Telltale shouldn't be afraid of making players miss out on action sequences
I recently finished playing Michonne, and I read the alternate outcomes of the episodes and frankly it seemed like barely anything you did affected the final showdown with Norma. You'd think letting Pete have his plan of giving himself up would make the escape in Episode 2 less violent, but in fact either way you blow up the boat and leave Norma's community in flames. You'd think ignoring your bloodlust and hatred for Randall and sparing him would give you a better chance of resolving the hostage situation peacefully, but it doesn't either Gabby or Jonas will execute Berto and cause a bloody confrontation. It seems like regardless of how diplomatic you tried to be, you always end up destroying Norma's community and having her storm the Fairbank Residence.
Its clear why this was done, because of how much money was poured into that sequence, and all the effects, so they made sure you'd get to see it regardless of your choice. But what's the point of trying to be diplomatic with the antagonist if you know that in the end you'll end up fighting, you just end up doing what you want to do, without thinking of the impact on the group and the situation. Why hold back against Randall when you know it makes no difference at all to a peaceful resolution?
The thing is it could've worked, if you let Pete give himself up in Episode 2, letting you escape without needing to destroy Norma's community, Randalls attack could've been Randall being a psycho and not revenge for destroying Norma's Community, allowing you the option to peacefully resolve the confrontation with Norma. Missing out on the action sequence isn't a punishment in this case, it's a reward for playing your cards right. The satisfaction that you took a violent situation and made it a peaceful one, allowing you and your companions to end their story alive without any blood on your hands.
Comments
Too much work for Telltale
Don't really know what to say except telltale definitely could've done that. Also, on the topic of diplomacy, you should have been able to save Berto as well and to stop the house from being burnt down. That way when the Michonne's daughters/Sam situation came up, it would seem more significant in that you'd be choosing in a safe environment and it would be more difficult; as opposed to burning with your make believe daughters or escaping, it would be reality or the dream, and in the end if you stayed you'd see them in the woods, but if you didn't, they'd be gone for good. Even if telltale planned to bring back Paige, James, Alex and Sam in an oceanside community for season 3, they could have it so that they still lived at the house but traded regularly with oceanside and all. Disappointing to see potential get thrown away but at least they've improved from season 2 with the michonne series. Just frustrates me that they seem to try so hard with a lot of other series to do stuff like implement unique character designs for backgrounders, important choices and gameplay and strong relationship with interesting characters as well as more than 5 episodes for the main chunks of the series (as opposed to DLCs) while they tend to overlook TWD even though it's the series that made them so well known. Just hope they don't mess up season 3 like they did season 2.
It actually didn't require much extra work, all you need to do is cut the action scene, and come up with some contrivance to get the group to leave the house and skip to the ending scene at the pier. It'd be mostly dialogue changes, no new scenes really need to be added. Plus it will shake things up since most people have come to expect choices are an illusion, so it'd get people much more engaged in future titles.
This was one of the main problems I had with the Michonne mini-series, which was how blatant the linearity of the story was to the audience in comparison to the main series.
The game's engine is starting to show it's age and it could end up compromising the quality of the story of Season 3. At this rate the majority of the audience is going to end up recognizing patterns in the narrative, and correctly predicting what outcome Telltale will choose long before it even happens. And when it does inevitably happen the audience won't care as much, and whatever impact the story tries to make is lost because of it.
A standalone series had the potential to go all out on showing how diverse the direction of the story could go due to our choices, especially when it had no ties to the main series that could hold it back in terms of branching storytelling paths, and the story would still have a definite conclusion regardless of what ending we achieve. Instead, we continue to get the same outcome regardless of our choices, and this time the audience is not easily fooled into believing that a diplomatic approach was possible in the finale, because the story barely does much, if at all, to disguise the 'illusion of choice' it has.
The Michonne mini-series could easily have been a taste of what to expect in Season 3, but given how disappointing and blatantly linear the story was, I'm not all that optimistic that Season 3 will be any better.
It's probably worth nothing-- just to keep it in mind-- that most of the people that worked on the Michonne miniseries were newcomers to Telltale, and by extension, was their first major release. I think it's safe to say that you can attribute a fair amount of the quality difference (for better or for worse) between the miniseries and the main series to that.
Not trying to make any excuses or anything here, but just something to think about.
Difference is that if you let Pete go, you didn't kill anyone (intentionally) and burning down Monroe was an accident.
I'll admit that there were some good ideas and sequences in the mini-series, and the series was a very good first attempt for the newcomers. As you said, the mini-series was basically an individual project made by a completely different team that were not involved in the main series, so it was a little unfair to compare their project to the main series.
If by any chance that Season 3 will be made by the same people who made the mini-series, I hope that they will continue to improve on the long run. I only give out constructive criticism because I want to see people learn from their mistakes or improve on their shortcomings.
You missed the sarcasm
This is what disappointed me the most. When I watched episode 3 trailer, I did have thoughts that the choices would matter. But seems like Telltale was just f***ing with our heads, for example:
Telltale really really just wanted to show off their fire and flare physics to everyone.
Sarcasm is hard to pick up on the Internet.
Except for the flare physics that mattered, that was determinant.
Flare: hangs around in midair ...Oh, whoops. I'll just pop straight back into his mouth. Hang on.
Yeah, thats sadly true. Especially since text is almost emotionless.
An Obama meme seems so out of place in this conversation.
I only used it for the text and expression. It has nothing to do with Obama.
Why not just, you know, say it without using an image? Seems pointless.
The Walking Dead: Post-Apocalyptic Latino Rivalry
I AM A MEMER
(in case you haven't figured that already)
(jk)
This picture is funnier knowing what she's looking at.
I'm really glad they included this scene.
What was she looking at? I forgot :P
That's racist. And hypocrite considering you're from Chile.
I feel betrayed
I still don't know what the hell happened to his eyes.
Luke & Jane doing "it"
I'm just kidding. Thought it would make sense to post that, though, since out of everyone, Gabby decides to kill Berto on the spot, and they're the the only two Latino characters in the miniseries. There shall only be one.
I'm not really keeping track about my own ethnicity. It's probably something along the lines of Mixed Latino/Caucasian-Chilean. My skin is pretty light.
By the way, I'm flattered you remember where I'm from! Where are you from?
I'm from Mars
(besides, it was a joke. I'm a terrible joker D':)
Edit: And by joke I mean the part of the racist and hypocrite thing... sorry about that :P I'm not stupid enogh to explain my joke about Mars... I think)
Damn.
Swallowing a flare what a painful way to go, your eyes burning out their sockets, as well as your throat. Horrible.
Oh, don't worry—I understood what you referred to as joke.
I honestly wasn't planning to reveal my nationality, but I guess I just kind of shot myself on the foot by revealing that on the letter hacks. Then @Deltino caught me… [insert non-cingrey slang for laugh here]
I think the whole "They didn't do it because they spent a lot of money on this scene." excuse is bullshit. They don't care if you beat their game and see all the cool stuff in it they already have your money it's irrelevant whether or not you actually play it. People barely finish the games they buy anyways. Look at Season 1's global achievement stats only 40% of players that bought the game actually beat it. The reason they force you to go through the scene is because it's cheaper to make 1 scene and make up some bullshit reasons to force everyone to go through that scene regardless of their choices.