Episode 3, make or break point?
There's been a lot of hate for S3 on these forums, while my own review is mixed on the series so far. I think how Episode 3 turns out will be the make or break point of the season.
This is going to be long so bear with me...
I've posted this on a discussion before on the parallels between Season 2 and Season 3 during the first two episodes, but I'll point it out here.
Season 2 Episode 1, Clem is alone, meets a group, finds a sanctuary (The cabin) one likeable character is killed (Pete).
Season 3 Episode 1, Clem is alone, meets Javier, goes to group, both find a sanctuary (Prescott) one likeable character is killed (Marianna)
Season 2 Episode 2, Return to sanctuary after death of likeable character, sanctuary instantly abandoned (cabin) travel, meet bearded messiah (Kenny), ends with standoff with bad guy (Carver's group)
Season 3 Episode 2, Return to sanctuary after death of likeable character, sanctuary attacked and abandoned (Prescott) travel, meet bearded messiah (Jesus) ends with standoff (or surrender) with bad guy (David and New frontier group).
Now before anyone nitpicks I know it's not as straightforward as that, but too me the plot follows a pretty similar story both ways. While Season 3's plot seems more focused however, I really enjoyed the mystery and tension that Season 2 brought in the first two episodes, everything was building towards this big bad settlement, the ominous figure of Carver, implied history of the cabin group not being saints, the fact not all of the Carver's guards seemed like so black and white evil or good and had a moral grey area (demonstrated with Bonnie).
Then Episode 3 came along and despite the flaws in Episodes 1 and 2, Season 2 took a nosedive due to Episode 3 essentially abandoning what the series had been building up to for the past two episodes, with Episodes 4 and 5 really lacking a solid story like Season 1 did, hence making my fight for survival as Clementine feel aimless compared what we were driving towards in Season 1.
Now we have Episode 3 of Season 3 on the way and the comparisons are there, with Javi and Clementine's flashbacks building on the big baddie's (The New Frontier) with Javi knowing their leader David and what type of man he was in his flashbacks and Clementine first being associated with them through Ava, it's created a decent backstory and intrigue (like Season 2 did with the cabin group's behaviour and dialogue and the visit of Carver himself) there's the implication not all of the New Frontier are evil (Clem, Ava, Max) and the fact Clementine has a dark past with them that can be explored, similar to the cabin group in Season 2.
Of course In Harm's Way threw so much potential out of the window and what followed made were two mediocre episodes in my eyes, so far I've enjoyed Season 3's first two episodes. Yes they have their massive flaws (Kenny and Jane's fate, the length of the episodes) but are okay. Due to more action and less down moments, I'd rate them slightly below All That Remains and A House Divided.
But Episode 3 could be the episode that makes Season 3, by exploring Clementine's past with the group, David's reaction to his daughter's death, what's going to happen to Eleanor and Tripp? Gabe being torn between his father and Javi, the fate of Kate, Max maybe getting some redemption or something? There are a ton of plotlines to explore and develop and if Episode 3 does it right then the first two episodes have been building to something great and creating a meaningful story.
But if it fails, then I can see this series taking a serious nosedive.
Thanks for reading, let me know what you think below, are you excited for Episode 3, do you have faith Telltale can do it justice?
Comments
I was really hoping ep 3 would make up for 1 and 2, but after hearing about the rewrites, I don't know anymore. Now I'm just scared it's going to be 3 months of waiting for a poorly written 1 hour episode. Conrad is probably going to die or just act like he isn't there, and I'm sure Max will help us and then get killed because "character development"
I am honestly terrified for the next episode. Hope I'm not the only one.
Rest assured, you're not. Pretty sure a 3rd of the forum agrees with you there. Under the impression that they haven't already dropped the series entirely.
I'm not terrified as much as I am...interested. I don't know. I still liked the premiere (LOVE being in the minority about that) but the ending to episode 2 was just...really stupid.
When most YouTube commentators saw David as the leader, they all flipped shit or reacted in a shocked manner somehow. As if they liked the twist. But me? I just went, "Really?" I sat there, watching the credits and the decision highlight thing in slight disappointment. It was waaaayyyy too fucking coincidental, man.
