Color me surprised as all hell. I enjoyed the first episode of The Walking Dead: The Game, but I absolutely didn’t expect the whole season to blow it out of the water. With the possible exception of Episode Four: Around Every Corner, every episode following the first builds on the promise of the season premiere and lives up to, and possibly exceeds, the potential of the source material.

Season one of The Walking Dead: The Game follows Lee Everett, UGA history professor charged with the murder of a state Senator, and Clementine, the 8-year-old girl he finds soon after the opening of the first episode.

The details of each of the five episodes are spoiler-ridden, as so much happens in each episode as to make summary very, very difficult.

The game builds itself around story and choice, to the point that the gameplay surrounding that can often feel somewhat mundane. It’s made more interesting because of the context it’s given through the story, but in a vacuum, it can get dull.

However, the story this game tells is among the most important things in the medium this year.

It’s a harsh story, one filled with death and sorrow and a loss of hope and innocence. Much like Schindler’s List, it’s far from being fun or enjoyable in any normal sense.

But the way it bends with Lee’s choices, even in ways that are undone further down the road, is incredible and worth seeing, regardless of how you feel about video games or The Walking Dead in general.

A certain death that occurs in Episode 3: Long Road Ahead was criticized by players for nullifying a choice in an earlier episode, but I could never see it that way.

The game follows a linear path in regards to the broad story strokes and the locations each episode occurs, and as such, at specific points, all characters are at the same logistical point in the game. The same characters are alive regardless of the choices you made before.

But those choices didn’t go away. You experienced a different journey getting to that point than other characters. Just because the destination ended up being the same doesn’t mean your choice was disregarded.

It speaks to the powerlessness of characters in The Walking Dead’s universe. No matter what choices you make, certain characters will die by the time the series ends. It’s the way of life in The Walking Dead. It’s accurate to the vibe of the comics in that regard. Rick Grimes can do what he thinks will protect the survivors, but the deaths that befall them can happen independent of his decisions.

Your choices change how characters view you, and what things they will say to you in later episodes. In this way, every choice matters. The story is yours.

The thing that, in my mind, makes this game series better than the television adaptation is the far superior cast of characters. Despite the fact that The Walking Dead show carries almost 75% of the comic’s cast over, most of them have been neutered and made significantly less interesting characters.

The game, however, contains a nearly complete new cast of characters, aside from three cameo roles in the early episodes. Each of these new characters is perfectly fleshed out, include one of the cameo characters (the one you’ll only recognize if you’ve read to issue 48 of the comics).

One of the complaints I had with the first episode was that Clementine was underutilized, and that was quickly rectified in following episodes. In fact, the game becomes primarily about Lee and Clem’s dynamic, and it works because they’re some of the most well-written characters in contemporary fiction, period.

The moments they share grow more potent as the story progresses, and the finale plays off of their relationship in the most powerful way imaginable.

The last couple moments of the final episode honestly had me in tears. I realize it’s not flattering to say that, but I want to make sure it’s known every time it happens. I hope that demonstrating that the game has the ability to make me cry will influence some people to pick it up just out of curiosity.

As a result, the game feels like a psychological test of some kind. I half expected a Silent Hill-esque statistics screen when I finished the finale.

However, the game just ends with a table of the characters you met, how you interacted with them, and their final fate. It refuses to pass judgments regarding your choices. If you feel like a bad person after making a choice, then that’s your business.

Each choice feels like choosing the lesser of two evils, or being pragmatic in the zombie wasteland over being idealistic.

You are very rarely rewarded for doing what you believe is right. You never receive an in-game bonus for deciding to take certain supplies over others, or deciding that one character dies and another lives. Even the achievements limit themselves to being solely tied to finishing certain chapters in each episode.

By doing this, the game encourages you to make the choices you would make in these situations for reasons outside of any gameplay context. If an achievement were tied to making each choice, it would invalidate the choices you make by rewarding you for seeing both outcomes.

It’s an incredible, important game, but it’s not without issues. I played on the PC through Steam and with the release of each episode, and at a certain point every time I opened the game, my saves were deleted. I got around it by running in Windows 98/ME through compatibility mode, but that caused frequent stuttering within the game and some graphical glitches.

I’ve heard that frame rate drops are frequent in the console versions, but I’ve had no experience with those editions of the game.

The graphical presentation of the game mirrors the comic’s style very well, and the original score and voice acting are pitch-perfect.

If I’ve been vague about what the game entails, I apologize, but I do it so as to not ruin the wonderful experience you’ll find within. You should play this game. It doesn’t matter who you are, how many video games you’ve played in your life, or your opinion on post-apocalyptic fiction. You owe it to the medium and to yourself to play The Walking Dead. It’s easily my favorite game this year, and it might be my favorite part of The Walking Dead universe.