'The Walking Dead Season 2: No Going Back'

The imagery at hand is provocative for its bluntness, as Clementine stumbles over that frozen lake, through a half-built house and, finally, blindly into the snow. Yes, she is lost and no good thing builds to fruition. It can slip away at any time. See? I did it. I connected the dots, and compared to most video games that rely on one straight line through its plot, I'm ever more appreciative of the opportunity to think things through. The environments and the expressiveness of the characters actually peaked my interest far more than what they had to say in 'No Going Back.' Well done to the artists.

As always, the voice acting is top notch, and the music matched well with the absolute dire tone of the final 30 minutes. Again, a great job in creating the atmosphere and the reality from all involved here.

My overall negative attitude towards this episode exemplified in "The Game Itself" section is undoubtedly a little inflamed. The visual imagery actually hit some impressive highs, and the voice acting and musical backdrop did some excellent work to support the random plot, more than in past episodes, so the experience was lifted a bit by the team's artists. The writers, on the other hand, dropped the ball.

Somehow, with each passing episode, I felt the potential of this series give way to mediocrity, and the finale did nothing to stop that trend. Without a whole bunch of interactive control or emotive impact, I can't say Telltale achieved its goal and I can't say season three is looking promising. Perhaps there's another kind of enemy Clementine needs to survive.