It was godawful from a writing stand point. But interesting from Javier's. "My brother leads an evil faction in the apocalypse." I'd be lying like shit if I said I didn't wanna see the tension and how that whole thing would play out. Only time will tell.
I'm nervous, but hopeful. I had high expectations for this game, and they weren't met. This was mostly because of Kenny, Jane, and Wellington. I see these rewrites as a restart, a clean slate. They're re-evaluating everything and hopefully listening to feedback.
As much as I loved S2 I do understand the parallels that your making. We might end up getting an episode 3 where we're stuck in Richmond under the rule of a mad man just like S2's episode 3. Of course the rest of the season can literally go anywhere, this is just a strong possibility.
I enjoyed parts of episode 1 a great deal, namely the time spent traveling with Clementine. As far as new characters go, I like Tripp, Eleanor doesn't rub me the wrong way but we've barely spoken to her, and while Javier is much more of a typical character than either Lee or Clem I enjoyed his interactions, though that's a biased answer because I generally set the tone for his interactions with my decisions.
Second episode was too action packed for my liking, I felt minimal progress was made when it came to getting to know the characters better because it felt like we were constantly moving to a new QTE action sequence.
They definitely need to make the answers clearer during some of the conversations, I felt like intervening during your brothers argument and "I'm old enough" were misleading labels to force players into developing the very narrow story they seem to be trying to tell with them. Also, wtf was up with "don't worry about her"? The length of flashbacks and the episodes in general needs to be addressed, and I'd personally like Clem to be as involved as possible. They've had time to take in peoples criticisms and make adjustments going forward, hopefully they do so.
I'm willing to give the rest of the season a fair chance. If it turns out I like the next three episodes, then hey, TellTale saved the game for me. If I end up being as disappointed as I currently am, then TellTale failed and needs new management, because that's obviously what the main problem in the company is nowadays.
Honestly, I'm not sure. There's some things I'm excited for, but whether or not they'll even explore those things or brush them off to the side is still up in the air (how will David react to Mari being killed by his own people? It could be interesting... or they'll just make him find a way to blame Javi anyways, and not actually see the effect it has on him)
And the rewrites don't fill me with too much confidence. Nor is the fact that quite a lot of S3 seems to be reused and repurposed stuff, as if the dev team haven't had the time to really put their all into it. It's like they listened to the criticisms of S2... then decided to purposely ignore it anyways. Episodes get shorter, hubs get smaller, character development gets lesser, characters themselves get more cookie-cutter, choices get less difficult, choice outcomes get less varied, gameplay gets less... game-y. Why are they seemingly going backwards after the shitstorm S2 caused on here? This forum may have gotten hostile at times, but a lot of the major criticisms of S2 were quite clear; longer episodes, more hubs, more character development, more choice impact... that's the stuff people really wanted. But now those elements are regressing even more in S3.
But that's the thing-- I don't think that's the developers' fault. If they had it their way, they probably would have listened to the critcisms and worked to improve. They would have taken their time. But I'm willing to bet most of them just got shifted onto other projects, or replaced by people that haven't even worked on the series prior, or just forced to cut corners like it's crunch time at the circle factory.
I'm still standing by my belief that it's mostly related to management. They're the ones hampering the quality of these games, and the developers and designers still get blamed for everything because some genius thought it'd be better to replace the guys that wrote for both seasons with some dudes that haven't even worked on the series before. I can't be the only one that finds it a bit weird that out of the 7 writers on episode 1, and the 8 writers on episode 2, only two of the people listed actually worked on previous seasons, right? And the other 5/6 are either new to the company, or haven't worked on TWD prior. And I'm sitting here wondering "Why put new people on, when the previous team probably learned from their mistakes and have improved since then?"
A decision like that is a conscious decision from someone higher up in the company. It's not like all the S2 writers huddled up and granted knighthood to some other guy. Nine times out of ten, stupid decisions like that come from executives. It's almost always the case in video game development. Rarely do you have an actual development team making stupid decisions; it's someone else making the stupid decisions for them. Someone they can't really argue with unless they want to risk their job.
