Game Name: The Wolf Among Us
Developer: TellTale Games
Publisher: TellTale Games
Price: 24.99$ (XBOX One)
Platforms: XBOX One, XBOX 360, Playstation 3 and 4, Windows and Mac
Release Date: October 11, 2013
Introduction
I downloaded this game because at some point the game was free with Games with Gold. I had heard about it in the past but it had never peaked my interest. Since nothing is better than free to peak my interest, I tried it out.
Gameplay
The game is about Fabled characters that live in the town of Fabletown. I know it is very original. You play the role of Mr. Wolf (Big Bad Wolf). He is the sheriff of Fabletown and during the game you try to solve crimes and murders.
The first thing that really struck me are the visuals of this game. The animation is very unique and it is not the usual graphics for a video game. This has been the staple of TellTale games. It is done in the style of the Archer animated series. You will see below in the sample gameplay.
The gameplay is not what you would typically think of what a game is. This is definitely not a button masher. The game is one big movie, where you choose the outcome. You will be presented with choices depending on the situation. The choices you make affect the the way the game will unfold. Think of watching the TV show, Once Upon a Time but instead of watching every episode, you get to choose how the story unfolds.
There are 5 episodes to play through. every episode has 5 chapters. Sometimes it is difficult to know when a chapter ends because the game will just continue. You only know that it ends when you have the pop up that says you are done with the achievement.
Although you get to investigate certain places and people, the game does not feel as if you would really get a different outcome depending on your choices. From what I have played the gameplay seems very linear. You do have some parts where you will fight and you need to follow the instructions on the screen, but these are few and far in between and it often catches you off guard.
The controls are very simple. When investigating, you will see white circles. This is where you need to put the crosshair so that you can have different options depending on the item or object being looked at. Usually Yellow is the Y, Red is B, Blue is X and Green is B. Yellow is to look at something. Red is usually a physical fighting or hitting an object. Green means that you need to crouch or pick up something and blue is usually the talking bubble. You press this to talk to the person that you are hovering over. So since the instructions are on the screen you rarely have any choice to do any of those. Yes the dialogue may change depending on the option but there is not enough variety.
Below is sample gameplay from this game.
The Wolf Among US - Sample Gameplay
Bottomline
In the end it is an easy game to play. It would be like watching a TV series and controlling the outcome. I do not really consider this a game per say. You don't really play a game. You just make decisions based on the scenario. I have not played this game more than once. I would need to play again to see if the outcomes are that much different than the first time that I played.
Since this game was released I have played a few other TellTale games such as Batman and The Walking Dead. The strength in these games is not the gameplay but the story. This game is no exception.
My wife liked sitting beside me watching the storyline unfold so it does have its appeal. I liked the storyline as it was entertaining. The idea that some gamers might find this boring is true. However there have been many games that have come out recently that follow a sjmilar format such as Murdered: Soul Suspect and Detroit: Become Human.
Rating: 8 fabled characters out of 10
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