Setting and characters

Several members of the main cast of survivors of The Walking Dead by Episode 4. From left, Christa, Omid, Kenny, Lee, Ben, and Chuck.

The Walking Dead occurs simultaneously with the events from the original comic series, where a zombie apocalypse overwhelms much of society.^[12][13][14] Characters in the game come to call the zombies "walkers", due to the slowness of their movement. Although the survivors initially think that being bitten by a zombie is the only way to become infected, it is later discovered that one becomes a zombie upon death irrespective of the manner in which one dies; only by damaging the brain can the reanimation be stopped. As with the comic and television series, the game's events occur in the state of Georgia.

Numerous characters appear throughout the game. Lee Everett (voiced by Dave Fennoy^[15]), the primary protagonist, is a native of Macon and a former university professor convicted for killing a state senator who was sleeping with his wife.^[16] Lee finds and becomes a father figure to Clementine (voiced by Melissa Hutchison^[17]), an eight-year-old whose parents had left for Savannah, leaving her with a babysitter who was killed by the walkers. Lee and Clementine join a family from Fort Lauderdale, Florida; Kenny (voiced by Gavin Hammon^[18]), a fisherman who prioritizes his family above all else;^[19] Katjaa, Kenny's wife, who works as a veterinarian (voiced by Cissy Jones^[20]);^[21] and Kenny and Katjaa's son, Kenny Jr. (voiced by Max Kaufman^[22]), nicknamed "Duck".^[21] The five join a survivor group led by Lilly (voiced by Nicki Rapp^[23]), who was formerly stationed on the Robins Air Force Base.^[24] Lilly's group consists of Larry (voiced by Terry McGovern^[25]), her aggressive and judgmental father, a retired U.S. Army commander who knows Lee's past;^[26] Carley (voiced by Nicole Vigil^[27]) a quick-thinking regional news reporter who is also aware of Lee's past but is open-minded about him;^[24] Doug (voiced by Sam Joan^[28]), a resourceful and logical information systems technician;^[26] and Glenn Rhee (voiced by Nick Herman^[29]), a former pizza delivery boy.^[30] In the second episode, two more people join the group: Mark (voiced by Mark Middleton^[31]), a survivor who used to work for the U.S. Air Force; and Ben Paul (voiced by Trevor Hoffman^[32]), a high school student rescued by Lee, Mark and Kenny. Also introduced in the second episode are the farmers-cannibals the St. Johns, consisting of Andy (voiced by Adam Harrington), his brother Danny (voiced by Brian Sommer), and their mother Brenda (voiced by Jeanie Kelsey). In the third episode, more characters are introduced; Chuck (voiced by Roger Jackson^[33]), a level-headed homeless man who lives in a boxcar; and Omid and Christa (voiced by Owen Thomas^[34] and Mara Junot^[35] respectively), a young couple who tend to stay away from large groups. The fourth episode introduces two more characters; Molly (voiced by Erin Ashe^[36]), an acrobatic and resourceful young woman who carries an ice axe; and Vernon (voiced by Butch Engle^[37]), a doctor and leader of a group of cancer survivors hiding in the morgue of a hospital. The Stranger (voiced by Anthony Lam,^[38] and by Roger Jackson through the walkie-talkie) is a mysterious man that communicates to Clementine via her walkie-talkie as the group nears Savannah.

Plot

The following summary is a broad overview of the work, describing the major events that occur regardless of player choice. Some specific elements not listed here will change based on the impact of player choices.

Lee is on his way to prison when the police car he is in crashes off-road after hitting a walker. After killing the zombified cop, he flees a group of walkers, and while taking shelter in a suburban home, meets Clementine, whose parents had traveled to Savannah. The two arrive at the farm of Hershel Greene, meeting Kenny, Katjaa, and their son Duck. After Hershel's son Shawn is killed by walkers, he evicts the others. The group travels to Macon, Lee's hometown, where they join another group led by Lilly barricaded in Lee's family's pharmacy, where Lee finds his parents and brother are dead. The group is forced to flee to a nearby defensible motel to stay.

