series of characters who'll form a group of survivors important to Season 2. While most of the decisions are pushed into the background when Season 2 starts it offers a decent enough prequel and provides background context into the characters Clementine will meet in Season 2. 400 Days was mostly a promotional episode and doesn't hold up today as it did when it released.

The Walking Dead: Michonne is based on the character Michonne from the popular television series and comics. This narrative exists outside of Clementine's journey and has Michonne surviving the apocalypse and explores what she did during issues 126 and 139 of the comic series. It's an isolated story that has its share of decent twists, exploring Michonne's past and family before the events of the core story. For those who love the character, it'll give you more context into Michonne and does have a dense array of consequential choices. It was clearly developed for Michonne fans and those with little interest in the character will most likely find the season dull compared to Clementine's series.

Clementine's adventure is what most gamers will focus on. The entirety of season 1-4 is here, with these versions including better resolution, more helpful UI, improved lip-syncing, and best of all stability. Those who played the original games will notice that many of the glitches from the first releases are no longer here.

In addition, new extensions such as a music player that has all the musical scores from the series, art gallery, 3D model viewer, 3D font option, and behind the scenes commentary from the original developers provide a lot of new content to explore. The 3D model viewers provide an extensive look at the character models, animations, and voices for each season. The developer's commentary provides information about the game's development shared by the development team. This includes how the game was almost entirely in first-person before deciding to shift the focus. It's a lot of information but shows how much work went into developing each episode.

The journey of Clementine is one of the most acclaimed stories of this and last generation. Starting off Season 1 as Lee Everett, a history professor heading to jail for life after murdering a Senator who was sleeping with his wife Lee is given another chance at freedom. After a Walker walks onto the road when being transported to the prison, Lee is freed but not without fighting for his life. Quickly meets a little girl named Clementine who is all alone and whose parents left town for vacation during the outbreak. This begins a long and difficult journey as Clementine learns to live in this new world where the only rules are the ones you make. Throughout each season you'll control more characters than Clementine, but she'll remain the central focus of the main series. Allowing you to alter her behavior based on what you want.

This control over the decisions allows you to alter the narrative, shifting how characters act towards you and depending on who lives what direction the story will take. Despite the seasons be chronologically connected, the decisions you make are often discarded at the start of each new season. For example, Season 2 has multiple ways the narrative could end but when Season 3 begins that decision is negated to progress the story. Because of this, much of outcomes can be predicted as only a handful of characters return for an additional season.

Despite having a general idea of how each season will end the decisions within the seasons themselves are varied and profound. Many of the more critical decisions are timed and usually, have 2 choices to them. These massively important choices change the story dramatically. This doesn't mean the smaller choices don't matter. The way you interact with your fellow characters will impact how they view you and sometimes their actions, opening different dialogue options. This ripple effect encourages replayability.

The characters from each season are unique, well-voice, and written with care. Each season starts a new cast of characters that Clementine must work with to survive. Each one has distinct personalities, desires, and issues that are incorporated into the story. For example, Carly from the first season is brave and an excellent shot while in the final season you encounter Terrance, an often absent-minded child whose actions result in others getting hurt. You start to care for certain characters and even develop a type of favoritism towards them until the narrative strips control from you. Despite the series giving you ample control over your decisions sometimes, either through choice or not, the game will remove that control and you'll be left to pick up the pieces.

Each episode ends with a list of what decisions were made and possible choices. Showing how the player could've changed the story. As the series continues, the choices start to add more layers as decisions made episodes ago could come back full circle to bite the player. 

The decisions you'll make are the most critical and exciting parts of the game but the puzzle-solving that you'll have to occasionally do isn't. Many of the puzzles are basic and usually slow down the momentum of the story. There are sections where you can openly explore the environment and obtain collectables, which sometimes provides more context into the world or just serve as a way to encourage exploration. For example, in The Final Season Clementine collects random dolls and the skulls of animals to decorate her room for some reason.

The Walking Dead: The Telltale Definitive Series is the perfect way to experience this acclaimed narrative experience. While Clementine's journey takes center stage the inclusion of The Walking Dead: 400 Days and The Walking Dead: Michonne provides the complete series for anyone who wishes to take part in those adventures. The improvements made from the core games such as frame rate and visuals help modernize the experience but the stability is the best addition. The inclusion of the special features provides the most hardcore The Walking Dead fan more context into the game's development but Clementine's adventure will likely be the major focus for many players. With The Walking Dead: The Telltale Definitive Series giving both newcomers and old fans the chance to experience this unbelievable venture. Either for the first time or for another playthrough.
 

Adam Siddiqui,
Senior Editor, NoobFeed
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