Citizen Brown Review
The latest episode of Telltale’s current episodic series, Back to the Future: The Game released today, and of course I played it straight away. And here’s what I decided…
This is definitely the best episode of the Back to the Future Game so far.
But in no way does that make it an “excellent game”. But, that’s not being mean, because its still a great game. I just don’t think its up to the standards that Telltale are capable of producing.
The story is definitely awesome, and much more than the first and second episodes this one feels like a movie. Not just in plot.
I can barely recall any puzzles. The few that were there were simple and tedious for the most part, and there was WAY too much exposition for the amount of puzzles. Saying that this game lasts about 3 hours is an overstatement, because the actual gameplay value is around about 1 hour. The rest of it is walking from one side of Hill Valley to the other and listening to all the talking. All the exposition makes the game feel more like an interactive movie, when what people want is a game that can serve as a replacement for a movie, and this spreads the “fun” too thinly.
On that note, however, the dialogue itself is interesting, and is acted much better than the previous two episodes, and Marty’s voice is getting better all the time.
Jennifer was a great character, and the different personalities of all of the characters really made it feel surreal, which was discomforting and enjoyable at the same time.
Unfortunately, the game was lacking in the sound department this time around, especially during the Guitar Fight puzzle (which, by the way, was WAY too easy and poorly animated) and this was very disappointing for me as the music in Telltale’s games are usually the one shiny part of the statue, even if the rest is covered in pigeon poop. But it just wasn’t there this time.
The cliffhanger at the end of the game is pure cruelty, and Telltale have really make me itching for the next episode, something that they are getting better at as the quality of the season improves.
All in all, the concept for this episode is sound, with well defined characters and a good story. I would like to see an improvement in puzzle design (an overall failure for Telltale in this season) and in the animation of the characters, and even though the game was a bit thin at times, it was still riveting throughout and I definitely enjoyed the game; which, really, is the most important thing to consider.
Especially when compared to the other episodes of BttF: The Game so far, this episode is great, and I don’t hesitate to rate it an 8.5 out of 10.
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