| System: Xbox 360, PS3, PC* |  |
| Dev: Telltale | |
| Pub: Telltale | |
| Release: July 8, 2014 | |
| Players: 1 | |
| Screen Resolution: 480p-1080p | Intense Violence, Blood and Gore, Sexual Themes, Partial Nudity, Strong Language, Use of Alcohol and Tobacco |
This trial is perhaps the tensest part of the entire series. Your actions come back to haunt you in a major way. All of the things that you thought were just you, being Bigby, being cool, start to have an effect on how the game plays out. Were you a ruthless murder wolf? Were you a gentle savior that looked out for everyone else? Were you the champion of the state? Were you the hero of the people? Nothing is the “right” answer. Nothing will make you “win.” It all just changes who trusts you, and how that trust effects the ending of the game.
But as tense and thrilling as the ending is, it actually has nothing on the brilliantly crafted epilogue. At first, you get this strange feeling of lack of payoff, much like you feel at the beginning of the episode. It seems like nothing is changing. There is still a wealth gap between upper class and lower class fables. The line to the mayor’s office is longer than ever. Things are still unfair and while you may have avenged the lives of a few girls, there are countless other fables who are out of work.
It’s in this scene that you get to talk with one character about the events that happened during the game, and things start changing. With only a few sentences you start doubting everything. You wonder, was your conclusion correct? Was the game telling the truth about who the murderer was? Did you punish the right guy? All of these questions are left up to your interpretation but, if you go back and play the episodes over again, you’ll start finding interesting little clues here and there that clue you into what is happening behind the scenes. The game doesn’t give you all the information straight up. You have to work for it. You have to do your own detective work as a player to figure everything out.
That’s when it hits you. You care about the murderer again. The game really is a complete cycle, starting you with making choices and ending the same way. It starts you caring about the murderer and ends you the same way. It starts with a screwed up Fabletown and ends with a screwed up Fabletown. But it’s not the destination that matters. It’s the journey. The one thing that is different now, is that you look at Fabletown differently. The same change that happened in you, is the change that happened in Bigby Wolf. You see beyond the superficial layer of this screwed up town into the deep darkness underneath, just as Bigby does, and if you choose to start the game again, it will make you look at it in an entirely new light.
Overall, it was a fun ending to a great series. Its ending isn’t satisfying at first, but it grows on you as you think about it. This is the sort of ending that has you talking with your friends for days about it. Everyone is going to look at the ending in a totally different way. But what’s the true ending? What really happened? Where are the answers to all the questions you have? If you ask Telltale about it, they’ll only say one thing: “These Lips Are Sealed.”
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By Angelo M. D'Argenio Contributing Writer Date: July 8, 2014 |
Game Features:
