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The Wolf Among Us bitten by season pass issues on Xbox 360
Following yesterday's release of the second episode of Telltale's The Wolf Among Us, those who purchased a season pass on the Xbox 360 began reporting problems with their game. "I bought the season pass but there is only an option to buy [Episode 2], no option to download it with the season pass," reads one of the few complaints suitable for publication. 17 pages of comments follow that remark, the majority of which claim that owners of the season pass are not being given immediate, gratis access to Episode 2, despite having already paid for the entirety of The Wolf Among Us. Telltale Games has yet to offer users a solution, but says that Microsoft is looking into the issue. "Note: Microsoft is investigating a current issue regarding season passes for TWAU on 360 and will supply progress updates via @XboxSupport," Telltale tweeted. So far, the @XboxSupport Twitter account hasn't mentioned The Wolf Among Us, nor provided additional information on this problem. Update: Telltale has issued a more comprehensive statement, noting that the issue stems not from the developer but instead from ongoing problems with DLC on the Xbox 360. "We are aware of the issue on XBOX Live Marketplace affecting Season Pass owners of The Wolf Among Us where the user is still prompted to purchase Episode 2 even though they own the Season Pass. There appears to be an issue on XBOX Live affecting multiple titles with DLC offerings and Microsoft is actively working to resolve the issue. We apologize for the inconvenience and are hopeful it will be resolved soon." [Image: Telltale Games]
The Wolf Among Us 'Smoke and Mirrors' review: Of wolf and man
Fairy tales are stories for children, and as such are full of magic, fantasy, and wonderment. What we tend to forget, however, is that murderers lie in wait for the princesses, and monsters lurk in the shadows, waiting for the perfect moment to destroy happiness. Episode 2 of The Wolf Among Us, "Smoke and Mirrors" reminds us that our fables are full of twisted characters who prey on the innocence or desperation of others. It's harsh and bleak and will make you uncomfortable, even when you're not examining the corpse. As a quick reminder, the characters of Wolf Among Us are Fables, the actual characters from our storybooks, who've fled their Homelands and taken up residence in a section of New York called Fabletown. You play as Bigby Wolf, sheriff of Fabletown, who is continuing his investigation into the murder of Episode 1, "Faith," finding himself with another dead body and even more questions. Between his responsibilities as sheriff, his checkered past, and his own less-than-stellar interpersonal skills, Bigby's constantly being pulled in several different directions at once – is he the wolf, or the lawman, the reasonable symbol of justice, or a thug? He is all of these things, and more, and the events of "Smoke and Mirrors" reveal his complexities. He's a marvelous character to role-play, never quite one thing or the other, and he provides the anchor that the story needs to keep from spinning off into the darkness.
Norwegian school teaches ethics with The Walking Dead
A teacher at Nordahl Grieg Upper Secondary School in Bergen, Norway, is using Telltale's The Walking Dead video game to help teach students ethics. Norwegian news station NRK has a report you can watch above, but we suggest turning on captions - unless you speak Norwegian. As part of his religious studies class, Tobias Staaby has students take anonymous polls which are centered around events of the game. When Glenn wants to save a woman trapped at a motel for example, Staaby asks his students if it's the "right thing" to do. "I want a good catalyst for discussions about ethical theories or ethical dilemmas," Staaby told NRK. "This game provides the students with a space they can navigate and discuss within based on the curriculum." Staaby said he hopes his method will become more common as time goes on. We're inclined to agree, and who says it needs to be limited to ethics classes? Imagine Business 404: Zombies and You. Yeah. You're welcome.
