The Walking Dead Season 2: 'All That Remains' Review

Reviews
By Michael Andronico
published

Telltale Games kicks off Season 2 of its hit "Walking Dead" game series with one of its most intense installments.

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Graphics and Content

Graphics and Sound

As with the original game, the characters and environments of "The Walking Dead" look as though they were ripped out of the Robert Kirkman comic book of the same name.

The game has a distinct cel-shaded look that could be mistaken for a cartoon — until you see a man get his heart ripped out by zombies. While watching Clementine bite a man's finger off doesn't look as brutal as it would in a photorealistic action title like "Call of Duty," the game is animated well enough to be evocative during those violent moments. The same goes for each character's facial expressions, as you'll be able to see genuine feelings of fear, joy, distrust and sadness by watching each conversation closely.

"All That Remains" is just as wonderfully voice-acted as its preceding chapters, as Melissa Hutchison reprises her role as Clementine with an appropriately weathered tone. Clem hasn't fully lost her innocence, but Hutchison drives home the point that she's willing to do what it takes to survive alone.

The subtle, haunting strings that make up the musical score are as potent as ever, making everything from an all-out brawl to a search for a pair of scissors feel tense and unpredictable.

Episodic Content

"The Walking Dead" is an episodic game with a total of five chapters set to release over the next few months. You can buy each chapter as it's released for $4.99, or pick up a $25 season pass that entitles you to all five. If you buy the PC or Mac version of the season pass from Telltale, you’ll get a collectors' DVD once all five episodes wrap up.

The bite-size structure is part of what makes "The Walking Dead" special, as you'll likely find yourself discussing choices and consequences with friends in anticipation of the next chapter.

Bottom Line

The brilliantly paced "All That Remains" starts Season 2 of "The Walking Dead" off with a bang, providing tons of action and a handful of tough decisions that you'll be analyzing all the way until chapter two arrives. This intense 90-minute experience closes out a stellar 2013 in gaming, and opens the book on what is shaping up to be a truly taxing adventure.

Price: $4.99
Platform: PC, Mac, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, iOS
Release Date: 12/17/13
PC Requirements:

Minimum:

OS: Windows XP Service Pack 3
Processor: Core 2 Duo 2GHz or equivalent
Memory: 3 GB of RAM
Graphics: ATI or Nvidia card w/ 512 MB of RAM
DirectX: Version 9.0c
Hard Drive: 2 GB available space
Sound Card: Direct X 9.0c sound device
Additional Notes: Not recommended for Intel integrated graphics

Recommended

OS: Windows 7
Processor: Core 2 Duo 2.3 GHz or equivalent
Memory: 4 GB RAM
Graphics: ATI or Nvidia card w/ 1024 MB RAM
DirectX: Version 9.0c
Hard Drive: 2 GB available space
Sound Card: Direct X 9.0c sound device
Additional Notes: Not recommended for Intel integrated graphics

Mac Requirements

Minimum:

OS: Snow Leopard (10.6.X)
Processor: 2.3 GHz Intel
Memory: 4 GB of RAM
Graphics: 512 MB Nvidia or ATI graphics card
Hard Drive: 2 GB available space
Additional Notes: Not recommended for Intel integrated graphics, Mac Minis or early-generation MacBooks

Recommended:

OS: Snow Leopard (10.6.X)
Processor: Core 2 Duo 2GHz
Memory: 4 GB of RAM
Graphics: 1024 MB NVidia or ATI graphics card
Hard Drive: 2 GB of available space
Additional Notes: Not recommended for Intel integrated graphics, Mac Minis or early-generation MacBooks

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Michael Andronico
Michael Andronico

Mike Andronico is Senior Writer at CNNUnderscored. He was formerly Managing Editor at Tom's Guide, where he wrote extensively on gaming, as well as running the show on the news front. When not at work, you can usually catch him playing Street Fighter, devouring Twitch streams and trying to convince people that Hawkeye is the best Avenger.

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1 Comment Comment from the forums
  • u_gonna_squeal_b4_we_cookya
    The first "season" of this game was one of the most original games I have played. Some of the scenes in it had my heart nearly beating out of my chest. After reading this, it is nice to know that Clementine is still surviving. It didn't look too good for her in the last scene of the main game. Hopefully they don't change much in terms of gameplay and have an equally excellent story to make us want to keep playing. In fact, I hope the game looks identical to the first and the way it is played is identical as well. I am hoping that season 2 is simply an sequel to season 1. The only thing that is going to suck is having to wait for the next episodes to come out.

    I have played through the first season several times now and the "400 Days" DLC only once. I did notice that the "ripples" you are supposedly able to create when you make a major choice in the story are quite small. In fact, I have played through a season and took note of the major choices I had to make (who lives, who I take, etc.) then I played through it again and deliberately made the exact opposite choices and I realized that they always end up in the same place every season except there might be a character replaced by a different one. But the fate of Lee and Clementine are always exactly the same no matter what you do (unless you get Lee killed then you obviously start over). I am hoping that they change that aspect of the story to have at least two different fates for the main character. But, I am not expecting it to happen. It would probably require the size of each episode to be nearly double in size meaning some players will never play half the game if they keep making the same decisions.
    Reply