Three months later, the group is running low on supplies. They take the offer of providing gasoline to the St. Johns, who run a nearby dairy, in exchange for food, but discover that the family has engaged in cannibalism. The group overcomes the St. Johns and leaves the farm to be overridden by walkers. On their way back to the motel, they come across a car packed with provisions, which the group ransack. Some time later, the motel is attacked by bandits, which draws a walker horde. The group escapes, though Duck is bitten by a walker. Lilly is either evicted from the group or steals Kenny’s RV, after she has become unstable due to losing her father Larry during the events with the St. Johns. As Lee's group prepares to Savannah via train with plans to find a boat to escape the mainland, but before heading to Savannah, Lee encounters Chuck, a wise and resourceful homeless survivor living in a boxcar. Chuck advises Lee to teach Clementine self-defense using guns and shooting techniques and to cut her hair to avoid being easily grabbed by walkers. En route, Duck succumbs to the bite, driving Katjaa to suicide. Near Savannah, Lee's group meets Omid and Christa who join them. Clementine's walkie-talkie goes off, and a man tells her he has her parents in Savannah.

The group sets up shelter in an abandoned mansion and Lee and Kenny go to River Street and discover that all the boats have been taken or destroyed, and useful supplies have been scavenged by the walled community, Crawford. Separated from the others, Lee meets another group of survivors led by Vernon, who helps him return to the mansion, where they discover a parked motorboat in a backyard shed. Lee and the others lead a raid on Crawford for supplies but discover the whole community has been overrun by walkers. Once they return to the mansion, Vernon leaves to return to his group but tells Lee he does not think he is fit to be a guardian for Clementine.

Desperate to find her parents, Clementine goes missing. In his haste to find her, Lee is bitten by a walker. Realising his time is short, he tries to find Vernon's group but finds they have stolen the boat. Clementine tells Lee over the walkie-talkie that the stranger is holding her at a downtown hotel, the same that Clementine's parents were staying at. Lee's group takes to the rooftops to avoid the walkers in the streets, but Kenny is seemingly lost. Eventually, Lee separates from Omid and Christa.

Lee continues alone to find Clementine held captive by the stranger, who reveals himself to be the owner of the car the group had previously ransacked and caused the death of his family. Lee and Clementine kill the stranger, and the two cover themselves in walker guts to mask their scent from the horde roaming outside. While in the streets, Clementine sees her zombified parents, and drags a weakening Lee into an abandoned store. After working together to kill a walker, Lee tells Clementine to escape the city and find Omid and Christa. Lee can ask Clementine to kill him before he turns or to leave him behind to turn. If he does not decide, Clementine will choose herself based on Lee's previous actions. In a post-credits scene, Clementine, who has escaped the city, sees two figures in the distance who notice her.

400 Days

The downloadable content 400 Days relates stories of other survivors in the zombie apocalypse, starting at its onset and occurring concurrently with the first season.

There are five main stories:

