So Telltale's Michonne is not doing well...
Looking at Steam and Metacritic, as well as over here on the forums, the general consensus is that Michonne is just average at best. The episodes are far too short, whilst the story as a concept is extremely interesting it is poorly executed and both the cast of characters and even Michonne are a product of poor characterisation, to some extent.
Now personally I think the mini-series is great but I can understand and even agree with some of these complaints. As a mini-series, episodes should be 2-3 hours. Telltale clearly possess great writers but they're not really handed much in terms of production value. It is disappointing seeing this and after the catastrophe (forum-wise at least) which was Season 2, this sets a very upsetting message for Season 3. A lot of the complaints are also about the engine. I understanding creating a new engine from scratch would be very cost-heavy and take a lot of time, but at the same time, Teltlale, may have to resort to doing this, otherwise people are going to get very bored with their games which all follow a mostly similar style.
What do you think? Do you agree? How do you see Telltale improving? Will this just set the tone for Season 3?
Comments
TBH i love it more than S2 and maybe S1
I thought episode 1 of Michonne was bad but episode 2 was good and the story improved a lot, I enjoyed it.
Just remember that it is a miniseries and NOT an actual full season so don't expect long episodes. As for season 3 I would expect the level to be a lot higher though.
Huh? I thought the general consensus was that the Michonne Miniseries was more than average. Most comments I've read say that it's pretty good, and that it has surpassed Season 2, in terms of character development and depth, morally-grey protagonist, continuity and pacing. In my opinion, the episodes shouldn't be longer just because it's a rule that they should.
I'm talking about a general consensus, not just the forums and I have never heard anyone say it surpassed Season 2 whatsoever. In fact most of the comments about each episode on the forum are negative for obvious scenes, and generally an interesting premise with boring side-characters (not counting the antagonists, Randall and Norma).
On Metacritic, Michonne has around 60-70, slightly above average but the user scores are low usually being around 5/10
The most helpful (agreed) reviews on Steam are ALL negative.
It's clear there is general disappointment with Michonne, not to say this is what EVERYONE thinks, but at the very least it's a controversial series.
People are dumb then. Its a mini series not a full fledged game. Plus the engine is Telltales trademark, making a new engine anyway is useless when you already have one that gets updated every game.
Sounds like its doing well enough for a small mini series. I havent played ep 2 yet, Im waiting for the weekend, but Ive enjoyed the first one. Are you sure a lot of those negative reviews on steam arent because people are upset its not season three? Ive seen a lot of that.
Well TBF lots hate it cause it ain't S3
It is alright, It has potential to be much better but oh well.
I enjoy it, as do a lot of people here, and that's all I really care about tbh.
But it was implied that the number of episodes made it mini, not the length. That was never stated.
Ah true, I guess it my mind it just implies everything would be a bit shorter. So far both episodes were about an hour and a half, decent I guess.
Didn't have high hopes. It could have been worse but I don't think a Michonne dlc was as needed as further development for the game series
I don't get the engine complaints at all for Episode 2. I thought it ran beautifully.
I don't think it's meant to be really. From what I've heard it's just a bone to throw at walking dead fans whilst season 3 get's worked on.
Its pretty dumb that episodes are so short when its only a 3 episode mini series.
If we're going by metacritic Games of Thrones and Minecraft weren't liked either, so all of their recent games except Tales from the Borderlands have had a negative reception.
The Telltale Tool should probably be updated to 2.0, but that alone doesn't necessarily mean the games will go over any better.
I'm not agree with you ... season 2 was a great and this mini-series is very good. all game's telltale is very good! i love it. season 2 was the BEST for me.
the two problems I have with Michonne series is the new controls, the combos and the changing the screen resolution in action scenes. that's distracting as hell.
the story seems fine but it was slow to pick up. I think it pick up faster in a mini series. the length could have been slightly longer.
Eh, still better than Survival Instinct, so it's got that going for it
And in all honesty, 60/70 still isn't that bad. It's not great, sure, but from a purely objective standpoint, 6/10 is still above average.
I just wish the episodes were longer.
The low scores don't really bother me, but the only thing I hope the lower scores don't do is erode the trust between Telltale and Kirkman/Skybound.
It'd bum me out if they end up thinking less of Telltale because of it, especially since this is drawing heavily from the source material which they trusted them with and all. Then again, I doubt they'd be that shallow, especially since there's been worse games with TWD name on them (we all know the one)
Hmph.
The problem is that Michonne doesn't do anything complicated, it's all kick this, chop that, climb here, jump there and if you die it just turns the clock back five seconds, try again. It's like a horrible version of "Prince of Persia: Sands of Time" instead of a puzzle game. She doesn't create ambushes, forge weapons, set traps, make diversions, prepare defenses or anything else that would break up the pace, give you time exploring/experimenting and make her less of a simple brute while still being way more adult and a totally different kind of character than Clementine. The action sequences only worked in previous games because you got yanked out of puzzle mode to act quick, playing longer action sequences only emphasizes how crude hitting buttons to do scripted actions is. It's not an intellectual nor practical challenge, it's just stepping through a movie. The only good part are the creepy hallucinations, because the zombies have been totally gimped too. Not just because of Michonne's sword skills but the way they passed through the crowd in episode 2 was ridiculous.
I really enjoyed TWD Michonne so far, but I do agree that the episodes are too short.
But they didn't expect their fans to be rabid dogs who will ignore the bone because it isn't something else and attack them for no reason.
"Fuck her right in the pussy"
In reference to your profile pic
True, lmaooo.
I liked the first episode, but I just played the second and I'm so frustrated that the choices really don't matter and the options are so limited.
I think Michonne is solid but the episodes are really short and the story is a bit generic and predictable.
I agree completely. For me Life is Strange could have been sold at a lot more to be worth it whilst Minecraft story mode and Michonne do not feel worth the cost when playing them. (Especially Michonne that's only 3 episodes)
I don't think anything bad would happen if that was the case; I've seen lots of people say that Michonne's story/writing was better than Season 2, and all the complaints people had about Season 2 didn't really negatively impact Telltale's chances of doing future TWD games (outside of maybe making Telltale want to choose to hold back Season 3 for a little while longer to spend more time on it).
Isnt Life is Strange $5 an episode also? Where do you get $5 for five hours?
Featuring certain TV Show fan-favorite… Seriously, I haven't played that game nor watched a playthrough, but I know that it's used as an inside joke among The Walking Dead fans. What is bad about it?
<;)
Oh yeah, Im reminded of that interminable puzzle in episode 2 where you had to find soda or beer bottles or whatever it was. Ugh! It felt like I was walking around for five hours.
I actually really like this game, i was sceptic at first when i learned about the fact telltale would make a game about Michonne.
I dont really like tv-show Michonne, i haven't read the comics but this Michonne, seems like a real diffrent character, then her tv-show counterpart.
So i was really positively suprised that i enjoyed playing as her.
Also all the characters we have met so far are all extremely well written, Randall is a great villain, cause i can actually understand what his motives are.
Not so much for Carver in season two, cause it didnt make any sense what he was doing.
I'm enjoying the game, I just wish the episodes were longer. Compared to similar games, you don't feel like you're getting your money's worth when it comes to game time.
Everything.
It may be no season one worthy but it ain't that bad. The length doesn't really bother me tbh.
I love this game. Its way better than season 2 series wise. Just wish there was more of an emotional connection with the group in TWD Michonne. Otherwise, I wish the michonne series was the third TWD game telltale did instead of a season 3, but we know how much static that would cause