Why clem dosnt work as the playable character and why she shouldnt be in the future
Another master post but anyway
Clementine may be the main character of arguably both seasons however she being player controlled dosn't benefit her character or the game at all for various reasons
Clem is essentially dead
From the moment we took control season 1 clem was essentially dead, any effect from choices and all of her personality vanished as we now control everything she says, clem cant grow and be shaped by the apocalypse any more as her character is player controlled: we now choose whatever she does and we cant see her develop.
It dosnt make sense
There's a large list of what Clem is asked to do this season
- Light a fire
- Come with Luke and Pete to the river
- See if any of the walkers are moving on the central island alone
- Go to Nick or Pete
- Watch Sarah
- Confront Carver
- Go with Luke to the bridge
- Talk to the stranger
- Search the shack alone
- Climb the ladder
- Turn off the windturbine
- Help Kenny escape the truck
- Get the radio
- Keep the radio on her
- Turn on the speakers and play the music
- Comfort Sarah in the horde
- Distarct a walker for a cow catcher
- Talk to Kenny
- Go get Sarah and Luke back
- Find a way to distract the walkers
- Convince Sarah to move
- Talk to Kenny again
- Go help Jane AND Mike and Bonnie with whatever there doing
- Distract someone for Jane
- Find all the items at the museum
- Help hold walkers back
- Help pull Jane up
- Convince people to come by the fire
- Save Kenny from a walker
- Help Luke (either way)
These are just the non determinant ones, there are several more and while some are reasonable for a child to be asked most aren't, furthermore in the majority of scenarios clementine takes a major part in conversations or even leads them (for example she more or less leads interactions with Arvo at the end of ep 4)
This obviously occurs as the protagonist needs to be in the thick of things, in season 1 Lee did the majority of the work however it was believable to a point as Lee was a full grown man who was more or less unofficial leader, an eleven year old girl does not make sense to be doing all the work, some episodes such as 4 and 5 have her doing more believable task for her age but still its a bit unbelievable
Unrealistic strength
Cutting off Saritas arm and kicking the door down that dozens of walkers couldn't budge were the best example, again totally unbelievable this could happen and again as the protagonist needs to do stuff
The way people talk to her
Again yes the people playing are adults however the entire group speaks to Clementine a child as shes an adult, when you compare there interactions with Sarah its kind of staggering.
Opposite problems
Unfortunately the same problems work against Clementine, mainly that as a child there are many restrictions there would not be on an adult A child playable character works in short instances which is why in many games you play as the deutarogonist to experience the feelings of being weak etc. And while this does have its moments an entire season of this feel weird, I want to play as an adult making adult decisons not a child trying to make adult decisions
Conclusion
This by no means mean I want clementine to not be in season 3 I just think she would be better as an NPC where she will be treated appropriately and we can actually see her character progress. A new balanced adult protaganist would provide a better scope in a decision making game where you can have appropriate repercussions even though its going to be hard to change her back to being an NPC
I always considered Christa to be the better option as we know her, her personality is fairly balanced, she cares about clementine and honestly she has similar views as the majority of players. Though any adult would beat a child
Comments
I completely disagree, I thought it worked really well this season and we wouldn't be able to relate to a new protagonist we just met or Christa who already has a pretty much set personality which wouldn't work for being a protagonist. Clem should stay as the protagonist for season 3, in my opinion she worked incredibly well in season 2.
I know there was a timeskip but clem was way more set in personality, we knew way more about her ideals etc. But we could do what we anted when playing as her
I want her to be the PC. I´m too attached to her character and everything I did will feel pointless to me.
If I´m being honest, I´ll probably drop the game.
I completely agree. Here is a recent discussion between Jared x Gamer and I.
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To be honest I'm not sure the writers of S2 could have even handled Clem as a deuterogamist.
Poor phrasing.
Well, do you want to sit around throughout the whole game?
Clementine needs to learn how to light a fire for her survival (cough, alone ending, cough). You can't deny that all of us were once asked to do something (Like watch someone or help them in something).