• Vince (Anthony Lam) has been sentenced to prison for murder, which he had done to help his brother sometime prior to the outbreak. On Day 2 of the outbreak, Vince is on a prison-bound bus with Danny (Erik Braa) and Justin (Trevor Hoffmann) when following a stand-off, it is engulfed by walkers. Vince chooses one of the two to escape with, leaving the other to die.
• Wyatt (Jace Smykel) and his friend Eddie (Brandon Bales) have killed a friend of Nate (Jefferson Arca) and are fleeing from him in a car on Day 41 of the outbreak when they run over one of the prison guards from Vince's bus in a dense fog. One of them gets out to save the guard but is abandoned when the other one is attacked by Nate and flees in the car.
• Russell (Vegas Trip) is a teenager travelling by foot to visit his grandmother. On Day 184 of the outbreak he is picked up by Nate, who takes Russell to a nearby gas station and truck stop, where they are attacked by an elderly man named Walt. Nate suggests killing and robbing Walt and his wife Jean, with Russell deliberating on staying with Nate or leaving him.
• Bonnie (Erin Yvette) is a former drug-addict traveling with Leland (Adam Harrington) and his wife Dee (Cissy Jones). Dee distrusts Bonnie due to suspecting that Leland is attracted to her. On Day 220 of the outbreak they are pursued by survivors that Dee stole supplies from, forcing them to split up into a corn field. After accidentally killing Dee with a rebar, Bonnie must decide whether to tell Leland the truth or lie.
• Shel (Cissy Jones) and her younger sister Becca (Brett Pels) are members of the group seen in Bonnie's story and are residing in the truck stop seen in Russell's story. Several members are also Vernon's former companions who Lee encountered in Savannah. Roman (Kid Beyond) holds firm control of the group. When a Portuguese scavenger named Roberto attempts to steal from the group on Day 236 of the outbreak, Shel is given the deciding vote on him being killed or allowed to leave. Later on Day 259, fellow group member Stephanie (Dana Bauer) is caught stealing supplies, causing Roman to ask Shel to kill her. Shel then either goes through with it or escapes the camp with Becca on their caravan.

The five stories culminate in a final scene on Day 400 where Tavia (Rashida Clendening) discovers photos of the survivors on a billboard near the now-overrun truck stop, along with a map to a nearby location. She finds the group and offers them sanctuary nearby. Bonnie accepts, with the others either accepting or refusing depending on either their past choices or whether Tavia successfully convinces them.

Supplemental episodes

An additional episode, titled 400 Days, was released in July 2013 as downloadable content, bridging the gap between the first and second season. It focuses on five new characters, and is presented in a nonlinear narrative style; players can approach the five stories in any order they choose.^[44]

Early development and rights acquisition

Prior to The Walking Dead, Telltale Games had made several successful episodic adventure games based on established properties, including three seasons of Sam & Max based on the comics and prior video games, and the five-episode Tales of Monkey Island, based upon the Monkey Island video game series. In 2010, the company secured the rights to two licensed movie properties from Universal Studios, resulting in Back to the Future: The Game and Jurassic Park: The Game. The latter included elements atypical of adventure games, including more action-oriented sequences incorporating quick time events, and was inspired by Quantic Dream's Heavy Rain.^[45]

Sean Vanaman said prior to getting the rights to The Walking Dead, Telltale's Carl Muckenhoupt had been working on a text-based prototype adventure game with a key gameplay focus of having an "active world", in which objects and characters in the environment would continue to go about their actions even if the player did not respond to them. Dave Grossman called this one of the long-standing problems that adventure games had had, as games in the past would have otherwise had to wait for player input. Telltale had approached Valve about using this concept for a Left 4 Dead spinoff game, another series that involved zombies, but these discussions failed to result in anything.^[46]

In February 2011, Telltale announced simultaneous deals with Robert Kirkman and Warner Bros. to develop episodic series based on both The Walking Dead and Fables, respectively.^[47][48][49] For The Walking Dead, the agreement included provisions for "multi-year, multi-platform, multi-title" arrangements, with an initial episodic series release to commence in the fourth quarter of 2011.^[49]