So to sum it all up: if Telltale-- or more specifically, their management-- would unfuck themselves and get their shit together, then yes, I think there is a good chance things would work out for this series going forward, as well as any new series on the horizon
But unfortunately, the only way I see the above happening is if people make a big enough fuss about it, and by extension, cost them enough money/profit for them to decide to restructure things at the company, hopefully rotating in people better suited for the job. And that's something that would take time, which means some series will have to suffer before things start to get better.
I'm in a really weird place regarding the Walking Dead at the moment. I loved the first two episodes, and majorly disagree with most of the criticisms. So I'm in this weird place where I know I'll love episode 3, but I'm concerned about how forum members will react to it. This may not be true, but it feels like that no matter what Telltale does people are gonna shit on the game.
I think there's pretty much no going back (aye) on this season. They've burned their bridges pretty badly if not to the ground. The poorly and I mean motherfucking poorly written flashbacks, completely negating the main point of Season 2 in Kenny vs Jane in about 90 seconds. Also, the shortness of the episode feels like we're not even supposed to be done with episode 1 yet, let alone heading into episode 3. The poorly written new characters that I feel no investment in at all. The big return at the end felt like a real let down to me. We see David for what? 10 minutes at most? And yet I'm supposed to give a damn when they bring him back as the big twist in the series? Really? Really. There's no time left (aye) for the season to pick up. They've already dug their grave, and there's an extremely minimal chance (you know, unless they wanna make that piece of shit they called a flashback as a dream and bring back Kenny/Jane in real time) they're getting out of it. I miss Season 1 days. Hell I miss Season 2 days.
I've been curious about the re-writes as well, on one hand they could show that Telltale is listening to us and are making Episode 3 a better story overall, or it could show that they have no idea what they're doing and rush out (like you said) an hour long episode with predictable cliches and twists.
Also for your predictions, I have a feeling they will sadly come true, that's another issue with Season 3 so far it seems too predictable, even Marianna's death and David's return while meant to be shocking just left me like... meh. Okay Marianna's death was quite surprising at first, but afterwards she just seemed like something of a plot device... nice little girl... has to die to fuel Javi's amonisity with the New Frontier. Her death serves a plot purpose but I just wish we knew her more so it wasn't a case of "Oh she's cool, well she's obviously going to die... oh yep I'm right there she goes".
As for David's return, yeah from the flashbacks I knew he was coming back, if they could bring Kenny back, David's obviously alive. I don't mind him returning it's just the fact they ended the episode on his return like it was meant to be a massive, shocking cliffhanger, while it does leave interesting possibilities ahead, it wasn't really that shocking (as many youtubers make it out to be).
Anyway sorry about that, went off on a tangent there but I hope your predictions about the characters don't come true, although I have a feeling (sadly) they might do.
I can't tell you how much I agree on the Youtube commentators, acting as if Lee had returned the second they saw David again judging by their gasps and "OH MY GOD's...!" really gives you an insight in how click-baity and fake they can be because anyone playing the game can't have overreacted that much, when it was made quite obvious from the flashbacks David would be returning.
Hopefully they are listening to the feedback, as that's what these forums are here for.
It's gonna be shit.
That's my fear for the rest of the season, I don't want to look back by the time we get to Episode 5 and go "Episodes 1 and 2 were amazing, compared to what happened later", like I did with Season 2 (sorry if you love it, but after Episode 3 is where my opinion of Season 2 just lowers dramatically). Season 3 can go anywhere but hopefully they keep to an interesting story arc.
I was shocked that David was the leader, but yes they did overreact quite a bit.
Like I said my opinion of Season 3 is mixed, mainly due the differences between Episode 1 and 2, Episode 1 was pretty promising, we got introduced to new characters, a new community, a darker and more intriguing Clementine, the threat of the New Frontier... it was pretty good.
Enter Episode 2, new community falls in five minutes, characters dying everywhere, walker hordes everywhere, easy QTE's with walker herds, with Javier scooping headshots like a good Widowmaker (had to make Overwatch reference somewhere on here). Compare that to Lee's first encounter with a walker A New Day, or that frantic walker killing at the end of No Time Left, the heart in your mouth and tension filled scenes are gone, as are the threat of walkers despite the fact there's a giant herd on our asses we're meant to be worried about. Episode 1 set up the threat of walkers pretty well, with Episode 2 throwing it out of the window, in some typical, tension-less Michael Bay style action scenes, so long story short, yes I agree with you about Episode 2.