Season 2 pretty much worked normal, and you can kick a door open if you kick near the knob. When I was 11, I can chop through a whole chicken, does that mean that I have unrealistic strength in which I am an alien?
Sarah suffered PTSD and why they treat her like a child.
It makes sense as an 11 year old to do all the work, as in almost every family, the youngest child is the one being asked to do most of the work in their household.
Like I said earlier, Clementine works normally as a Protag. and a child.
the big problem is that now, even if fans don't like her as a PC, there's no way of changing it. It'd feel... Weird if we got a new protagonist in S3 to say the least. Sure, they could make try to make the script and her actions to seem more believable but that's all I think they can do at this point.
I can't disagree with most of this. There was always going to be a challenge having Clem as the protagonist. For me, another issue was that she often wasn't involved in driving the action as much as a protagonist should be (which is what makes them the protagonist) - on many occasions, the adults talked over her when it came to key decisions which is exactly what adults would do. And yet, as you say, she is then asked to do baffling things.
It was a difficulty and one I think they never quite overcame.
Nevertheless, Clem has been hugely popular and I think they just about got away with it enough that many people were fine just playing through.
Clementine as a protagonist could have worked in Season 2, if it weren't for the fact that we could directly alter her behaviour and beliefs as opposed to influencing them from Season 1 when she was a deuteragonist. Season 2 proved that by sticking to the traditional 'deuteragonist becomes a playable main character' just can't work with the gameplay formula Telltale has going for with this game. In essence, Clementine from Season 2 doesn't really feel like she actually the Clementine from Season 1.
Telltale also showed that they can't make child playable protagonist appear believable and relatable. Sure they made her competent, but they instead had the majority of the adult supporting cast act incompetent to make Clementine appear smarter in comparison, and ended up turning her into a glorified child slave instead, because the capable adults kept asking an 11 year old girl to do the work they should have been doing instead.
Remember when Alvin asks Clementine to search the small house for supplies? What's stopping Alvin from doing it himself? He seemed to be in good enough shape to do that, since he comes in the house later anyway with no fuss. Would it have damage the gameplay and story direction if we were given the choice to speak to Rebecca and Sarah instead and learn more about them while sending lazy-bum Alvin to do the supply raid himself? Alvin would have still gotten the knife and the supplies that would have affected the small sub-plot with Walter at the ski lodge. In the end, sometimes talking to characters and learning more about them and giving us a chance to care about them is a better alternative than just keep giving Clementine something to do that any other adult can do in her place.
Having Clementine doing the adult work is only fine if the adults don't expect her to do it, are capable of doing it themselves, and if the player can decide whether they want to or not. The scene where you can actually have Bonnie do the search through the office in Episode 4 was a good idea, but it failed since the majority of the players were probably expecting a 'but thou must' moment (especially prevalent in Episode 3), and not realise that this one time Clementine doesn't have to do the work for once. There should have been more moments like these early on.
I'd go on more, but Jaded X Gamer had already cover the majority of the problems and I'll end up repeating ourselves.
It's the apocalypse. "It doesn't matters if your a boy, a girl, young or old. you're either dead or alive." (the quote isn't a 100% accurate)
Because when someone is bad ass enough to kill anyone to survive, and won't back down for anything then you're not really being threat as a "child" anymore. and again. It's the apocalypse. plus Sarah was mentally weak, physically weak, she's being threat by her personality, weaknesses / advantages. and that's why they're behaving diffrently against Sarah than to Clementine. Telltalegames did an interessting thing by making Clementine the protagonist, and they have major plans for it in season 3.
I can't really agree with the things you said. most of them are your opinions. You're just talking like you want the old story from season 1 back. Where Clementine is the "NPC". Lee's story is over. please get over it.
Your Alvin example is a good one to illustrate both of the problems. 1) If she were a true protagonist, the decision to search the house would be hers and 2) her constantly being asked to do dangerous things by the adults.
I completely agree.
TellTale seems to have thought "Everyone loved Clementine in Season 1, so why don't we make her the Player Character in Season 2".
