Telltale games isn't about you playing as a character but rather writing a story through certain characters

[Sandwichman]

I know it's kinda late to talk about this but, i don't know if it's just me thinking about these Telltale games and it's "The game adapts to how you play" thing is a bit lackluster and i'm not sure why.
Any answers?

Also this is just a discussion for fun out of my boredomness

[GhostyOsty]

Let's say, it was boring.

[Rumpelcrutchskin]

Well they dont really adapt, the story can still go only in one general direction no matter what choices you make.
Despite that their The Walking Dead 1, The Wolf Among Us and Tales from the Borderlands are some of the best games I have played. Rest of their stuff is weaker.

[Kargor]

Publicado originalmente por Aiden:

it's "The game adapts to how you play" thing is a bit lackluster and i'm not sure why.

Well, I don't have a lot of Telltale games (and I only remember "Back to the Future"). In the latter, I don't think it "adapted" at all -- like in other Point&Click adventures, you had to figure out the correct solution to proceed.

I don't know whether newer games tried something different, but I can imagine that "a bit lackluster" remains simply because "adapt to your gameplay" is not how Point&Click adventures usually work.

EDIT: yes, BTTF "adapted" to your selection of (fake) name. It had no impact on the story and only made Edna use that name for you -- in the first chapter. This was a multi-chapter game and saves didn't transfer, so she always used the same name from chapter 2 onwards :-)

[Naedmi]

Telltales version of a storytelling game that has many endings and plenty of branching storylines wasn't a bad selling point. The problem lies with how it was executed, in the majority of storytelling games released by them, things would only end in one of two ways, instead of many different ways.

The branching arcs they tried to sell the story on were only introduced for minor scenes where someone would say something a little different before or some minor character would be around for an episode longer before ultimately dying on the next.

That compared to other branching storytelling games like Heavy Rain or Detroit Become Human, things seem a little shallow if you decide to play it a second time.

[reg1s7]

I only know about TWD. TWD is not really a choice game, it is just a movie with several branches, but they converge back to a single point.

Btw, check this out:
https://youtu.be/aF35hFeXO9Q

[Washell]

Yeah well, there's a reason why they went bankrupt. They didn't use the initial income to make games that actually branch, but rather paid for IP's and kept making the same cookie cutter games. The novelty wore off.

[Killerwhale]

Am i the only one who liked Minecraft story Mode 1 and 2?

[Ⓥenom Ⓢnake 🐍]

I'm quite happy with the way telltale does stuff. Or more to the point did stuff. It's an interactive narrative, and I quite enjoyed it.

[GetToTheTop]

Telltale Games's strategy wasn't to create a game where your choices meant anything it was to create a game where the player THINKS their choices mean something. For example, a player would never know if their choices varied the plot unless they actually played the game again. They did this because actually creating a game with that many choices is extremely time consuming and requires a lot of writing. Eventually, people started seeing that they didn't really have choices when playing the game and the formula got stale.

[gugnihr]

Publicado originalmente por Aiden:

i don't know if it's just me thinking about these Telltale games and it's "The game adapts to how you play" thing is a bit lackluster and i'm not sure why.

I have never tried their games, but I would say that it's because that is a very difficult thing to do, and expecially when a game is very story driven (as far as I know their games are) and have a lot of text (I assume their games had a good amount of text)

[Exiled Alchemist]

The "choices matter" tag was just a shorter label for "choose your own adventure," and "choices have a consequence" as the labels tend to be a mouthful when talking about it. Sadly this label change created more problems as many didn't understand its use. Thus creating arguments in the community.

An example would be what Sierra did with it's adventure games. Where you had to complete a puzzle by getting a gem out of a tree. You could go to one spot to find a pile of rocks, but if you chose to pick one up the pile falls on you causing death. The other option is to get a ball from a dog. That can be obtained by getting meat from the market to make the dog drop the ball.

As for the games themselves I found that Telltale Games did a great job at keeping Adventure games alive for the modern times. It took staples made from old Sierra, and Lucas Arts adventure games, and put a new twist on them to keep the genre fresh.

[Ailes]

Choices matter is overrated from start. People expect too much from it. It will mostly always "just" be flavor text and relatively unimportant side characters being affected by it. As soon as a story branches out, or a character, it will be killed off soon enough or return to the main branch.

To make things worse, numerous Telltale titles are taking place within existing IPs/franchises. If you know the comic novels, books and/or shows from Game of Thrones or The Wolf Among Us, the stories and characters depicted in them and what can or cannot happen will inevitably be spoiled and have less impact than by not knowing anything beforehand.

This is why Tales from the Borderlands and even Minecraft: Story Mode are some of their better games: Those do not have much of a background story and lore to pay attention to. Tales was a genuine continuation of the story that ended in BL2, even having some original Gearbox writers contributing. In GoT, TWAU, TWD and I reckon in Batman too the Telltale writers couldn't be truly free.

For this reason you should thank David Cage/Quantic Dream that their games are never having any pre- or sequels. An isolated story in which can happen everything - this is the basic necessity if you wanna do "choices matter" in a believable manner. I have neither finished Life is Strange: Before the Storm nor Life is Strange 2, but all these principles apply to them to some degree too.

[gugnihr]

Publicado originalmente por ExiledAlchemist:

An example would be what Sierra did with it's adventure games. Where you had to complete a puzzle by getting a gem out of a tree. You could go to one spot to find a pile of rocks, but if you chose to pick one up the pile falls on you causing death. The other option is to get a ball from a dog. That can be obtained by getting meat from the market to make the dog drop the ball.

This is not a choice, this is just solving a puzzle. Games are interactive, if you call "choice" every kind of interaction you are just telling lies to advertise your game.

[Exiled Alchemist]

Publicado originalmente por gugnihr:

This is not a choice, this is just solving a puzzle. Games are interactive, if you call "choice" every kind of interaction you are just telling lies to advertise your game.

If you take the puzzle out of the equation you are still left with a choice. You can ether take the rock, or not take the rock. If you play the game for the first time you will not know the outcome of this action. Taking it could lead to a good, or bad outcome. That was how Sierra adventure games worked.

[Hidden]

Publicado originalmente por Aiden:

I know it's kinda late to talk about this but, i don't know if it's just me thinking about these Telltale games and it's "The game adapts to how you play" thing is a bit lackluster and i'm not sure why.
Any answers?

Also this is just a discussion for fun out of my boredomness

coiuldnt stand any of the games. Was clear my decisions didn;t matter, and there was so much unnecessary BS that i felt wayyyy above having to deal with.

I remember playing the walking dead telltale, and at one point the girl is literally forced to choose between to groups to sit with at lunch, to spark off drama. It was just lame.

Add that to your choices genuinely having very little impact in the overall events, and that half the time you would pick one dialogue option and have another play, and this just wasnt worth my time.

The problem with games like telltale games is this - they aren't good movies, and they aren't good games, yet people act like this fusion is somehow artistic and groundbreaking and anything other than a really bad movie disguised as a game.

Like how senuas sacrifice sold itself as a piece of art, instead of a lackluster game. it really seems to appeal to people who want to tell other people how smart they are for playing certain things.