The Walking Dead: A New Frontier

It has been a while since we got a new installment in the chronological Telltale Walking Dead franchise – although the Michonne episodes were a nice break away from Clementine – but now that the story is back on track, things are bigger and better than ever. Once again, Telltale has brought us a work of art, both figuratively and literally.

Although Clementine does make in appearance in these new episodes, and is playable via flashback moments, the new main protagonist is Garcia Javier, a likeable enough character, and completely different than Clementine. Garcia, a former professional baseball player, is surviving America with his brother’s wife and step children, who are not very trusting. It makes for some interesting moments and scenarios, and makes me think about the first season of the AMC Walking Dead, although without the skeptical children.

Because we get to control a new character in this version of the Walking Dead, it all feels very hurried. You are quickly given tidbits about Garcia’s life, sloppily thrown together in my opinion. You realize he is separated from his family on account of his fame, which seems a stretch to me. The ultimate letdown, however, is that you don’t get to play as Clementine the entire time; it took me almost the entire first chapter to get over that and try to connect, in some way, with Garcia.

With all Telltale games, you begin to wonder quickly how much your choices actually impact the major moments of the game. No matter what I chose, it always seems like the death of a big character or a specifically sad incident was bound to happen. Sometimes, I wish Telltale could make a game where choices you make could prevent a death, although I suppose that it wouldn’t make a very good game.

Everything from previous Telltale games is here once again, including gorgeous visuals and great storytelling. Although I would like more interaction in my Telltale games, it does seem that there is a tad more to do in A New Frontier over the previous two seasons. Overall, if you love The Walking Dead, we highly recommend grabbing season 3, after playing 1 and 2 that is!

We will have more on the remainder of Season 3 once we complete all the episodes. Please stay tuned!