Eleven months after Telltale Games laid off employees and shut down, the company are back. Kinda. Ish. Not really. Holding company LCG Entertainment today announced that they've bought a chunk of Telltale's intellectual properties, assets, trademarks, and technology. Wrapping themselves in the flayed hide of Telltale Games and using their name, LCG Entertainment plan to not only return old Telltale games to sale but make new games in old series too. This isn't a move by former Telltale folks, mind, more a group of investors. But Telltale are back, baby! Kinda. Ish. Not really.
]]>The sad saga of Telltale's fall is due one last tragic chapter. GOG have just announced that all of the defunct choose-your-own-adventure studio's games will be de-listed next Monday, May 27th at 11am BST. That includes Telltale's own games like Puzzle Agent, and all three seasons of Sam & Max adventures, as well as licensed games like The Wolf Among Us, Guardians Of The Galaxy, Batman, and the excellent Tales From The Borderlands. The last of which has already been removed from Steam, though publisher 2K Games are working to bring it (and it alone) back, as reported by Eurogamer.
]]>Batman - The Telltale Series should probably have been called Bruce Wayne - The Telltale Series given how little screen time the Dark Knight actually gets in the first season of this ill-fated episodic adventure game, but I'd argue that it made for a more meaningful take on some of his relationships with the wider Batman cast - and specifically a person who's obviously very close to Bruce's heart: Harvey Dent, aka Two Face.
]]>Update: Telltale have officially confirmed the bad news that they've closed most the studio and only 25 employees remain.
As reported by Gamasutra, it seems that prolific choose-your-own-adventure studio Telltale Games is shutting down. This is backed up by media posts from developers at and close to the studio, such as Outerloop's Chandana Ekanayake.
The Verge report that a skeleton crew of around 25 will remain at the studio, down from around 250. A source tells USGamer the upcoming The Wolf Among Us 2 and a Stranger Things adventure series have been cancelled. Telltale Games have released no official statement yet.
]]>As an actual adult human being who still reads DC comics, I have to put up with a lot of BatBullShit. It's not the brooding that gets to me or even the weird and sudden flips between psychologically scarring street-level crimefighting and wacky Justice League space adventures. It's not the callbacks to events from previous decades that I don't care about or understand, and it's not even the fact that the world's greatest detective solves far too many problems by punching people until they stop moving.
It's the romance that bothers me. The sexytimes. I really don't care if Batman and Catwoman are making out on a rooftop, or tearing off each other's costumes in Crime Alley or some other unfortunate locale. It's not that I object to any of these mostly miserable characters having a bit of fun every once in a while, but just as in a computer game when two doll-like faces smash together and I'm supposed to pretend I'm witnessing a passionate and intimate moment, these caped and costumed comic characters don't seem real enough for anything other than the kind of sex-free coupling that Ken and Barbie might engage in.
How remarkable, then, that Telltale's Batman Series actually had my favourite romantic moment in any game I've played for a good while.
]]>The worst kept secret of Telltale's digital choose-your-own-adventures is that there's really not much choosing involved. While incidental details may change, the main thrust of the story doesn't. That may also be the case for the final episode in Telltale's well received second season of Batman adventures, but while your decisions may eventually lead roughly to the same end, it feels like every call carries extra weight this time, as you help define your personal origin for a truly legendary antagonist.
Concluding Batman: The Enemy Within, the fifth and final episode - Same Stitch - is out now, and its two launch trailers paint two very contrasting pictures of the man who is to become The Joker.
]]>Feast your eyes on a new trailer for the Batman: The Enemy Within [official site], the second season of Telltale Games' trip to Gotham. I say feast, it might be more cover-and-squeal, because there's a particularly nasty sequence of The Riddler, the villain of choice this time around, torturing a man for information.
You don't actually watch the gore but you see the choppy-choppy contraption and hear the saw blades and the screams and your imagination does the rest. Oh, and The Joker makes an appearance too.
]]>Episodic storytellers Telltale Games have announced a trio of new seasons for some old games. More Batman, more The Walking Dead, and more The Wolf Among Us are in the pipeline. Batman's second season will start in August while the others are expected in 2018. Click on for a blast of Taletellers gabbing about the games.
]]>Oh boy, have we got sales news for you, vast gaping maw of collective consumerism. Isn’t it a beautiful day for buying things? The Humbler Bundlers have put together a bunch of Telltale’s better games for $15. Yes, everyone has probably already got their critically acclaimed zombies ‘n’ conversation games based on the Walking Dead. But has everybody got Batman? Has everybody got Game of Thrones? Has everybody got…
*squints at notes*
“Bone: The Great Cow Race”?
]]>Telltale Games will start ooga-chakaing next year with an episodic Guardians of the Galaxy game but they've a little BLURP!ing and ZLOTT!ing to finish up first. Telltale today announced that the fifth and final episode of their Batman [official site] will launch next Tuesday, December 13th. Will Bruce Wayne keep his friendship with Batman secret or will the whole world try to gatecrash their Batbrunches?
But first, Telltale have started giving the first episode away free to all and sundry as a demo. They've also patched the game up with big performance improvements.
]]>Episode 4 of Batman - The Telltale Series [official site] has Batman locked in Arkham Asylum, and my favorite Danny DeVito character has taken over Wayne Enterprises. In the meantime Harvey Dent and the Children of Arkham are at each other's throats, and who knows who's going to help Batman this time?! Biff! Zot!
