The first thing that happens in Telltale Games’ The Wolf Among Us [$4.99] is that Sheriff Bigby Wolf talks to a toad in a cardigan. The second thing, at least for me, is that he gets beaten to death (twice). Apparent cause of death is an axe handle through the eye socket, but I’m no doctor.
That’s a hell of a first impression for the series, adapted from Bill Willingham’s Fables franchise. Fables’ premise—that fairytale characters have come to live in the real-world Bronx—isn’t uncommon: The 10th Kingdom and Neil Gaiman’s American Gods both predate Willingham, and contemporary shows like Once Upon A Time and Sleepy Hollow continue the unevenly handled tradition.
The violence in this introduction stands out as a way to overcompensate for The Wolf Among Us’ inherent silliness, to convince us that it’s brutal and dark. The overwhelmingly grisly murder that sets the game in motion only reinforces that idea.
The bloody posturing is unnecessary, as the The Wolf Among Us has enough grit and texture to stand on its own without drawn-out fight scenes or swear words. The game draws its tension and mood from Fabletown’s deep violets and navy blues, from a dusky soundtrack, from punchy voice-acting. The racism and classism that undergird the world of Fables and what’s left unsaid between characters are both sadder and more desperate than the blood and broken bones Telltale chooses to highlight first.
Still, Telltale are remarkably efficient alchemists when it comes to Willingham’s settings and premises. Telltale have an ear for dialogue and a genuine knack for plotting and pacing, but the promise of exploring more of the beautifully realized Fabletown is compelling too. Bigby’s punchy melodrama aside, The Wolf Among Us would still be interesting as a political fable, and if there’s one criticism, it’s that Telltale keeps the reigns too tight and doesn’t offer enough chances to poke around at the seams of Fabletown.
Adventure games—from Sam & Max’s goofball slapstick to The Shivah’s dour fatalism—usually handle investigations and cop stories well: You talk to people, gather clues, and make connections. Bigby does those things in The Wolf Among Us, too, but they don’t culminate in some solved puzzle or brain teaser as much as they change the tone and texture of Bigby’s relationships with other Fables.
In other words, this is chiefly a narrative experience, and the game’s whodunit is a plot device, not a game mechanic. Collecting evidence may unlock new dialog options, but its main purpose is to deepen the game’s mystery and to force Bigby to make decisions. That said, the choices players make over the course of The Wolf Among Us—some small, some not—form the game’s backbone, and every interaction seems to tie into whatever Rubik's Cube Telltale is using to drive the narrative.
Unfortunately, performance problems on the iPad 2 crop up with regularity. Stuttering frame rates and delayed inputs make for shambolic action scenes and disrupted cinematics, and The Wolf Among Us suffers from general instability and locks up often. These technical problems are a black spot on an otherwise gorgeous game that really depends on smart camera work and pacing to sustain its story.
Episode 1 — Faith
Early in this episode, Sheriff Bigby explains to Colin, the last remaining of the Three Little Pigs, that he keeps the peace in Fabletown “by being big, and being bad.” It’s a bit on the nose, but Colin’s response cuts to the heart of The Wolf Among Us: “Don’t say that shit in front of people. It’s embarrassing.”
Colin is mostly decrying Bigby’s dumb chest-thumping, but it’s a nice reminder that the characters in The Wolf Among Us have pre-conceived notions about Bigby, that those notions can change based on player input, and the this is primarily a game about exploring relationships in a fairytale society.
One of “Faith”’s strongest scene occurs in a library, where routine bureaucracy comes face-to-face with fairytale magical fantasy. There are the telltale signs of “real” life—a deputy mayor, an administrator, some public health and birth records—juxtaposed with a magic lamp and an omniscient talking mirror that speaks in rhyme. It’s just enough to remind of you of Fables’ allegorical potential while still breathing life into a still-mysterious new environment.
Like in Telltale’s previous series of episodic games, The Wolf Among Us “remembers” certain choices and uses them to shape the story to come. This is an increasingly common (and welcome!) narrative trick, but I’m always a little skeptical of games that notify the player so obviously when it happens. Mr. Toad doesn’t appreciate Bigby’s insistence that he obey the law, for example, as per an on-screen prompt.
Granted, “Faith” is only the first of five episodes. It’s hard to see if and how Bigby’s decision to be kind to Bufkin, the alcoholic Flying Monkey assistant to deputy mayor Ichabod Crane, will play out. What’s clearer is that both Bigby and “Faith”’s plot points are highly malleable.
The knowledge that The Wolf Among Us is keeping tabs bleeds into the quick-time events that govern “Faith”’s fights and chase scenes. Bigby’s potential for ultraviolence rears its head more than once, and whether he chooses to indulge it has, ostensibly, repercussions.
The QTEs themselves are straightforward taps, flicks, and swipes. One pleasant surprise is how flexible they are: you can miss a few prompts without failing, and the fights are choreographed well enough that everything flows naturally, even when a punch or headbutt is flubbed, or skipped on purpose.
Here’s the rub: it’s not always clear what a given QTE will do, or which ones can be skipped without losing the fight, and this has a negative impact on roleplaying. In one early fight, for example, Bigby steals an axe while a QTE prompt hovers near his opponent’s neck. I didn’t want Bigby to become a murderer (at least not yet) so, thinking his next move would be to decapitate someone, I skipped it and failed the fight.
Turns out, Bigby merely uses the flat of the axe to break a man’s jaw. Later, the game explains that these fairytale characters are unnaturally resilient (which, again, is a way to justify how crazy violent this series is). Players familiar with the source material’s various quirks might not be as hesitant with the Woodsman as I was.
