The Council Comes to an End with its Last Episode: Checkmate

By: GeekyGamerGirl87

I will admit it has been quite the bumpy road for me and the game The Council. I began coverage of this episodic game last year in July and this past December the final episode of the game came out. I will admit I was really into the game when I played the first two episodes came out. So much that it caused me to binge play the first three episodes. By the third episode, I was left a little let down, and episode 4 did nothing to ratify that. Then came the fifth episode: Checkmate and well…Well before I go into my review if you have not read my other articles pertaining to the game, I recommend reading them before reading this article. As I have talked about the graphics and controls for the game in the other articles. I am still trying to make the articles spoiler free. So, I will vaguely touch on the story and try not to give it away. If you are interested in reading the other articles you can read them here and in this order:

Does Mother Know Best? The Council  begs to Differ (Episodes 1-3)

The Council Episode 4: Burning Bridges Burns Bridges (Episode 4)

Before I do begin my article, I do want to take the time to thank Big Bad Wolf and Focus Home Interactive for providing us here at thedailygamepad.com with a free copy of the Full season of The Council. It is because of their generosity that I was able to cover the game for the website.

As with any Episodic game The Council Episode 5: Checkmate picks up where you last left off with Louis De Richet. In this episode, this is where the conference will come to an end and after all the crazy stuff that happened in episode 3 and 4, I will admit it didn’t leave a nice taste in my mouth. Episode 4 really threw me through a loop and so it made me shy away from the game for a bit. However, because I like to see things through; I told myself that I needed to see this game to the end. Episode 5: Checkmate  had its moments that made it a bit better, but still did not possess the ending I would have hoped for. As I stated with episodic games you get to choose your outcome by the things you choose to do.

Some of the things I found interesting is that some of the dialogue from the characters seemed to be tributes to famous memes and even straight from famous movies. Not that that is a bad thing, because often in games paying tribute to another media is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, I liked those tad bits because it added a little something extra to the game. However, even with some of its good moments like that; I still felt like the game sort of let me down.

The main issue with the game, in my opinion, is that it feels rushed. This is proven as each of the episodes after Episode 2: Hide and Seek, seemed to decrease in the amount of play time. For me, it started to lose its spark for me in Episode 3: Ripples. I had some issues with how that episode ended but it wasn’t too bad, and I would just simply wait for Episode 4: Burning Bridges to come out to see if it would pick up. Then Episode 4: Burning Bridges released and to me, it seems like the writers had no idea where the story was going to go. It even gave away certain information even if you hadn’t populated that scenario in the game, which I thought took away from the game.  They also seem to use what I felt was a cop-out method and let one event carry onto multiple characters. I wasn’t against it until it seemed like every single character had this particular trait occur. However, I remained a little optimistic and wanted to finish the game.

I bounced back and forth on when I would play because for me it made me question “How an episodic game could have such two powerful episodes? Then  be followed up by two mediocre episodes?” None the less, I decided I would finish the game because I had come this far, so it was only fair to see it through.

Unfortunately, Episode 5: Checkmate did not really get any better, but it wasn’t exactly bad. As I stated before it had its moments in which it was funny. The main issues are that it recycled what happened in episodes before it. I was okay with the puzzles in the game. However, it was the storytelling that really did not sit right with me. They tried to go for shock factor and it just wasn’t really a shock value, as more as a “Why was this even included?” value. Like leaking information that should not have been leaked if you didn’t trigger that scene. I was a little unnerved about that and it made me feel like I didn’t need to replay the game. Also, in one of the puzzles in this episode a character who was long gone from the ending of Episode 2 shows up. This made me scratch my head and say “Wait, what?” just randomly they seemed to remember the character and decided to use them in this puzzle. So, it felt like again they were just randomly throwing things together. However, the biggest let down at least for me was the ending of the game. Again, as I am trying to remain vague about the story, I will just say that I wish the ending could have been a lot better. It ended abruptly and that left me feeling unsatisfied and confused about the entire game.

Now that the game has finished, I can say that if you are an achievement hunter the game offers 42 achievements in total.  Also, if you do collect the trading cards the game does offer trading cards. Overall, When it comes to my impression of The Council,  I can honestly say this is the first time an episodic game has left me on the fence. As I stated it’s not that it’s a bad game because I enjoyed some of it and really love the puzzles. It was just the feeling of it being rushed and the storytelling not really being the greatest. I think that with episodic games the story should get more entertaining to pull you in and sadly this did the opposite for me. However, if you would like to try The Council for yourself. You can do so by purchasing the game on Steam, Humble Bundle, Fanatical, PS4, or XBONE for $29.99 USD.