Review

The Walking Dead: 400 Days

One of my enthralling gaming experiences can be attributed to Telltale’s Walking Dead series. Though the gameplay at times left something to be desired, the series was highly entertaining. It’s arguable that Lee and Clementine’s struggle for survival is one of gaming’s best in terms of character driven dramas – yes, that includes BioShock Infinite and The Last of Us. These are just some of the reasons why I was ecstatic to hear that Telltale had announced the 400 Days DLC.

400 Days is an episode that bridges season 1 and the upcoming season 2 of Telltale’s Walking Dead series. It features five short stories that are told one at a time, similar to a horror anthology film (Creepshow, Trick’r Treat, etc.) where each story is introduced separately but eventually converges. Concentrated at a particular truck stop in Georgia, each one deals with a character(s) during the first 400 days of the zombie apocalypse. Anyone who’s played season 1 will know what to expect in terms of gameplay mechanics here. More often than not, you’ll be put in dire situations and forced to make difficult decisions on the fly. Similar prompts also make their return; quickly tapping “Q” to wrestle free from a zombie’s grasp is a normal occurrence. What sets this DLC apart is directly linked to the short stories. As the gamer, you’re often thrown into the middle of a calamity with little, or no prior information.

Take the new character Wyatt for example. His story starts with him and another guy speeding away from a hostile group of survivors. Apparently something went down a few miles back that led to their current predicament; Wyatt’s friend is covered in blood, and it’s not his own. Bullets start flying back and forth before the pair can give their chasers the slip. In the midst of the confusion, small tidbits of background information about the characters and their current situations are given through the use dialog. Even though I’ve never seen Wyatt before, based on how he responds to his friend’s questions I can assume that he has an aversion to conflicts. Before I can find out more about him (confirming my assumptions) something else happens, pushing the narrative’s focus back towards the surviving this ordeal. After a few tough choices and an unsettling end, I’m sent off to experience another one of the shorts.

Going from tale to tale is an interesting way of experiencing The Walking Dead. For one, it makes it easier to make choices for some of the characters. The fact that I knew so little about Wyatt, allowed me to step into his shoes; the decisions I make are more mine than his. And even though that holds true for Lee in the first season, he was way more fleshed out than any of the characters in 400 Days. I felt lead to make certain decisions based on who I thought Lee was. Another thing the short narratives bring to the table is the offering of different scenarios. In the first season, everything was tied to the main cast. The writers couldn’t put just anything in because they had to work around what was already established in the previous episodes. With this DLC came the possibility to have random car chases, introduce multiple groups of people, and so on. Basically, this method allows for a more flexible approach to storytelling, which is the strong point of this series.

Of course being that each event is so short, you don’t really have the time to form a connection with each character. This isn’t as bad as it sounds though. Sure, you won’t develop a strong attachment to any one person but the stories are written in such a way that you will still care about what happens. I imagine it’s like witnessing a car accident. Even though you may not know the injured people, you’d still want to help make sure they are ok. That’s how I felt while playing 400 Days.

As it stands, 400 Days is worthwhile DLC. It features a lot of what made Telltale’s Walking Dead series great, just in bite sized pieces. I enjoyed playing through each shorts and experiencing different states of the growing epidemic. Also, seeing how they were all connected was interesting, to say the least. Speaking of connections, there are a few nods to the events that took place during my season 1 playthrough; the evidence of choices made were grim reminders of how difficult it is to survive in a zombie apocalypse. Simply put, this is a must play for fans of the series. I can’t wait to see how the survivors of 400 Days impact the story from the upcoming season 2!