Telltale's The Walking Dead: Season 1: A Review of the Ending

Welcome back to my blog my spicy chicken nuggets~

So, I just finished playing Telltale’s The Walking Dead: Season 1 and I am, to put it simply, speechless.

I won’t lie to you, I already knew how the game ended, since this game has been out for quite awhile and I’ve seen it played on YouTube. Yet despite already knowing the tragedy of the ending, the emotions it evoked in me were felt on a whole different level when playing through the game myself. And I think this fact alone, the game’s ability to evoke such raw emotion when playing through the game on my own, making my own choices and developing my own connections to the characters, goes to show the true literary merit embedded within the game itself. Because I was the one making the choices that affected the story, the ending of the story became so much more meaningful to me, despite already knowing the ending.

Even though the ending of The Walking Dead: Season 1 is tragic, I do think it is a good ending. Of course, everyone’s definition of a good ending is different. For me, a good ending to a story is one that evokes raw emotion, whether good or bad, and doesn’t leave me feeling incomplete or, even worse, indifferent. A good ending is one where I feel an emotional connection to the characters, where I am invested in their outcome and care about their success. A good ending is one that leaves me missing the game and its characters, enticing me to play the game again.

I'll miss you, Lee...DX

I felt the most emotional connection to Clementine, since the player’s character Lee is presented with the goal of acting as her protector, and because she is so young, cute and innocent, I felt invested in her safety. The moment in the story that I felt most emotionally invested was when Clementine was kidnapped, because I felt as if I was racing against the clock of Lee being infected. Despite knowing the ending of the game, I didn't clearly remember what happened leading up to the end. Because I didn't know what actions affected what, I still had Lee cut off his arm, thinking that would give him some time to find Clementine.

cutieeeeee

I also loved the relationship Lee formed with Clementine, and that made the ending all the more terrible. Clementine just discovers that her parents are dead before witnessing Lee turn, forcing her to shoot him to save him from turning, effectively losing all her parental figures within a few minutes/hours. However, the ending is still good because it left me wanting more. It left me wanting to play Season 2, because I cared about Clementine and her outcome.

Overall, I absolutely loved this game. I felt like the story and game play was integrated perfectly, making me much more invested in the game. If my actions hadn’t been so involved in the story line, I definitely wouldn’t have been so emotionally invested and affected by the game’s ending.

Until next time~

ricecakerabbit