The Wolf Among Us: Episode 1 - Faith starts off by setting up the world. At some point, all of the fairy tale characters from all of the stories had to leave their old worlds behind. They all moved to our world and settled in and around New York City. Most live in a neighborhood called Fabletown, but other, less fortunate fables live in some of the seedier parts of the city. Think of this as a version of
Once Upon a Time where everyone remembers who they were and tries to keep a low profile.
The game follows Bigby Wolf, formerly the Big Bad Wolf. He is the sheriff and his primary job is to make sure the rest of the world doesn't know about their existence. Some days are easier than others, but between non-humanoid fables who don't use enchantments to blend in and fights between others that are way more drawn-out and more brutal than anything else on the streets of NYC, Bigby has his work cut out for him.
The first episode, "Faith," starts off with Bigby having to break up a fight between The Woodsman and a working girl that Bigby knows is a fable, but doesn't quite recognize. The story really picks up when the unknown girl's head shows up on the steps of Fabletown the next day. What follows is an investigation that sends the sheriff all over the city to not only find out who the victim is, but why anyone would want her dead.
For those gamers who played through Telltale's The Walking Dead games, you can expect the same style of adventure here. The main difference is that there is a lot more action in this series. Where The Walking Dead was filled with a low and ever-present tension between the characters and what might be just beyond the walls, there weren't that many quicktime based fighting sequences. That isn't the case here. As the sheriff of a group of powerful, and often angry, supernatural creatures, Bigby ends up getting in a lot of fights, so if you didn't like the "fighting" mechanics of The Walking Dead, then you might not want to jump into The Wolf Among Us.
What most people liked about the previous title and is gladly brought into this one is the decision system. Like The Walking Dead, characters remember the way you treat them and the decisions you make. Dialogue branches naturally based on your attitudes towards characters and more obvious big decisions can change a lot about how the game ends, including who survives. There are a couple of points in The Wolf Among Us: Episode 1 - Faith where you have to decide between two paths. These include deciding which locations to investigate in which order, as well as who to chase when two people you seriously need to talk to run in opposite directions.
