For weeks, months even, The Wolf Among Us has been building to this. And what’s more, we’re only into the third episode of what’s turning into quite the impressive debut season for Telltale Games’ newest episodic series. Episode 3: A Crooked Mile picks up from that shocker of a cliffhanger (did nobody really see that coming?) in Episode 2: Smoke & Mirrors. Without revealing too many spoilers — because I still think you should go out and get the Season Pass and start playing — let’s just say we’ve encountered two murders and now have a suspect identified.
So A Crooked Mile begins with Bigby hunting down the perpetrator of these crimes, who shall remain unnamed for the time being. The episode has a much quicker pace to it, creating a sense of urgency and tension to the situation — like the clock is really ticking and one wrong move or decision could spell doom for another fable. And in A Crooked Mile, your decisions made in the past two episodes are beginning to show their effects, whether it be through the way other characters react to you or entire scenes not taking place and vice versa. Never, in any of my experiences with a Telltale game, has it seemed like my decisions have mattered more to the story.
The rapid pace of this episode did, however, lead to a source of personal frustration as I found myself torn between investigating a scene thoroughly and really examining every piece of evidence or moving on as to uncover the truth quicker. In some cases, the decision to move on from a scene was made for me as I would accidently investigate an object that would trigger a sequence of events and move on, even if I wasn’t necessarily ready to do so. At the end of the day, I appreciated the much quicker pace of A Crooked Mile as I sometimes felt scenes dragged on a bit in the previous two episodes.
Episode 3: A Crooked Mile is probably my favorite episode of the three thus far. The quicker pace, a realization that my decisions actually matter, and an entirely more intense feeling and approach really add to the tension of the investigation. With still two more episodes to go until the conclusion (or cliffhanger), it’ll be interesting to see how Telltale approaches the storytelling aspect. I personally hope they continue with this pace.