Writing

During development of the game, Robert Kirkman and the comic publisher Skybound Entertainment worked with Telltale.^[50] According to Kirkman, he had previously played Telltale's Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People, and felt that they "were more focused on telling a good story, and I thought they were good at engaging the player in the narrative."^[51] Telltale approached him with a proposal which, according to Kirkman, "involved decision-making and consequences rather than ammunition gathering or jumping over things." The proposal's emphasis on the survival aspect of the comics, and the need for the player to make choices between two bad options sold him on the project.^[51] Since then, Kirkman became involved with Telltale, mostly providing oversight on what aspects of the story were appropriate components of The Walking Dead universe, in much the same manner as he does for the television show, staying out of the direct development process.^[51] Dan Connors, CEO of Telltale, stated that working with Kirkman made it easier for Telltale to craft its story and introduce new characters, instead of having to work with those already established in the comic.^[50][52] One of the few demands Kirkman asked of Telltale was to avoid telling anything involved with the comic's main character, Rick Grimes, as Kirkman has stated long-term plans with the character in other media.^[52] Kirkman had not been impressed with an early build of the first episode, but by the time they had presented him with a near-final build, Kirkman told the Telltale team, "Holy shit guys, you did it", according to the game's co-lead developer Jake Rodkin.^[53]

Connors stated that from a gameplay perspective, they had looked to games such as Heavy Rain and the Uncharted series as a basis for in-game cinematics, while the idea of giving the player choice was influenced by the Mass Effect series.^[50] In addition to the television version of The Walking Dead, Telltale took cues from Game of Thrones and Mad Men in terms of how to develop characters within a brief time.^[50] Connors also noted that he found that traditional conversation trees did not possess "a believable rhythm" to dialog, and developed a conversion system, using timed input, to create more natural-sounding dialog.^[54]

The game's story was written with the final scene in the fifth episode, where Clementine either shoots Lee or walks away to let him become a walker, as the established ending that the game would build towards.^[38][55] As such, the character of Clementine was considered critical to the game's writing, and the team spent much time making her the "moral compass" for the game, while assuring that as a child character, she would not come off to the player as whining or annoying.^[55] Similarly, the scene with the Stranger in the hotel room was planned very early in development, and also used to review the player's decisions on a moral basis, allowing the player to respond, if they desired, to the allegations.^[38] Each episode was developed by pairing a writer and a game designer so that the plot and gameplay style for that episode would work in cooperation and avoid having one feel detached from the other, according to Vanaman.^[53] As such, certain gameplay ideas were left out of the game; one example given by Vanaman was a scene where everyone in the survivor group was firing on a wall of zombies, but as this would lead to a discrete success or failure, it did not fit in with the sense of panic they wanted to convey in the scene.^[53]

Choice

A major aspect in the writing The Walking Dead was the concept of death, whether for the player or non-player characters. Telltale itself was formed from many former LucasArts employees, who had previously written games where the player could not die.^[56] As such, they introduced situations where Lee would die if the player did not react fast enough, although the game would restart just before these events, and situations where non-player characters would die based on the player's on-the-spot decisions.^[56] The concept of requiring the players to respond in a limited amount of time came out of the prototype zombie game that Muckenhoupt had made.^[46] This timing aspect was designed to maintain the game's pace, and led to the idea of tracking the player's decisions. Telltale's development tools and engines had previously included means of tracking players' progress, but the use in The Walking Dead was more explicit, revealing global statistics.^[56]

The ultimate goal of introducing non-game-ending choices into the game was to make the player more invested in the story and more likely to avoid using the rewind feature. Telltale spent a great deal of time to assure that no choice would appear to be punishing to the player, though ultimately "all choices are equally wrong", according to Whitta.^[53] The writers wanted to create choices that would appear to have a significant impact on the story but ultimately would be mostly inconsequential to the larger story.^[53] At major decision points, the writers' aim was try to have the audience split evenly by making the dialog as neutral as possible prior to the choice; they considered that a split of 75 to 25 percent was not ideal.^[56] They noted such cases occurred in both the first episode, where the player has an option to save Carley (the "hot reporter with a gun") or Doug (the "dorky dude"), with the vast majority of players saving Carley,^[57] and in the second episode, where the player is given the option to cut off Parker's leg before they are attacked by walkers or leave him behind, with most players cutting off the leg.^[40] As such, in subsequent episodes, they worked to modify dialog to eliminate any sense of suggestion, leaving the notion of the 'right' choice ambiguous, and totally up to the player themself.^[56]

