Cut the crap, Telltale
Before we go on, this is a bit of a rant post. Just doing a head's up.
I just beat The Wolf Among Us. This isn't my first Telltale game, I've beaten the first season of The Walking Dead and Game of Thrones.
My problem with Telltale Games are that their main selling points are "The story is tailored by how you play it! Your decisions matter!" and they hardly do.
For example, if I chose to save Character A (Out of A and 
on one scenario, he/she will just keep on living uneventfully, and the other one will die. We will have the character we chose to save until Disastrous Event #12 happens, which most of the times, will kill him/her. Then, the story moves on, making a nice full circle around it, so it doesn't really matters who we save.
Or if we choose to go to Location A over Location B, the story will change a little, but the conclusion is going to be the same either way. It's just a circle that loops on itself. A road that divides itself artificially, as it rejoins itself later!
Another thing that infuriates me is the fixation on cliffhangers. Why can't we get some closure? I've yet to play one Telltale Game that does not abuse cliffhangers.
The Walking Dead ending? Cliffhanger. Game of Thrones ending? Cliffhanger. Hell, even The Wolf Among Us had a cliffhanger ending, followed by literally, advertising of their Graphic Novel. I can't help but feel this is a cheap way to keep us hooked, and guaranteeing we'll buy the next chapter or season or whatever.
Now, I'm not saying the stories are bad. They're great in fact, that's why I played 3 games already. But I can't help but feel like this is a bit of a scam. Our choices don't matter. The story never fleshes out in more than one way. And then there's the fucking cliffhangers. The fucking cliffhangers. I get it, they're good when used correctly, but I can't help but feel like TTG are abusing them.
TL;DR: I'm salty because choices don't really matter and Telltale Games love to praise themselves as the holy grail of choice making, and they depend so much on cliffhangers it's annoying.
Thanks for reading!
PS. A good example of a game that makes choices that actually matter? The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt.
Comments
TWAU is a prequel to the Fable comics (if I am not mistaken). Plus, Fables isn't even Telltale's.
Which is why Telltale said that our choices tailor the story. They don't create a major impact as you can expect, but it does make unique effects such as dialogue changes. Tailor, by definition means make or adapt for a particular purpose or person; The story adapts to the choices you make and connects each part of the story together to create a story distinct to you.
Telltale creates games based on narratives, whereas the story is set to be linear (which may depend on what story they're trying to tell).
The ending wasnt a cliffhanger, it was a little nod to keep you thinking. Thats not a cliffhanger, A cliffhanger is a major event/storyline that is left unresolved. They resolved the murder plotline
I think only game of thrones as done that so far.
Choices in TT games never did matter, it's not a new thing. People don't play these games for choice making, it's about the story. I have never seen TT boast about the choice factor of their games. Sure when you start up one of their games it says the choices you make will shape the story; and to be fair it does to a certain extent. But the reality is the episodes in their games are usually made within a three month span. Do you really think they could take into account all those choices from each episode in three months time, and make the story branch off in another direction? They would need more time. Actual choices aren't going to happened.
Lose the tude, dude.
I don't recall "Your decisions matter!" ever being on the beginning screen of any of their games, I also didn't realize that whether a decision mattered what objective. The simple truth is that whether a decision matters, it's subjective - up to the player to decide if it matters to them, whether it has an effect on the game/story is objective, as it either changes the game in some way or not, opinions don't dictate the effects of decisions, how much they matter is dependent on opinions however.
Determinant characters do have a pretty bad run in TTG's choice-based games, however, all determinant characters add at the very least some dialogue that would either not be there or would've been different if that determinant character was not saved or taken with you. There are still some determinants such as in The Walking Dead Game and Game of Thrones that alter parts of the story rather largely and in games such as The Wolf Among Us, determinant characters don't always end up dying and play a minor but recurring role throughout the game. Even then, we were never promised that determinant characters would always play a major role, even though I would like them to personally.
TTG only makes episodic games, there's only so much you can do with these types of games, even larger games such as Mass Effect and Dragon Age that are rather heavily choice-based don't create entirely different plots so that choices largely have an effect, whilst the games technically all begin and end in the same way(although some games change the way your character begins their journey and there are often multiple endings to the story), the journey is where your choices tailor how the story plays out, even then, there's few games I've seen where the ending isn't dependent on the final choice.