The dialogue exposes a narrow story, so once again I agree with you there and yep we can only hope Telltale listens and makes an awesome episode 3.
They won't listen to feedback. Since when does Telltale even communicate to their customers - Season 3 has gotten good reviews and that's what counts for Telltale. They don't care about fans.
Lowkey hoping I'm wrong.
Wow, that's a very detailed reply and thanks for sharing your opinion on the matter so far. I wonder if any of the higher up's will ever look on the forums on here or simply and briefly check the mainstream gaming media (IGN etc...) and popular youtube reaction videos, which all show Season 3 in a very positive light so far and ignore many of the growing concerns and criticisms from the fans.
I wouldn't be posting here if the Walking Dead didn't mean much to me, or many others here. This is the game that reduced grown men to tears, the game that surprised us all and took an already popular franchise with an acclaimed comic series and tv show and outshone both of those completely, with only 5 episodes under their belt, Telltale gained more reaction and investment from me, than 100 issues of the comic, or 6 series of the show managed to do. It's really sad to see how far they are falling in recent times compared to when they were at their best.
If the "continuation" was actually well written and not bad in literally every single area except graphics, we wouldn't be whining.
That's fine, I can see where you're coming from in liking Season 3. I want to like it as well, but I just find the quality has dropped since Season 1 so much it's impossible to like it without comparing it to Season 1.
Hell, maybe if Season 3's story was released first we wouldn't be complaining as much, but because Telltale set the bar so high with Season 1 and we know what they are capable of (plus they had two years to work on the game) we expected a lot more. But I'm glad you're able to enjoy Season 3 and I'd be lying if I said I disliked every second as there are certain parts (mostly in Episode 1) where it was enjoyable.
I can see us joining TNF because I remember seeing Javier with the mark on his neck in previews before the game came out. BUT Clem was missing part of a finger in same clip which only happens depending on your choice of ending in S2. So might be same for Javier and his neck? I'm hoping it's not a big wait for Ep3. There wasn't even a clip for next episode which normally happens.
See that's the thing, I'm convinced that if season 1 came out today, fans would think it's garbage. Nobody around here seems to like anything anymore.
I think that they will do an epic comeback of greatness in the two next eps then dissapoint us again with a nonsense ending in ep5 but with Clem alive so they will release an hyping trailer of S4 with Clementine as main character playable and ta-daa one more year making money and selling ilussions.
What really sold Season Two to me was Clementine, playing as her and ultimately being her protector. Now we're this Javi guy and I'm a little concerned they're gearing up for a departure with Clementine.
I think Episode 3 will make the season if we get to play as Clementine again, even split between Javi and her.
Thinking from a corporate standpoint, if they continue to mess this up there will be less hype for future seasons. This means less money, and that would be a significant blow for Telltale. They're listening, at least a little bit.
I still believe.
Oh lol please do tell me TellTale decided to rewrite EP 3 XDDDDDDDDD
WELL it's worth the wait for me, i'd rather wait 3 months for a properly written ep, instead of contiuing on this flawed line of rushed story for money.
By the first line I meant that its surprising that TTG actually IS rewriting, thought they dont care anymoar.
But its maybe just Clem's VA stating her opinion on ANF and its the same as mine and many others'.
I still have hope that Kenny/Jane scene was a nightmare, and they DO add story diversity, and making decisions matter.
That would be one way they can make up for that fuked up premiere.
I'm sure people still like aspects of Season 3, just not the whole product and the negativity seems to get a lot more attention than the positive things. Then again considering we were waiting for 2 years I can understand why people are pissed off (especially considering the flashbacks).
As for Season 1, I think if it was released today it would be under a lot more scrutiny, but would still pass as a good game. Take The Last Of Us for example, that's generally regarded as a brilliant game and wasn't released too long ago, or was released while expectations for zombie games was already sky high (in the aftermath of the Walking Dead) yet many consider that equal to (or above) the walking dead in terms of story, characterisation and many other things.