In some cases, the writers had to work around the established characters and chronology from the comic series. In the first episode, for example, the player is introduced to Hershel Greene, who is established in the comics as a bitter character due to witnessing his son Shawn turn into a walker in the early stages of the outbreak. One of the first decisions the player makes is whether to save Shawn or Duck; however, either choice results in Shawn being bitten, so as to maintain the comic's continuity; only the manner in which he is bitten is changed. The major consequence aspect of the choice instead involves how Kenny feels towards Lee.^[57] In other cases, Telltale designed scenes and choices knowing how the majority of players would be predisposed to certain characters. One example is the character of Larry, who is introduced in the first episode as a hard-nosed jerk. Based on the statistical feedback, Telltale recognized that most players would want to either abandon or kill Larry at the first opportunity, and as such, they created a conversation tree in episode two where Lilly goes some way to redeem Larry in the eyes of the player. The idea was that this might influence the player when they must choose whether to help Kenny kill Larry, who may, or may not, have died from a heart attack and be on the verge of turning. Telltale found that 75% of the players now wanted to save Larry, a result they had expected.^[40]

The writers also used the decision statistics from previous episodes to develop the direction of future ones. Gary Whitta, the writer of the fourth episode, specifically reviewed all the statistics from the previous three episodes to determine the general development of the episode's story. One example involved the death of Duck in the third episode. In that episode, the player must choose to either kill Duck for Kenny, or have Kenny do it himself. In the fourth episode, Whitta wrote a scene where Kenny finds a similar-looking boy, who has starved to death in an attic and come back as a walker. Again, the player is faced with the choice of whether to kill the boy themselves or have Kenny do it. They also included a third choice, in which the player would simply walk away, leaving the boy as a walker trapped in the attic, but this decision would harshly affect the disposition of the others characters towards Lee.^[41] By the first act of episode 5, there were 32 variations due to past player choices that they had to write towards.^[38] The number of possible scenarios were considered necessary to make the game feel "organic" to the individual player, making the player feel like they weaved their own story within the game instead of just taking a specific route through the choices.^[38]

Art

Telltale's art director, Derek Sakai, led the creation of the characters and their expressions. Sakai was told to not use symmetric expressions to help create more human-like expressions and help improve the realism of the game.^[53] Sakai drew inspiration from his own daughter to develop the character of Clementine.^[55]

Soundtrack

On September 10, 2019, an official soundtrack album of Jared Emerson-Johnson's B.A.F.T.A. Award nominated^[58] score to the game was released for digital download and on streaming services,^[59] with a special edition set of vinyl lps due to release shortly thereafter.^[60]

Multi-platform

The game engine used for The Walking Dead was optimized so as to facilitate the multi-platform nature of the release, which included PCs, gaming consoles and mobile devices, with the aim of minimizing the work in porting.^[61] However, the development team still focused on achieving the best control schemes for each platform; in particular, the touchscreen control scheme on mobile devices was based on experience gained during the development of the Back to the Future game.^[61] A major challenge through the development of all five episodes was the save game file format, which they continually had to update and fix across platforms, in some cases causing existing save files to become invalid.^[52] Unique fixes applied for earlier episodes on one platform would reappear as problems in later ones.^[52] Connors stated that for the next series, they would be "a lot more diligent" on the save game issues, using data gathered during the first season development and information on how players would approach the game.^[52]

In previous series developed by Telltale for multiple platforms, they had had difficulty in timing releases to reach all players at the same time. One aspect of this was due to issues encountered on the Xbox Live Arcade service for the Xbox 360; for small publishers, like Telltale at the time, they had to arrange with larger publishers to allocate a slot within the Arcade's release schedule several months in advance, making it difficult to coordinate with releases on other platforms.^[56] After the success of the Back to the Future and Jurassic Park games, however, Telltale were able to officially achieve a publisher status on Xbox Live, giving them more control of the release schedule. Furthermore, they had designed the game such that the second through fifth episodes would be treated as downloadable content, allowing them to bypass slot scheduling and assuring same-day release on both PCs and consoles.^[56]