Best of the Rest: Susan's picks of 2013
Team Joystiq is barging into 2014 with a celebration of last year's best games. Keep reading throughout the week to see our assembly of ingenious indies and triple-A triumphs. Puppeteer Come one, come all, to hear the remarkable tale of Kutaro and the magical scissors, Calibrus! Come, see the evil Moon Bear King as he tries to cast the world into nonstop darkness! Come, see his 12 generals steal the power of the Moon Goddess! And see young Kutaro ... basically get mixed up in the whole thing by accident. Wrong place, wrong time, delicious-looking head. You know how it goes. Puppeteer commits to its puppet show aesthetic with gusto, crafting every character, object and bit of scenery out of paper, wood, string, or fabric. The narrator provides the exposition with the nuanced delivery of someone who's attended one too many acting classes, and the cast does their best to remember their lines while the audience murmurs in appreciation. The entire setup is bonkers, keeping its tongue placed firmly in its cheek as you cut down the Moon Stone-hoarding generals one by one and eventually square off against the rotund MBK himself. With sly writing, a spectacular soundtrack and gorgeously detailed locations that include neatly manicured gardens, a Halloweentown, a swamp and outer space, Puppeteer is a gaming experience to savor, rather than rush. Of course, it will take multiple run-throughs to find all of the collectible puppet heads, so you'll have more than enough opportunity to catch every joke and notice every secret. As a PS3 exclusive at the end of that console's cycle, Puppeteer didn't get nearly as much attention as it deserved, but this is a real gem. Hunt it down and play it. Your audience awaits.
Spike VGX round-up: Telltale's new projects, Cranky Kong, No Man's Sky and more
Despite ending with musical performances that closely resembled a form of torture, the Spike VGX show packed some decent surprises! Joel McHale and Geoff Keighley endured four three hours of nonstop programming, and they only seemed to want to murder each other a handful of times. Let's recap everything that was shown: Telltale Games' success with the first season of The Walking Dead seems to have granted them a Golden Key to any partnership they desire. Naturally, they've revealed Tales From The Borderlands, a collaboration with Gearbox Software that will be set in the Borderlands universe. They've also started work on a Game of Thrones series, which will be based off the HBO show. Both projects are slated for 2014. Cranky Kong has had it with these youngsters and their rambunctious romps through jungles, so much so that he's decided to chase them all as the fourth playable character in Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze. Cranky must have gotten a few good strikes in with his cane for that delay, too, because the Kong family has settled on braving the Wii U's incoming frost on February 21. Titanfall had already shown a decent arsenal for blowing up buildings with, but in case you doubted its capabilities, Respawn Entertainment debuted two new mech types tonight. Aside from the Titans, Ogre and Stryder mechs will spread destruction across Titanfall's cityscapes. Ogres will be slow, clunky and powerful, while Stryders will focus on outrunning everyone on the field. Hello Games, the developer of the Joe Danger series, brought along the show's biggest surprise - No Man's Sky is a procedurally generated, exploration-focused sci-fi game planned for 2014. The game's trailer showcased vivid landscapes before blasting its way through asteroids in spacecrafts.
Game of Thrones game from Telltale announced
Telltale Games, announced this evening during the VGX a new series based on George R.R. Martin's A Song of... oh, please, you all know it as Game of Thrones. Rumored since last month, the project is now official and will be based on the HBO series. The new series is planned for 2014, hopefully sometime before winter.
The wolf is among iOS today
Telltale's The Wolf Among Us is set to launch today on iOS. The game's first episode, titled "Faith," will cost $4.99, while a pass for the game's entire season will be priced at $14.99, Touch Arcade reported. The latest trailer for the game notes that it will also arrive "soon" on PlayStation Vita. The Wolf Among Us' first episode launched in mid-October on Xbox 360 and PC. The series is based on Bill Willingham's Fables comic series, guiding the werewolf-like Sheriff Bigby through a section of New York City known as Fabletown. Our review of the episode found the game to be a "perfect beginning" to Telltale's new series, and it made us "invested in protecting these curious creatures from our storybooks."