But that’s beside the point: When Bigby talks to people, Telltale encourages us to roleplay, to make decisions that have lasting consequences; but when he’s fighting someone, we get bottlenecked. Our choices in “Faith,” such as they are, matter in one context but not the other, and that’s jarring.
In other words, every game mechanic in “Faith” builds upon, changes, or informs some aspect of the narrative, whether it’s the plot, Bigby’s relationships, or others’ perceptions of him. With one enormous, climactic exception, the fight scenes in “Faith” don’t tie into that narrative framework.
Nevertheless, “Faith” puts forward a dense tale that excels and building momentum. Here’s to sustainability.
Episode 2 — Smoke & Mirrors
In episodic gaming, as in life, time is double-edged. The model’s great promise is that the piecemeal release of an adventure game builds anticipation among fans while allowing the developer to gather feedback, while a steady flow of cash keeps them nimble and lean. There’s a trap set for every installment of an episodic series, however: “I waited two months for that?”
This is the trap that “Smoke & Mirrors,” the second episode in Telltale Games’ The Wolf Among Us series, falls into.
The first episode was bookended by a pair of brutal decapitations and, depending on your choices, punctuated by either a suicide or another murder. “Smoke & Mirrors” opts for a more laid-back plot that introduces new characters, suspects, and locations but that does its most interesting work in characterization rather than violent set pieces.
The two-month gap between episodes is felt right away: the finer plot points of “Faith” get lost in the influx of new characters, and “Smoke” struggles to find a rhythm as players try to remember who’s who and why they’re interrogating the Woodsman (or Dweedle Dee). I was tempted to replay the first episode to get back up to speed, but it’s a compliment to Telltale’s brand of designed that I ultimately chose to explore the consequences of my first playthrough.
“Smoke” eventually settles into itself, but it’s a much shorter episode than “Faith.” Its comparative brevity is compounded by the way Telltale shunts Bigby from one scene to the next. One early scene involves Bigby examining a headless body, for example. There are several clues and interaction points to explore, but one in particular triggers the end of investigation, as Deputy Mayor Ichabod Crane swoops in like hideous bird to shoo Bigby out of the room.
You won’t get another crack at the body, even if there are other clues to gather, and the implication is clear: investigating isn’t as important as moving the story forward. Adventure games tend to handle investigation particularly well—and Bigby is a cop, after all—so it’s frustrating that “Smoke” never gives us a chance to do something both the character and mechanics are ostensibly suited for, especially since the investigation in Toad’s apartment in “Faith” worked so well.
That same pressure to move quickly exerts itself through the timed dialogue system that Telltale has been using since The Walking Dead. This kind of design makes sense in the context of a zombie apocalypse, but “Smoke & Mirrors” never earns the sense of urgency imposed onto it.
Where “Faith” is violent, “Smoke & Mirrors” is seedy, taking Bigby through a strip club, brothel, and flop hotel in short order. It’s unclear at this point whether or not this slum tourism supports a good faith effort to explore the social ills at the foundation of Bill Willingham’s Fables series, but Bigby seems poised to act as the blunt force trauma needed to clear a path for Fabletown’s much-needed reforms. By that same token, there’s an undercurrent of class guilt and noblesse oblige in “Smoke”’s most lurid scenes.
That doesn’t keep the scene between Bigby and Holly, the proprietor and (as far as I can tell) sole employee of the Trip Trap Bar, from being the best in the episode. Not only does it successfully encapsulate the game’s class tension, but it deliver’s on Telltale’s promise of a reactive and responsive gameworld. Holly and Grendel both seem appreciative that I-as-Bigby decided against ripping Grendel’s arm off and beating him with it during the climax of “Faith.” Indeed, the relationship between the player, Bigby, and the other denizens of Fabletown continues to be a highlight of The Wolf Among Us.
It’s too bad, then, that Colin—the sardonic talking pig who appears, unannounced and uninvited, on Bigby’s couch—is totally absent from “Smoke & Mirrors.” He was Bigby’s moral compass in “Faith,” but it seems that his services are no longer needed. Bigby’s Good-Cop-Bad-Cop routine works best when both options seem reasonable or realistic, but some of his choices in “Smoke” are cartoonishly prickish, unless you want to get crazy on scared children and traumatized victims.
There aren’t many opportunities in “Smoke” to use Bigby’s potential for unfettered aggression, but the fuzzy boundaries between player and protagonist are explored in other ways. In the opening scene of “Faith,” Bigby is forced to pummel the Woodsman, whether the player wants him to or not. Near the end of “Smoke & Mirrors,” he again finds himself in a brawl. “Smoke”’s fight scene is more flexible, and Bigby is allowed to lay off if the player wants.
Later, during the course of a second crime scene investigation, Bigby finds a pack of cigarettes. He doesn’t think they’re important, and the game doesn’t recognize them as an official clue, but I do. Even though Bigby’s investigation is cut short, it doesn’t keep the player from doing his own guesswork outside the confines of the game itself.
What I like about both of these examples is that they give audiences a chance to role-play Bigby naturally and organically, without any formal indication that their decisions are being explicitly framed as Big Moral Choices. The Wolf Among Us is at its best when its mechanics back off enough to let players play.
Still, “Smoke & Mirrors” is more often interesting than riveting, consigned to doing The Wolf Among Us’ dirty work: it moves the plot forward in ways that are necessary but not compelling, and touches on the series themes without revealing its hand too early. It’s a short, workmanlike episode, content to stand on “Faith”’s back and prep us for Episode 3, rather than find its own legs.