The only problem is that they mostly killed off everything that people love about Clementine in Season 1 (protecting a weak, innocent little girl who is like an adopted daughter and serves as your moral compass through the game) in doing so. The purpose was defeated.
Lol, if an apocalypse happens and all your parents die, you will make what? Wait for dead or try to be alive? I won't will make a Constructive-Commentary, because I don't on the mood for that, but... you are fucking crazy. In this days, people rape children and kill them, why you think in a apocalypse people will treating children like children? For survive, everybody need to be treated equally ( but in most part of times, everybody treats her like a kid, no matters what you say ). About strength, episode four messed that, but in others episodes, her strength is good maked; her don't cut off Sarita's arm in one hit, and etc. You need to think before post that. ( Sorry if my English is bad ).
How many times am i going to say that it was the writers fault, 90 min episodes and not the fact that Clem is a little girl. Blame it on whoever thought 90 minute episodes, working on 4 games at once and hiring garbage writers was a good idea for a sequel to their best game.
You listed objectives and actions as a reason for Clem being a bad PC..... What????
So master chief is a bad PC because he literally saves the galaxy with his own hands?
Clementine will need let a new hero to help her. Wyatt to the rescue.
So you want them to fuck up the next season just because of your feels? Dude. You're being unreasonable.
But a theme of TWD is humanity. Not everyone is just another Chuck, people are going to have different ideals and morales.
But Halo isn't a game that's grounded in reality and doesn't try to tell a story that a person can relate to someway. While TWD is trying to be a realistic survival game. It works in Halo and it works in Mass Effect, but not in a game like this.
I held your opinion not long ago, but honestly, people have made some excellent points in terms of Clem being deuteragonist as opposed to PC. If she is entirely absent from the season (which I highly doubt) then yeah, I'll most likely drop the game too.
NoClemNoBuy
But the OP is listing those actions as if they were the reasons that make Clem a bad PC.
Clem is a bad PC because she has to light a fire... Lol come on
Lee is a bad PC because he has to help shawn or duck.
Lee is a bad PC because he has to find a way to get Larry's meds.
Etc.
Because Lee's an adult and basically the leader of the group Clem is 11, it dosnt make sense that people are asking her to do all that. i even left out all the stuff Clem basically volunteers to do and all the other determinant stuff she can do as well.
What? They were both separated, she had to run to somebody for safety.
Also I disagree with 99% of everything that you listed. If Clementine is completely dropped from the series I'm done with the game. I didn't spent two seasons to watch this character grow, then to be completely dropped. That would be a waste of time.
He didn't say he wanted Clem to be dropped from the series.
Ah, I misread that. But still I disagree with his points.
Fair enough
I never said that. I believe Clementine can work.
If you think I´m being unreasonable, that´s your opinion, man.
Opinions, I guess.
I just want to continue what I like doing.
I see. It's still 2014....with the best technology, in the 2080. Now, that's a different story. What I'm saying is....it can only grow. As RESIDENT EVIL 6 have 6 playable characters compare to RESIDENT EVIL 1. I can see why 1 playable character isn't enough. DYNASTY WARRIORS 2 had about 10-20 warriors to DYNASTY WARRIORS 8 over 120 warriors. Only 1 character fix is MAD MAX...you can wish to play more than one characters in "THE WALKING DEAD" in the future. But right now, I can only see 1 playable character so far.
Actually I'd like add something somebody else wrote. I was reading some old posts Conviva Ebrius linked me and edited together a bit of an abridged version of his idea of playing more as an influence on a more fully realized Clem that you can choose to act certain ways, but don't actually control her motives or reactions for.
It certainly would have been difficult to achieve, especially considering all the variables from season one and what could be seen as possibly contradictory actions. But I think it was in the realm of possibility. Lee himself, despite not having been established as character before we took control of him, had a remarkably consist personality even when making totally different decisions. A couple of examples:
With Danny St. John. Lee either angrily kills him, or he hurls a pitch fork and tells Danny he can't make him kill him. Different actions, but in both situations he clearly hates Danny and likely wants to kill even when he doesn't go through with it.
