Developer: Telltale Games
Publisher: Telltale Games
Rrp: £14.99 (Steam and
Humblebundle), £19.99 (Gog.com) and $24.99 (Telltale.com)
Released: 23rd December 2010
Available on: Steam, Humblebundle, Gog.com and Telltale.com
Played Using: Mouse and Keyboard
Who on Earth would make a video game based on a movie that’s over twenty years old? Quite a few companies actually… but who would make a point and click adventure? Telltale that’s who. Not only do they choose to make a game off an old (some would argue irrelevant) intellectual property but they choose a genre that not to long ago many would have called dead.
Back to the Future: The Game is exactly what it says, its a game (of the point and click variety) based on the movie Back to the Future. Except, its kind of not at the same time. The story deviates wildly from the original film, going so far as to have Doc Brown disappear from the time line. Not to worry though! Marty is on the job and will bring the Doc back.
It’s strange playing a Telltale game from before they seemingly discovered their formula for the narrative focused adventure stories. In playing this game you can kind of see the prototype for the formula in action. For example, the dialog choices that are typical and essential to Telltales later games like the Walking Dead are there but without a timer or the ‘Kenny will remember this’ style of consequence. These play much more like point and click adventures, which makes sense since that’s exactly what they were trying to create.
Unfortunately because its somewhere in between the narrative game and a point and click there are lots of things that feel out of place. For example in NGs (Narrative Games) don’t really tend to have a HUD because it breaks the flow of the game. In this game? Well, the HUD is a mess. It feels intrusive, especially at the beginning of the game with pop ups and buttons appearing.
Sad to say the problems don’t end there either, the movement system while controlled by the mouse is quite confusing, at least it was for me but perhaps that’s my dyslexia talking.
To top it all off lip-syncing is quite often out of sync . It’s clear the Telltale were trying to avoid the uncanny valley by choosing a more cartoon-y looking art direction, and for the most part it works. But every so often there’s an uncomfortable moment usually when the cutscene focuses on a characters face.
Awesomely, Christopher Lloyd reprises his role as the voice for Doc Brown, I suppose no one else could really do the role justice. Michael J Fox, who played Marty in the films, also makes an appearance but not as Marty. Just keep an ear open for a familiar voice.
This is very much a game that requires the player to have watched the film series and because of that, I really can’t recommend it. It doesn’t help that the whole things just feels uncomfortable. Left in the uncanny valley in many ways.
If this appeals to you perhaps try;
Tales from the Borderlands
Broken Age
Deponia
