In recent years, the phenomenon created by the famous The Walking Dead television series has led to the creation of many different projects, including videogames, dedicated to the post-apocalyptic world narrated by Robert Kirkman in his comic series. It is from these comics that he takes his cue The Escapists: The Walking Dead, second title of The Escapists series developed by the software house Team 17 and available on Steam, Xbox One e PlayStation 4 at a price of around € 14,99. The title is proposed as a particular role-playing game with 8-bit graphics where, unlike the first chapter in which our goal is to escape from various prisons, we will have to try to move between the various scenarios of the campaign by strengthening ourselves, trying objects useful for the construction of weapons and tools, arm our allies and eliminate the zombies that will stand in our way. Will the developers be able to merge the game mechanics with the universe of The Walking Dead? Find out with our review!
Screen
As we said before, the game has some differences with The Escapists, in fact the various levels are connected to each other with a real mini-story based on the The Walking Dead comic series (present as collectibles within the game, but we'll talk about it later). We will start with a level / tutorial in which we will impersonate Rick Grimes, one of the main characters of the series, who wakes up after a long period of coma in a hospital full of zombies and corpses. From here, our escape will start and then find ourselves in the company of other survivors (other characters from the series and comics) to the virus.
gameplay
After successfully escaping from the hospital, we will realize that we have entered the real gameplay of the game: at the head of a group of survivors, we will have to explore the vast scenario proposed by the various levels to find components, weapons and instructions that will be useful for our escape, which will develop over several days marked by some activities that we will be required to do in order not to raise the percentage that indicates the zombie threat. In fact, if in The Escapists the activities are to keep the guards away from our cell, in this version The Walking Dead themed it will work differently: maintaining a low level of Meriwether danger, represented by a percentage value in the upper right corner of the screen, will make zombies less aggressive and not make them respawn; this could be a great advantage when we need to explore in search of new items, weapons and components for crafting. By ignoring these assignments, the danger percentage will increase and with it the difficulty of the game. Unfortunately, these activities have very little use for the purposes of the game, as they will only undermine your search for items and character enhancements. Only the breakfast / lunch / dinner phases are an exception, which will guarantee the restoration of energy, a statistic that we will need to face the character enhancement phases.
But let's go into the gameplay discourse by talking about the fights: at the beginning of a campaign mission, attacking the other zombies will be completely useless, as they will be much stronger than our character. Hand-to-hand fights which, among other things, take place by repeatedly pressing the appropriate button, that's all. Different speech regarding firearms, much more powerful and effective, but also difficult to manage because of the scarce ammunition that we will find and the loud noise caused by the shot, as it will attract many more zombies present in the surrounding area.
To enhance our character we will need to train through a gym located within the scenario, which will allow increase the stats of Strength and Speed through very simple quick time events that turn out to be too repetitive. Also present is the intelligence statistic that will be used to craft higher quality items; how to increase this statistic? Going near the bookshelves or game tables, we press the A / X button, we wait for a small bar to load and that's it: another rather boring method.
The crafting is cared for slightly better with lots of instructions for the components to be used for the construction of new objects, all found around the scenario of the level in the various backpacks and desks ... there is only one small problem: we will be able to take only 7 items with us (one of which can be equipped as a melee weapon), therefore having a very limited inventory that will force us to make several trips from one part of the level to the other to recover all the components useful to our cause. To be an RPG, the inventory capacity is truly awkward, we will only have the desk present in our dormitory as a "backpack" which, of course, we will not be able to take with us (the desks of the other NPCs are updated with new objects every day).
But the problems do not end there: in some levels we will need keys to be able to enter certain rooms, with these they will occupy the slots of our inventory. Result? Even more limited capacity, especially in the case of multiple rooms with different keys, which will force us to leave most of our objects around the level and then retrieve them in with other exploration phases. In short, a series of elements that, yes, increase the general difficulty of the game, but too much, and incredibly lengthen the duration of our session, requiring a good amount of time and patience.
As mentioned before, we will find ourselves at the head of a group of survivors who in the course of the game will have some new-entries, or may lose some elements considered non-functional for the plot. It will be our concern to best equip our allies, mainly to ensure their survival and their usefulness in dealing with areas infested by numerous zombies. We will also have to pay attention to the morale of our group, in fact, if we do not fulfill our daily tasks, our allies will not look favorably on us and it will not be possible to recruit them. To increase the value of this statistic, we will be able to accept requests / favors that each of them will offer us with a cash reward. By doing so, we will keep their morale high and we will be able to spend money to get the best equipment at the various vendors scattered around the scenario.
Returning to the speech of comics as collectibles, let's dwell briefly on the question: around the various levels we can find the various comics that are part of the The Walking Dead series, too bad they will have autility equal to zero (if not something related to achievements / trophies). It will not even be possible to read them or see a preview, only the title, too bad.
Survival mode
We conclude by talking about the Survival mode, recently introduced through a free update. In this particular mode, surviving becomes even more difficult: we will start inside a room equipped with various desks, backpacks and tools to empower ourselves, this time in the role of Abraham Ford, another main character in the series. Our only goal will be to survive the endless waves of zombies that will arrive at our base with different time intervals. At the end of each wave, we will have to take advantage of the precious time we will have available to go in search of medkits, ammunition, make purchases at the various vendors and place barricades. Even this mode, much more frenetic than the campaign, is very difficult as it will be important to manage the ammunition for us and for our two allies. It would probably have been a lot more fun online co-op with other players, but unfortunately the title does not have an online component, another point less.