Report: Telltale developing Game of Thrones game ... of thrones
Telltale is working on a game based on George R.R. Martin's book series, A Song of Ice and Fire, better known as the HBO show Game of Thrones, IGN reports, citing "multiple reliable sources." Telltale told Joystiq, "We get these sorts of rumors about what we could be working on next cropping up all the time. Officially we have no comment." Telltale successfully transposed The Walking Dead comic series into video game form, and it's currently working on The Wolf Among Us, an adaptation of the Fables comic series. Episode 2 of The Wolf Among Us is due next, and it's set up to hit a high bar. If this Game of Thrones project is legit, we hope it includes a "Slap The Royal Brat" mini-game. That one's free, Telltale.
The Wolf Among Us Episode 1 delayed for Mac
Telltale Games' The Wolf Among Us, an episodic adaption of the Fables graphic novel series that tells tales of mythical characters trying to exist in the real world, has hit a bump on the road to its fairytale beginnings. The studio updated its initial post celebrating the episode's October 11 launch to note that an "unforseen issue" has delayed the release of Episode 1 for Mac. The post explains that the studio is "working on an update right now and expect to have the Mac build live on Steam and the Telltale website within the next few days." Windows users can currently purchase Episode 1 via a five-episode season pass on Steam or through TellTale's site for $24.99. Xbox 360 fans can purchase the first episode and a pass for the future four episodes for a collective $19.98, while PS3 users can look for Episode 1 in the PlayStation Store on October 15. Our review called Episode 1 "slap-your-face brilliant."
The Wolf Among Us - 'Faith' Review: Grim fairy tale
Telltale's The Wolf Among Us has more than a few things in common with the developer's previous game, The Walking Dead. It's episodic in nature, based on a beloved comic book series, presented in distinct visual style, and focused more on character interaction than big action sequences. It is also slap-your-face brilliant, offering a community of heroes, villains and things in between, all just trying to make it through the day as best they can. The Wolf Among Us is based on the Fables series of graphic novels, which star characters from every fairy story, myth, or legend you've ever heard. Hundreds of years ago, these Fables, as they're known, fled their Homelands and hid here, in our world. Fearful of revealing their true identities to us "mundys," they instead keep very fiercely to themselves, tucked away in a corner of New York. Bigby Wolf – he of the huffing and puffing and blowing houses down – acts as Sheriff of Fabletown, attempting to keep the peace in a community where the normal rules don't quite apply. Seriously, what is the appropriate way to deal with Beauty and the Beast having a marital squabble? Can you really blame Toad (from The Wind in the Willows) for not wanting to stay confined to the upstate farm where all non-human-looking Fables must go? "Faith," the first chapter of The Wolf Among Us, walks right up to this house of misfits and drops a corpse on the front step.
The Wolf Among Us emerges in Telltale's new trailer
A new trailer for The Wolf Among Us shows off Telltale's boldly drawn approach to adapting "Fables," the Vertigo comic series that follows fairytale characters exiled and hidden in New York City. The episodic game centers on Bigby Wolf, a reformed villain who has taken to the role of detective after a stint in exhalation-heavy home demolition.
Clementine 'definitely a part of' The Walking Dead Season 2
Telltale Games CEO Dan Connors told San Diego Comic-Con panel attendees that The Walking Dead darling Clementine "will definitely be a part of" the game's second season. Likewise, the fate of another character, Kenny, "will be explored." Further details concerning Season 2 were not offered. The Walking Dead: 400 Days was released this month and served as a short bridge into the next season.
Telltale Games sale on App Store
As long as you don't have a hankering for The Walking Dead, pretty much every other Telltale Games series is available now on the App Store for 99 cents an episode. That includes all of Back to the Future, Tales of Monkey Island and Jurassic Park. If you're not looking for an adventure game and just want to play some cards with buddies, there's always Poker Night 2. The sale will last until July 7, unless you have a Delorean and a Mr. Fusion, because then time simply has no linear meaning to you.