By contrast, you can't make Lee happy about killing Larry or Ben. Even if you had previously made comments about hating them, he clearly doesn't enjoy dropping Ben and he feels bad for Lilly in the immediate aftermath about what happens.
It'd be harder to do this for Clementine since in addition to her personality and our choices, you've also got the S1 choices to contend with. But if done right, it would have been really exciting to see who Clementine was becoming because we wouldn't actually decide that for, we'd see how our influence affects her as a person, almost like a real child. As I'm sure most parents can attest, you don't control kids, but certainly do affect them. If you structured Clementine in this way, a major feature of season two could have been watching to who she grows up to be. And we could be proud of her... or horrified at what lousy parents we would make. =P
EDIT: And it's JaDed X Gamer. I don't know no Jareds. =P
u wot m8
It'd be interesting if we had a dynamic similar to Tales from the Borderlands, with dual protagonists in the third Season. Perhaps Christa and Clementine, or Clementine and Gill (the little boy in Jane's ending.)
Tbh I'd rather play as an adult and have Clem as the NPC. Season 2 was okay with Clem as the prog but it just felt wierd playing as Clem imo. So used to protecting her in season 1. Then a year or 2 goes by and Clem changed drastically, hell now she's doing the protecting. She acts way too mature for her age and people treated her like an adult too.. Making her do everything, offering her drinks and smokes. I feel her character was just too rushed in S2. But after the way season 2 ended, the only way I could see there being a new playable character is if it if a DLC.
So Clementine doesn´t work as the protagonist because the shitty writers of this season made shitty decisions?
K
i feel like season two ended clementines story well, it basically took away any ambiguity about the season one ending and showed us what happened to clementine after lee died.
it seem to me like the perfect time to start a new story.
Yeah don't get me wrong, the plot is good and makes sense no doubt about that. After S1 everyone wanted to know where Clem will be in S2 so yeah it was a good move making Clem the protag. It just felt wierd playing as her and seeing her drastically change in a year or 2 imo. It felt rushed for her age. Seemed like Telltale tried to make Clem capable of anything an adult could do. Kickin down doors, stitching the huge dog bite by herself, drinking alcohal, smoking etc.. She's not even a teen yet... Overall it was still a good game, I enjoyed it.
I don't think Season 2 ended Clem's story at all though. Season 2 mostly ended with questions for her story in Season 3 if anything.
Endings with Kenny
-If you chose to goto Wellington; Is this a good place or is this another corrupt place like Carver's base, Terminus etc.
-If chose to leave with Kenny; How are we gonna survive? Where will we go now? How do we provide for AJ?
Ending with Jane
-If you chose to let the strangers in; Are these good people? Will Jane and Clem try and start a community?
-If you chose to deny the strangers; Will they be back and try to attack? Will we try and keep this place to our selves?
Ending with just AJ
-How the hell will Clem not only survive but raise a baby? Will she join a new group?
Clem as protagonist worked really well for me, because she was a child I felt like I had to constantly prove myself to the adults that I could be treated as an equal. With Lee he was the man and was respected by everyone in his group... except Larry... with Clem i felt I had to work for everyones respect... which worked out great.
No I clearly said what was wrong with it, A child cant be a protaganist in a game like this, the protaganist has to do much of the tasks in this game and a kid cant do this while maintaing realism. Plus I liked clem as a character not like she is now a bland vessel
i really didn't see any arc of proving herself and gaining peoples respect, it was more like:
sew your own stitches = getting treated as an adult and relied upon to do everything
and that happened at the end of episode 1
Ok so if we were Clem and did barely anything for the group I doubt it would be a fun game..
No, but if we were Clem, and the adults wouldn't let us do things, and we snuck out and did stuff anyways, it would probably be fun, and make more sense, and would also make Clem's action seem more like her own instead of being a workhorse for incompetent adults.
Maybe Clem will get older in S3 and her strenth will make more sense.