In 2012, Telltale Games killed off their burgeoning episodic gaming model, saying goodbye to the likes of Wallace, Gromit, Sam and Max for the time being. They reanimated the corpse via a darker licensing deal, and unleashed The Walking Dead upon the world. The result was a staggering TV/gaming hybrid, where each episode was drip fed across a number of months completing a first season like no other. Followed up by an exemplary second run of episodes, The Walking Dead continues to evolve leaving in its wake a heap of plaudits and awards, not to mention ravaged corpses. Employing an interactive storytelling approach, where progression is guided via conversation choices, location interaction and heart-pumping quick time events, each season takes the player on an unforgettable journey into apocalyptic Georgia. To discuss the plot and character turns would be a spoiler of unforgivable proportions, and in all honesty each player's experience will differ from the other given the games myriad of different character routes. But what really sends The Walking Dead to the top of this list is those bloody, messy quandaries, the ones that force us to wriggle out of our own skins and adopt the tired mindset of the survivor. But the game's pivotal puzzle esque moments aren't like any previously seen before. Take Beneath A Steel Sky or Monkey Island, which are both towering entries in the point and click genre. But, for every Dystopian password trap or rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle puzzle, the player had time in these titles to amble around and think before executing the pay off. Not so much for us doomed The Walking Dead players, where decisions need to be made in a matter of seconds and the ramifications of, say, lopping off a fellow survivor's arm before zombiefication sets in can alter a player's entire experience going forward. Best played with a friend, partner or fellow survivor the grim beauty of The Walking Dead is that this is a series that will continue to get better and, scarily, seems hellbent on pushing the boundaries for what it forces us gamers to do. Playing god in a godless land has never been so much fun. You've screened the list and we hope you've enjoyed the show, but before you peel yourselves from the sofa, take the leap and comment on the thread below with your thoughts, suggestions and pixel-perfect musings.
Shaun is a former contributor for a number of Future Publishing titles and more recently worked as a staffer at Imagine Publishing.
He can now be found banking in the daytime and writing a variety of articles for What Culture, namely around his favourite topics of film, retro gaming, music, TV and, when he's feeling clever, literature.