The Walking Dead's '400 Days' episode comes to Mac this week, iOS on July 11
IGN reports that the new, extra episode of Telltale's The Walking Dead series will be arriving on both Mac and iOS very soon. And by "soon," we mean this week for the Mac (on Steam and Telltale's site), and July 11 for iOS. The episode, first revealed back at E3, is called "400 Days," and is supposed to serve as a halfway step between the game's first season and the upcoming second. The Walking Dead game is critically acclaimed as one of the best games of last year, and while I played (and enjoyed) it on the Xbox 360, it also earned a lot of praise on iOS as well. If you've played the first series already, you'll want to try and play this episode on the same platform, because your choices should carry over in the storyline. I don't want to know anything about the episode before I play it, but in case you do, here's a launch trailer from Telltale that you can watch now. I'm going to pass, though -- this game and this series are so great that I know I'll play this episode no matter what. We look forward to continuing this very gripping story.
The Walking Dead 400 Days: Dissecting one of its stories at E3
The Walking Dead's next episode, 400 Days, stars five different characters in five separate stories of survival during the zombie apocalypse, all tied together by a geographical locale: A truck stop. These newcomers offer a fresh perspective on the events in season one of The Walking Dead, but overall, Telltale's tone hasn't changed much. "Aw, fuck." Those are the first words that Vince, one of the five characters highlighted in 400 Days, says. He spits the phrase into a dark alley as he searches for a spot to stash his gun, police sirens blaring from down the street. The player gets to decide where Vince throws the pistol – the garbage, his pants, the roof – but it doesn't appear to affect where he ends up: chained to the floor of a prison bus, with a heartbroken statutory rapist in front of him and a white-collar, former millionaire behind, all latched on the same line. %Gallery-191351%
The Walking Dead 400 Days DLC has five stories of (maybe) survival
The Walking Dead "400 Days" DLC is on its way to XBLA, PSN (including Vita!), Steam, and iOS this summer. This fresh (see: not rotting) DLC includes the stories of five new survivors in the zombie apocalypse. Five times the fun! And death, probably.
The Wolf Among Us screens break the peace
In Telltale's Fables game, The Wolf Among Us, Bigsby Wolf – that dude who loves blowing houses down – is charged with keeping the peace amongst fairy tale creatures hiding out in the real world. As these first screens show, sometimes keeping that peace means punching a guy in the face.
Telltale drops King's Quest plans
Two years ago, adventure game specialist house Telltale Games revealed plans to make an episodic game based on King's Quest, the classic Sierra adventure game series about accidentally walking into alligator-infested waters and/or dying in the desert. However, those plans have gone yonder."While we deeply love King's Quest here at Telltale, we can confirm that we are no longer working on the franchise," Telltale Senior VP of Publishing Steve Allison told Digital Trends. "There was a time last year that we investigated partnering with third party developers to produce the game as a partnership but decided against outsourcing. We are not privy to what plans Activision has for the franchise, if any."Rights holder Activision has its own episodic King's Quest series. The Silver Lining was originally conceived as a tribute project by fans, but developer Phoenix Online Studios later gained non-commercial license permission from Activision.
The Walking Dead classified for Australia
Despite being surrounded by water and populated with vicious crocodiles, Australia will still suffer the inevitable incursion of the undead. More specifically, Telltale's The Walking Dead has been classified in Australia. The game received an MA15+ rating for its "strong themes and horror violence." Sounds about right.Telltale confirmed to IGN that the game will be available to download on both PlayStation Network and Xbox Live "very soon," with retail release dates for the console and PC versions expected "in the coming weeks."
Telltale: The Walking Dead has sold 8.5 million episodes
Telltale's acclaimed episodic series The Walking Dead has sold over 8.5 million episodes, CEO Dan Connors told The Wall Street Journal. Connors said that about 25 percent of the sales come from iOS devices, and "at about $5 per episode, that's roughly more than $40 million in sales, not including any promotions."Of course, The Walking Dead has seen its share of promotions, and is even a part of this weekend's Steam Holiday Encore sale. With Telltale Games planning to expand in the coming months, these sales numbers could equate to a much bigger conference room.