All that being said, Season 1 took us by surprise and left us with good memories, there wasn't time to analyse every episode or point out the good and bad as the fanbase was still growing by that point. Now we're at Season 3 many people are so attached to Clem and want her narrative to continue with the brilliance Season 1 left us with, that we can't help but be disappointed with how the final product's turned out.
However like I said before, I get where you're coming from, Season 1 wouldn't be considered garbage if it was released today but I imagine you'd see some discussions pointing out it's flaws. Although no-where near on the scale of Season 3 so far.
Liking that pun BroKenny, but I too miss Season 1 and now I'm starting to miss Season 2 as well. Yes it had it's flaws, but I hope it doesn't come to the point where we reach Season 6 and I'm saying "Oh I never thought I'd miss Season 3, but I do because compared to this..." that will be the day IGN decides to lower their scores for the Walking Dead to say... GASP! a 7 or 6 and maybe mainstream youtubers and gaming media will start to realise the game isn't that good anymore (if this downward spiral continues that is).
I agree with you on David, I couldn't stand him, In Episode 1 his behaviour was understandable because his father has just died and he was upset and jealous of Javi. But in Episode 2 we get more on his character and I don't like it at all, it's implied he abuses (or mistreats) Kate, has to have his way with everything, seems like a basic Grade A prick and wannabe Alpha Male. Gabe's comment about "wanting to be a real man" like his father really made me hate the kid. So he looks up to someone like David? Hell, I don't know enough to judge, but a man who cares more about his prized cup being broken than the fact his wife's hand has been cut open, strikes a bad chord with me. Maybe Gabe didn't know all that much about his father's true nature, so I'll cut him some slack on that, but his comment still annoyed me regardless.
Carrying on from this point (yes i'm ranting now) we've spent about 10 minutes in game with David like you said. The only impression I've got from him is what I mentioned above, plus the fact Clementine said the new frontier used to be good people until a certain point. Makes me strongly suspicious David has had a lot to do with the way it's turned out, if he throws a BF and blames Javi for Marianna's death then I'm done with his character. Those are supposed to be his men and his allies, so acknowledging the part he played in that and seeing some guilt or remorse from him is what I want to see in Episode 3, also expand on his military background or what he went through during the apocalypse. Give us some reasoning Telltale to as why the way he is, rather than show us short flashbacks and expect us to receive him as a morally grey character I'm supposed to care or feel shocked about returning, but in reality couldn't care less about.
Sorry for going on like that, but yeah I miss the old days too. It would be an awesome twist if the flashbacks were just nightmares from Clementine and Jane/Kenny were with the New Frontier with AJ... that would be great but most likely not going to happen.
I noticed that, which means EP3 may be a while off for now, but hopefully they take their time with it and produce a good episode.
I prefer to be optimistic, but... I wouldn't be surprised if it is.
No one would.
Hmmm... nonsense ending? In a...Introduce a new character in E3, have them fight Javier in the final episode and Clem must decide between them, sort of nonsense ending?
I don't mind playing as Javi, but the split is very uneven at the moment and I agree playing more Clem in E3 would be a starting point for making the episode good.
Dammit dude now you've got me wondering if it was a dream, because if my memory serves correctly, Clem did close her eyes when we went into the flashbacks so it very well could have been a dream. But, with so much let down in the past, chances of it happening are slim to none. Ah well, let's just pretend Season 2 was the final chapter and Clem, AJ, & Kenny/Jane live happily ever after!
they're re-writing ep 3? who's writing that shit? please not Kane..
I would.
Okay, most people wouldn't.
Episode 3 will be interesting to see what they do with it. Seeing how as of now they have really no clue what they're doing and the heavy amount of polarizing reactions it does leave an interesting situation for Telltale. In my opinion at least i don't feel Telltale has to do any real hard work to improve or save the series depending on perspective as most of the problems can be easily corrected. Whatever ends up happening i do hope this installment ends up being quite good and enjoyable as i do believe this is it for Telltale's Walking dead series.