Now Playing: The Wolf Among Us

The Wolf Among Us is an interactive, episodic adventure developed by Telltale Games. It’s based on the ‘Fables’ comic book series by Bill Willingham and serves as a ‘canon’ prequel. You play as Bigby Wolf, Sheriff of Fabletown. Your job is to investigate the murder of a fellow ‘fable’ – a storybook character seeking refuge in our world.

I wasn’t familiar with the original comic upon playing The Wolf Among Us but the game does a good job of explaining things with little exposition. As you progress you’ll unlock information boxes that provide more context to various aspects of the world, characters and lore.

If you’re familiar with other Telltale adventure games you’ll know exactly how it plays. It’s a very narrative heavy adventure with a few small ‘exploration’ segments and QTE heavy action scenes. It also promises that the story will change depending on your unique choices but, as is usually the case, that’s not entirely true.

There are 5 episodes each taking about an hour or so to complete. That’s a little shorter than some other Telltale titles and particularly disappointing in this case. Because despite not knowing a thing about the original comic going into The Wolf Among Us, I thoroughly enjoyed what I played and came away with a strong connection to this world, its story and its wonderful cast of characters.

As far as the central narrative goes, I really have no complaints. It’s an engaging and enjoyable tale from start to finish. But it’s also very short and it doesn’t leave you entirely satisfied at the end. Considering the depth of the source material, The Wolf Among us could have easily been at least twice the length – which would have really fleshed out the story, world and characters to a far more appropriate degree.

The Wolf Among Us sets up so many potential story threads but drops so many of them as it focuses entirely on the core narrative. This gives the narrative a great sense of pace, but it’s incredibly frustrating when so much of its world and characters are teased but barely explored. Like other Telltale titles there’s a lot of notifications that ‘X character will remember that’ but very few, if any, pay off by the end.

Even when you think you’ve made a decision that will change the narrative it doesn’t really do a thing. That’s always been a problem with Telltale and the ‘illusion of choice’ but it feels even more pronounced here because this game, as I’ve said, is a canon prequel to the comic series. As a result, everything has to end in such a way that ties neatly into how the comics begin. So no matter what you do, or what choices you make, you don’t really have any influence on the overall narrative.

What you do have, however, is the ability to shape the character of Bigby – how he responds both verbally and physically to the various situations you’ll find yourself in. Do you try to be the law abiding sheriff that Snow White wants you to be? Or do you give in to the beast inside? That struggle is at the heart of the narrative and thanks to some great VA for Bigby and the supporting cast, it’s that struggle that keeps you engaged throughout.

I won’t get into story specifics because the narrative is what makes this game great and it’s best to discover it on your own. I just wish the experience was far more substantial and not so heavily restricted by its status as an official prequel to the comics.

Despite my disappointment at its length and how it largely glosses over your choices due to those restrictions, I still thoroughly enjoyed The Wolf Among Us and I’d be interested in seeing more of this world and these characters.

7/10