]]>The third instalment of Telltale's episodic Batman [official site] is thunking, vronking, and zgruppping its way out this afternoon. This is the mid-way point of the season and, from what I've seen (I've not had a bash myself), it looks like the Batstory is potentially branching a bit from established Batcanon of Batbackbatstories. I'd been concerned that the Batburden of Bathistory might Batstifle Telltale's whole 'Batchoices and Batconsequences' Batdealio, Batbut maybe Batthis will Batbe Bata Batinteresting Batone. Here, have a peek in this launch trailer for Episode 3: New World Order.
]]>You'll never guess what: Batman's mate Harvey has gone a bit funny. He's always fiddling with change in his pocket and staring intently at coins, but you'll never see him buying a cup of tea, Cornetto, or can or Irn-Bru. You'll even catch him muttering at coins, as if he's crushing on Lady Liberty. Give over Harv, you ol' horndog! Batman and his secret bestie Bruce Wayne will be figuring out how to broach this difficult subject with Harv in the third episode of Telltale's episodic Batman [official site], which Telltale have announced will launch on October 25th.
]]>Batman - The Telltale Series, Episode Two: Children of Arkham [official site]. For me this game's biggest problem is that the name hardly trips off the tongue. BTTSETCOA? Betsy Cola? Pepsi Cola? Anyway, Pepsi Cola arrives tomorrow and thus we have a trailer. It's so Batman. So. Batman. I mean, there is corruption and Gotham and the DeadWaynes and hench dudes with guns and voice modulators monologuing to a literally captive audience.
"Brothers and sisters of Gotham, something something something".
]]>"Bring back Joel Schumacher, all is forgiven," our Alec said in his Wot I Think of the first episode of Telltale's Batman series [official site]. Not a fan, that one. Found it a bit tedious, he did. Too familiar a Batstory. And I'm totally with him - I miss Joel Schumacher's Batman too. So look, here's the news: Episode 2 of Telltale's Batman will arrive on September 20th and it will be named Children of Arkham. Now that's out the way, we can focus on imagining Joel Schumacher's Batman - The Telltale Series.
]]>Last week's best-sellers, today. Most of the recent mainstays are still hanging on in there, but it's goodbye to Dead by Daylight (for now, at least). We do get two intriguing new entries, one glowering and one that is ALL THE FISH. Number one, meanwhile, is probably the number one you expected. That's right: Limbo of the Lost is back-back-back!
]]>I don’t know about you, but I’ve often wondered about just what it was that made Bruce Wayne become Batman. If only there was some sort of insight to be had into whatever tragic event caused Wayne to wage a war on crime. 77 years of Batman, thousands of comics, hundreds of cartoons, a dozen films and still his origin is entirely mysterious to us. If only there was some way to find out a) what makes Wayne hate crime so and b) how he feels about it.
Thank you, Batman - The Telltale Series, for finally putting us out of our misery.
]]>SNIKT! That's the sound of Telltale cutting the ribbon to formally launch the first part of their episodic pants-over-trousers 'em up Batman: The Telltale Series [official site]. THWIP! That's the sound of someone in spandex sitting down in a leather chair to play another adventure story game in the typical Walking Dead-ish, Wolfamongus-y Telltale way. BAMF! That's me.
]]>Playing The Wolf Among Us with my wife was one of my favorite gaming experiences ever, so I'm pretty excited that Telltale has seen the potential and will be adding a new multiplayer mode with upcoming releases, starting with Batman, that will let participants vote during decisions to decide the outcome of the story.
]]>Your man Batman and his Batchums are leaping, diving, and chatting all over the place in the first in-game trailer for Batman: The Telltale Series [official site]. It comes alongside news that the first episode will launch on August 2nd. Until then, here, have a gander at Batso, Brucie, Vicki, Harvey and all the gang, see how they've come out in Telltale's episodic adventure game:
]]>Batman: The Telltale Series [official site] is finally getting a digital release date. Almost. Telltale have revealed that the first episode will launch sometime in August. We'll have to wait until next week, though, to see the specific the date is revealed alongside a new trailer.
]]>Telltale will be BAM!ing, CRAAACK!ing, FLRBBBBB!ing, and ZGRUPPP!ing all up in your business this summer. That's when the episodic adventure Batman: The Telltale Series will kick off, the developers of Wolfamongus and The Walking Dead announced today.
They're being a bit cagey about what your man Batman will be up to but, intriguingly, it sounds like Batman's friend Bruce Wayne - the billionaire playboy - will be almost as important to the story as The Dark Knight himself. Catwoman, Harvey Dent, Jim Gordon back in his Lieutenant days, and Vicki Vale are involved too.
]]>Last year, when Adam first reported Telltale were developing an episodic Batman [official site] game, he said: "I really really really really really really really hope that 90% of the game has me playing as Bruce Wayne, trying to pick the most obnoxious behaviours possible so as to maintain my cover as the world’s shittiest billionaire playboy."
While it's unclear if socialite sabotage will be possible at this stage, it does seem as though Adam's wish will be granted as Telltale have now confirmed players will spend more time in control of the man behind the mask.
]]>Telltale are making a Batman game. Take a trip to Crime Alley and other Gotham hotspots in the brief teaser below.
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