Even the camera work, which takes on a life of its own during the more intense sequences, contributes to endowing the entire production with the stylistic hue of a big budget TV show, and it works wonders in absorbing you further into the drama.
Character models are given a new lease of life through enhanced visual artistry, and the studio’s first foray into using motion capture has gone a long way in making character animations appear much less puppet-like than previous titles. Perhaps the greatest improvement to A New Frontier compared to Telltale’s previous work is with regards to the production quality. It’s a great close to a story that sets itself up for some really interesting conflicts going forward, and here’s hoping that Telltale can sustain this tension for the rest of the season. I can’t name many Telltale cliffhangers that have left me truly jaw-dropped, but, once Episode Two of A New Frontier faded to black, I was already counting down the days until I could find out what happens next. As such, these first two episodes are packed with sobering moments of tragedy, agonizingly difficult choices, and a few well executed twists that I genuinely did not see coming. There were a couple of frustrating instances where the words that came out of Javier’s mouth were completely different to what had been suggested by the on-screen text.Īs with previous seasons, A New Frontier touches on themes of family, sacrifice, and what it means to care for the vulnerable in the apocalypse. Additionally, while the writing remains solid for the most part, The Walking Dead Season 3: A New Frontier sometimes falls into the same trap as Fallout 4 when it come to the presentation of its dialogue trees. The one exception to this is with regards to Javier’s hot headed teenage nephew, who manages to storm off in a mood on no less than three different occasions within three hours. The surrounding cast of characters are also portrayed with impressive depth, as almost every survivor you meet manages to subvert your initial expectations of them as events progress throughout the episodes. Props must be given to Melissa Hutchison who perfectly captures Clementine’s evolution into maturity with a performance that retains the character’s signature voice, while simultaneously embellishing it with a palpable sense of grit and stoicism.
As the latest protagonist to follow in the footsteps of Lee and Clementine, Javier has yet to prove himself to be quite as memorable or endearing as either of those two, but his youthful affability works nicely as a foil to the more world-weary Clementine, who completed her transition from innocent youngster into a full-fledged bad-ass. In perhaps another decision guided by the need to welcome the uninitiated, players are now thrown into the shoes of new character Javier Garcia who finds himself looking after what’s left of his family, before running into a certain frizzy haired teenager.
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