Summary
New social deduction gameThe Walking Dead: Betrayalis likeProject Winterwith zombies. Game Rant was able to go hands-on withThe Walking Dead: Betrayalfor a few sessions to see just how this latest take on the social deduction genre stacks up compared to its competitors.
Social deduction games have been all the rage in recent years, largely thanks to thesuccess ofAmong Us. BesidesAmong Us, one of the more popular social deduction games on the market isProject Winter, which currently enjoys a “Very Positive” overall rating on Steam. InProject Winter, a selection of players work together as survivors trying to escape from an unforgiving wilderness, while the secret traitors in the group attempt to sabotage their efforts. This is exactly howThe Walking Dead: Betrayalworks, but with a decidedlyTWDflavor.
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The Walking Dead: Betrayalis basicallyProject Winterwith aWalking Deadtheme. Those that have already playedProject Winterextensively and were hoping for a genuinely new social deduction experience may be disappointed by this, but others will be able to appreciate the clever waysThe Walking Deadworld is incorporated.
Survivors vs. Traitors
InThe Walking Dead: Betrayal, six survivors attempt to escape a zombie-ridden area with their lives, while two secret traitors have to take them out. Players get specific roles that give them unique skills. For example, the Confidant gets a hint as to who one of the traitors are, while the Tailor can make skin suits out of corpses to sneak through crowds of zombies unharmed, likethe Whisperers fromThe Walking Deadcomic booksand TV series.
Players have to put these skills to good use after venturing out from their base camp. The goal is to acquire specific supplies to fix a wagon needed for escape. Players have to explore the nearby buildings and neighborhoods to find these items, all the while dealing with hordes of zombies, or “walkers” asThe Walking Deadcalls them, and the knowledge that a couple of traitors are actively working against the best interests of the group.
Traitors have a variety of tricks they can use to throw a wrench in the survivors' plans, like laying traps or breaking the gates so survivors can’t get back to base. The key tosocial deduction gameslike this is the ability of the traitors to keep their identities secret while wreaking this kind of havoc. Traitors inThe Walking Dead: Betrayalneed to be very calculated with their actions to avoid getting caught, and the best players will likely figure out ways to not only avoid getting caught, but also effectively frame innocent survivors and turn them against each other. The tools are all there forThe Walking Dead: Betrayalplayers to pull off incredible deceits and make impressive plays, though whether it’s any fun or not boils down to the quality of the people playing.
Survival Game Features
While the survivors try to work out who the traitors are and the traitors get busy sabotaging the survivors, everyone needs to keep their hunger meter in mind.The Walking Dead: Betrayalincorporatessurvival game mechanicsby forcing players to scavenge and cook food to increase their odds of survival while on supply runs. With limited inventory space and a time limit to consider, though, players have to think strategically about what they carry with them. Food takes up precious space that could instead be reserved for a more powerful weapon to kill walkers or even hostile players.
Weather also plays a role in the game. There was one instance where we were traveling in a group, only for it to start hailing. We were forced to take shelter in a shipping container to avoid taking damage. Zombies began to swarm in, creating a tense situation where we had to carefully take out the zombies while trying to avoid hurting our fellow survivors. These moments are the highlight ofThe Walking Dead: Betrayaland give the game more of a genuine horror vibe that’s not necessarily present elsewhere.
Playing as a Zombie
In most social deduction games, death is the end. That’s not so inThe Walking Dead: Betrayal. Anyone unlucky enough to die inThe Walking Dead: Betrayalcomes back as azombie, with players able to take control of any zombie they’d like. Walkers die very fast, but if players are careful with them, they can create serious headaches for the survivors. It’s an interesting twist on the social deduction formula and makes the game stay fun even for dead players.
When the time runs out in aWalking Dead: Betrayalgame, a storm starts raging and massive hordes of zombies are unleashed on the players. This is where playing as a zombie can be especially fun, but the build of the game we played seemed to have trouble when this happened. Perhaps it was the sheer number of zombies on-screen at once or other some other problem, but there was one instance where all the zombies simply disappeared on our end, and we got stuck floating in the void. Others participating in the test also had issues with the game crashing, but hopefully those problems are ironed out come launch.
While some may feel it doesn’t do enough to set itself apart fromProject Winter,The Walking Dead: Betrayalhas potential to make a splash in the social deduction space. By leveraging anestablished IP likeThe Walking Dead,The Walking Dead: Betrayalcould potentially draw in many who never playedProject Winterand will be able to appreciateWalking Dead: Betrayala lot more as a result. There may need to be some balance tweaks and the technical issues need addressed, butThe Walking Dead: Betrayalis definitely one to watch.
