Gameitall (* I would like to note before hand that this review is insisting of Episodes 1-4 and was played on the PS3*)
I don’t think I’ve played a bad Telltale game, Sam and Max was amazing, so was Tales of Monkey Island, and even Strong Bad’s Cool Game For Attractive People. So you can guess when I heard that Telltale games and Universal Pictures would be working together to bring movie based games like Back to the Future, Jurassic Park and The Walking Dead.
Now I’ve expected Back to the Future to be a point and click game, but what I didn’t expect is how much thought and care went into the game.
Back to the Future: the game takes place 6 months after the 3rd movie, Doc is missing from Hill Valley and the DeLorean had been destroyed. Life goes on as Marty attempts to cope without Doc Brown. That is until the DeLorean comes back without a driver.
Marty goes back in time to rescue Doc who was mistaken for an Arsonist of a speakeasy back in 1931. In true Back to the Future style, Marty fixes the issues only to have another arise, whether it’s getting your grandparents together so you don’t fade away in time, or stopping a gangster turning Hill Valley into a dictatorship utopia, the story is just well crafted. Each episode ends with a cliff hanger that leads into the next and makes you can’t wait for the next part.
If you ever played a point and click game like Myst or Sam and Max, then the gameplay will not surprise you, you take control of Marty solving puzzles and talking with the people in Hill Valley to get clues on how to fix the certain problem or get past obstacles, some items need to be used on certain characters or under certain time restraints. For example, one part of the game shows the famous guitar mega-amp blow out, to do this you need to use Marty’s guitar with the amp, tell your dad to let you fight your own battles, and gloat Biff into making an ass of himself (something that’s simple anyways.)
If the game gets too complicated in what you need to do, then there is a 3 tier help system. Pressing the help button will give us a clue on what to do, still don’t know, press it again to see the next one, and finally have them out right tell you. It may not add to any challenges and it does make the game much easier, but when your stuck with a obscure puzzle, having an in-game system instead of looking at FAQs on the net is very helpful.
The only problem I encountered with this game is the same that I’ve encounter throughout most of TellTales catalog and thats the movements and the camera, something that’s pretty much unimportant in point-and-click game, if you can play Sam and Max or Monkey island, you will have no problem playing Back to the Future.
All the major points of a movie based game that doesn’t suck is in here, you have key elements from the film in the game, references from the movie to compare what your doing, and the original cast returning as their characters, with the exception of Michael J Fox, who plays an ancestor of Marty’s because we all know he’s too old to play 18 year old Marty McFly, still great to have him show up in the game along side Christopher Lloyd who returns as Doc.
So it really comes down to this, do you like Back To the Future? Do you like Point and Click games? If the answer is yes to either or both of these questions then this game is a must buy, it’s well crafted, funny, and overall great game.
Personally the game is awesome, probably one of the best point and click games I’ve seen in a long while, and really makes me want to see what TellTale can do with “The Walking Dead” and “Jurassic Park.”
Pros – great comedy, easy to control yet challenging, amazing voice acting and aesthetics.
Cons- Camera is alittle stiff causes problems when trying to move (think Resident Evil 1.)