TTG makes episodic games, cliffhangers are pretty necessary since the entire Season usually follows a single plot and each episode focuses on a sub-plot, even then not all the endings are cliffhangers, specifically The Wolf Among Us and Tales from the Borderlands, they have cliffhangers at the end of their first four episodes because the plot still continues, however, in their final episode, they finish the plot of the season, they might end pretty mysteriously but the plot is resolved, which isn't the case for The Walking Dead Game or Game of Thrones as they're going to be getting another Season each.
It's not a scam, you're given exactly what you've been offered and chose to buy.
I thought this was gonna be someone complaining about how Telltale isn't making a Season 2...
And although you can say "choices dont matter" which wouldn't be true, GoT ep 6 had huge impacts, Wolf among us did a good job of disguising the choices, for example, Episode 3 has the choice of where you are going to investigate between 3 places, each one gives you something unique and different, and then the other might also be different on the next place you choose, in the end of the episode you get to the same spot, but you feel like it was because of you and you really won't even notice till you look up the episode on youtube.
And should you really be complaining about cliffhangers when you can just go to "Play Episode" right after and don't need to wait?
Telltale games are the best, stop complaining when they work extremely hard to put these episodes out, you should be thankful.
that is not my only problem with them. the huge bug where the choices are blank. its been well over a year and that glitch is still there. i just recently started playing telltale games and i noticed they have no communication in Steam forums. so many discussions and not pinned topics. nothing. what does that tell me as a customer. I really want to like them but this is not the only bugs i've seen in their games. Constant Freezing in the Walking Dead season 2. Some in Game of thrones. Even the reaction time felt too short. i mean when im hitting my buttons and it shows i hit it but i still die. doesn't that say something.
i know i am not alone because on Steam there are a lot of talk about some of this stuff mentioned. why does it go unheard? look i want to like them and support them but communication is needed. i play a mmo called DDO which has its fair share of problems but they communicate with us and try to fix them. so why do i not see any on Steam. if you want that as one of the platforms then there should be some there.
Shut up and eat your beans! Mama worked hard putting them in the microwave scowl
Are you talking about the [Q] sequences? Because you have to mash the button, actually, and not just press it once or twice.
To get a quicker response, you have to contact Telltale's Tech Support here on their website. Not the Steam ones.
I've been thinking that the fact that Telltale says "the story is tailored by how you play" could actually also mean that they modify the story and make it evolve based on the feedback they receive from the community and in the forums. It is no secret that Telltale pays a lot of attention on what people say here and they have changed the storyline of their games many times to surprise the community.
Other than that, I have to agree that the choices we make in the game don't really matter and I hope it will get better in their future games.
I honestly think it's how we perceive it - after playing them surely we know that there is only an illusion of choice, The narrative is the focus of the Telltale games but the choices do serve their purpose be it immersion or putting you in that position of "did I make the right choice?" (usually both).
The choices serve their purpose over however many series it has; it's only over time that your choices might feel a bit more significant but if you expect Telltale to put pivotal defining choices in their games that essentially split the overall plot - you are delusional so it has to be done in the realm of allowing the story to still progress for everyone despite some minor things being different per player.
Telltale have done a terrific job thus far in my opinion so you either accept them for what they are or you just play other games, it's as simple as that.
So shut up or leave? People expect game companies to improve with every installment not just stick to the same formula year after year with little to no improvement. The games aren't as fun when they're so transparent.
People shouldn't be labled delusional for wanting their choices to have an impact, maybe choice should just be scrapped if its just going to remain a waste of time or it could serve a purpose and mean something.
That isn't exactly what I meant. The choices aren't really as insignificant as people make them out to be but they obviously don't shape the story because I doubt they would even be able to make that work. You could argue that not enough choices have repercussions but again the game has to follow it's narrative in a linear fashion because a lot of people will only play it once and won't bother trying to get the other endings for example.
I can agree on the 'little to no improvement' thing considering nothing has really come close to The Wolf Among Us (in every aspect) - at least in my opinion.
Telltale is all about how you react to the story, not about how the story reacts to you. Your every choice DOES matter, only not the way you expect it to. You may not be able to change the whole picture of things and get multiple outcomes, but your personality throughout the game will make this your own story.