The Walking Dead – “Around Every Corner” (Episode Four)

With episode five right around the corner (11-21-12 for us PC folk), there may be no better time than to review and recap what happened in episode four. As I explained in the review of episode one, all future reviews (including this one) will be a plot summary with my thoughts added in as I go. There will be spoilers, so do not read any further if you want to experience this episode for yourself.

There is a non-spoiler review in episode one, in case you’re interested in buying the game and want more information, located here:

The Walking Dead – “A New Day” (Episode One)

Editor’s Note: This game is pretty graphic and describing the plot requires me to be so as well. If you are squeamish, then reading the following would not be a good idea. You’ve been warned.

Plot Summary

Kenny lost Duck and Katjaa (his son and wife) and I lost both Lily and Carly in episode three. Our numbers are diminished, even though two new survivors (Omid and Christa) joined the group. To make matters worse, two of our group were kids, even if one of them was a teenager. I was anxious to see if things turned around in episode four for Lee and Clementine, the latter of which deserved much better than what she’s experienced thus far.

The Walking Dead Episode Four: Around Every Corner

It didn’t…right off the bat a church bell began to ring in Savannah that attracted a horde of zombies to our location. A mysterious man on Clementine’s walkie tried to warn us, but the warning came too late. Ben, who was in charge of Clementine, panicked and ran away to save his own skin. The group managed to save her, but Chuck ended up getting separated from us. The rest of us, Kenny, Omid, Christa, Clementine, Ben, and myself (Lee) manages to get inside a mansion after figuring out a way to get in the back door. It was rather gruesome in that we had to dig up a dog collar from the corpse of a buried animal…this game wasn’t pulling any punches.

As much as I want to hate Ben for screwing up, he’s still just a kid.

Omid’s leg wasn’t healing well and things looked pretty bleak for him. Even though the mansion was deserted (save for the kid zombie in the attic), there were no medicines or doctors available to treat an infection. Kenny and I head out to the waterfront to look for a boat and come across and individual by the name of Molly, who is quite skilled in terms of getting around and surviving. She speaks of a group in town located in “Crawford”, who only accepts the best and throws out anyone not contributing fully to the group. Needless to say, small children and the disabled aren’t welcome.

Molly turned out to be a lifesaver.

During the conversation with Molly, walkers appear and I end up getting separated from the group and forced into the sewers. There, I discover Chuck’s corpse and soon after, a hidden group of people trying to survive after being kicked out of Crawford. I manage to persuade Vernon (a doctor) to come back to the mansion to look at Omid’s leg. I soon learn that Ben, once again, didn’t take his responsibility in looking after Clementine seriously as she seemed to have gone missing. After searching the whole house, I ended up finding her in the shed in the backyard, which happens to house a boat. Kenny looks it over and realizes that it’s not large enough to fit everyone, which makes me wonder who would be left behind when this was all said and done. Perhaps Telltale planned to kill more people off?

Be quick during this scene.

The group decides to raid Crawford for their supplies and I’m given the choice to take Clementine with us. Normally I wouldn’t put a child’s life in danger, but I didn’t feel comfortable leaving her out of my sight. I would have done the same with my own son, for the record. I doubt any parent could just leave their child alone or in the hands of a stranger, especially during a zombie apocalypse. All of us, including Vernon and Brie (a member of Vernon’s group) head into Crawford only to discover that it’s pack full of zombies. I guess they weren’t as good as they thought they were.

The Walking Dead Episode Four Clementine

Dangerous or not, I couldn’t leave Clementine alone.

After getting what we needed for the boat and our group’s survival needs, Ben does something incredibly stupid that allows the zombies to rush our hiding place. He also decides to confess to the group that he was the one who had made a deal with the bandits, which Kenny did not like one bit. Brie bites it during the zombie attack and the rest barely escape, though we’re given a choice to save Ben from falling into a pack of zombies. Kenny seemed fine in letting him die, but stupid teenager or not, no kid deserves that fate. I pulled him up from danger and we hightail it back to the mansion.

Did you save him?

Vernon treats Omid with the meds we acquired and offers to take Clementine into his group, offering her a sense of family and claims she’d be safer. I, of course, refuse. After waking up from a much-needed rest, I discover that Clementine is missing for real this time along with Vernon. In my search for Clementine, a walker ends up biting me. I have the choice to conceal it, but I end up being honest about it and show it to the group. Despite that, I manage to convince all of them to help me find Clementine…even Kenny, who I didn’t really get along with.

Lee gets bitten…

After breaking in to Vernon’s hideout, we discover that it’s empty. Lee begins to feel weak from the walker bite, which is not a good sign. A man comes on the walkie and says that he’s not Vernon, but has Clementine. He tells me to choose my next words carefully and that’s when the episode ends.

The Review

It pissed me off to no end that Lee had been bitten, but it didn’t surprise me. Telltale seems to have no qualms about killing characters off…what’s one more? With Lee being on what appears to be his last leg, I have to wonder what will become of Clementine. How will she cope? Will she find her parents alive after all? Was Lee simply a transporter of sorts, designed for the sole purpose of reuniting a frightened girl with her parents?

I didn’t run into any issues with save files and / or run into technical difficulties. My Asus laptop ran the game just fine, though I had the settings on low/medium so as not to overtax the video card and fan. Even on low graphics settings, the cartoonish nature of the game still managed to convey dread and despair.

Like the previous episodes, the puzzles weren’t hard and I was too engrossed in the story to really care about them. I’m anxious to see what happens next week in the final episode. I’d like to see Lee and Clementine survive, but I have a feeling that it will be a tear-jerker.