Sales

The Walking Dead was a financial success, aided by the ease of digital distribution.^[81] The first episode topped the charts on Xbox Live Arcade for the week of April 30,^[136] and remained at the top for two weeks. It also topped the sales charts for both PlayStation Network and Steam for a week.^[137] The first episode sold one million copies in 20 days (not including iOS sales), making it Telltale's fastest selling title to date.^[137] With the third episode's release, over 3.8 million episodes were delivered to 1.2 million players.^[81] As of January 2013, over 8.5 million episodes have been sold across all platforms, representing about $40 million in revenue.^[61] Telltale's CEO Dan Connors has stated that the iOS version represented about 25% of their overall sales, the "largest upswing" for any platform, with sale particularly high in November and December 2012, due in part to various sales on the App Store.^[61] Upon announcement of the 400 Days content, Telltale reported that over 17 million episodes have been purchased across all platforms worldwide,^[138] while by October 2013, at the time of the formal announcement of Season Two, over 21 million episodes have been sold.^[64] As of July 28, 2014, 28 million episodes have been sold.^[139]

Accolades

The Walking Dead has been described as representing a revitalization of the adventure game genre,^[140] which had been in decline since the mid-1990s.^[141] Telltale have been praised for taking their previous experiences in the genre and expanding on them, whilst also incorporating strong writing and voice acting; Gamasutra and Game Developer named the studio one of the top 10 developers in 2012.^[142]

The Walking Dead has garnered many other 2012 "Game of the Year" awards, notably from USA Today, Wired, Complex, GamesRadar and Official Xbox Magazine.^{[143][144][145][146][147]} The Walking Dead was awarded "Game of the Year", "Best Adapted Video Game", and "Best Downloadable Game" at the 2012 Spike Video Game Awards; Melissa Hutchison's role as Clementine was named as "Best Performance By a Human Female", while Dave Fennoy was nominated for "Best Performance by a Human Male". Telltale Games was also named as "Studio of the Year".^[148] The game was awarded "Best Downloadable Game" and "Best Character Design" for Lee Everett at the 2012 Inside Gaming Awards.^[149] The Walking Dead was Destructoid's 2012 "Game of the Year" and "Best Multi-Platform Game".^[150][151] Digital Trends awarded the game with "Best Writing", "Best Digitally Distributed Game", and "Game of the Year" for 2012.^[152] Yahoo! Games' Flan Dering listed The Walking Dead as his "Game of the Year" and "Best Downloadable Game" for 2012.^[153][154] During the 16th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, The Walking Dead was nominated for eight awards including "Game of the Year", "Outstanding Innovation in Gaming" and "Outstanding Achievement in Game Direction";^[155] it ultimately won awards for "Adventure Game of the Year", "Downloadable Game of the Year", "Outstanding Achievement in Story", and "Outstanding Achievement in Character - Male or Female" for Lee Everett.^[156] The Walking Dead won the "Best Narrative" award^[157] and received nominations for "Best Downloadable Game" and "Game of the Year" for the 2013 Game Developers Choice Awards.^[158] The Walking Dead won the "Story" and "Mobile & Handheld" awards at the 2013 British Academy Video Games Awards,^[65] and was nominated for "Best Game", "Game Design", and "Original Music" for the 2013 British Academy Video Games Awards, along with separate "Performance" nominations for Fennoy and Hutchinson for their roles as Lee and Clementine, respectively.^[159] In March 2013, the game was nominated for and won several Pocket Gamer Awards categories, including iOS Game of the Year.^[160] The Walking Dead: 400 Days won Animation, Interactive at the 2013 National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers (NAVGTR) awards.^[161]