Concerns about choices and season 2
Okay, first up: SPOILER WARNING! I'll being going briefly over the ends of some TellTale games, but nothing majorly spoil-ish.
I was browsing through a discussion about the cast of the 400 Days DLC from The Walking Dead season 1, and someone mentioned that determinant characters have never really made a large impact in any TellTale game and someone else retorted with Game Of Thrones. This got me thinking; yeah, GoT did have a lot of choices that have or are going to have some serious impact. In fact, more so than any TellTale game (well that I know of. I haven't played Tales From The Borderlands, Minecraft Story mode or Batman, so sorry if they go crazy with their choices and I missed it). Both of these guys are right and that worries me.
TellTale has been putting more variety into it's ending since adopting the choice formula with The Walking Dead season 1 ending pretty much the same no matter what. But since then things have been getting more spread out and open. Season 2 of The Walking Dead had 5 endings (although 2 of them were pretty much the same)! Now it's still going to be a few weeks before season 3 starts up and we can see how these choices play out, but TellTale track record with addressing multiple endings is, hmm... spotty at best. Oddly enough they seem to be able to manage on a short-term episode to episode basis with the Rodrik and Asher decision having a large effect (maybe not the end results but how you got there) and the Ben decision from Amid The Ruins resulted in a solid character arc in the next episode. But GoT is taking it to a whole new level. The Asher or Rodrik decision, Duncan or Royland is probably dead and possibly a traitor, Gared leaving the grove, Gryff or Ludd being dead, Gwyn loving or hating (by which I mean shanking) Asher, and Mira possibly being married to Morgryn who's going to try and take over Ironwrath or dead! Hello! 5 endings is pansy town frolic! Now that's a LOT of possible changes. Long story short; I'm concerned this might amount to little variance. I mean, 400 Days had 5 (actually 4. Thanks Bonnie) determinant player characters (determinant in their endings, not their deaths) and what was speculated to be a large effect on season 2 wound up amounting to cameos. Pointless 5 second cameos. Now thankfully family relations and the faction dynamic means that something like the 400 Days situation probably won't happen as these large characters being glazed over won't fly, but I'm still concerned. Any words of reassurance?
Comments
I think that the Asher/Rodrik plot will stay pretty much the same, aside from slightly different dialogue to choose from the remaining brother. The whole Royland/Duncan/Gwyn/Sentinel/Traitor is a lot to take in, so I believe said person won't survive long or disappears from the story by other means. Mira's status might get mentioned in the dialogue sometimes and maybe if we're lucky, she'll briefly appear. But I doubt she'll be playable again or play a major role. Honestly not sure how they're going to approach Gared's story, but I guess either you'll be forced to come back or leave the North Grove anyway.
Then again, when it comes to Telltale games, I don't generally expect expect the choices to matter much, so take it with a grain of salt. That way I can be pleasently surprised when they actually do somewhat matter.
On a different note, you should definitely try out Tales from the Borderlands. It's amazing.