The "Walking Dead" franchise has become one of the biggest in American pop culture since the AMC series premiered back in 2010. Those 15 years have brought numerous spin-off series, tie-ins, and video games, in addition to Robert Kirkman's original comics. Of the bunch, the "Walking Dead" games have achieved some of the highest critical acclaim -- specifically, the narrative-driven adventure games from Telltale, which broke ground in the genre with a high degree of player choice in how the stories
played out.
Those games are well-known at this point, but they also don't tie directly back to the TV show. Rather, they're attached to the separate comic continuity. However, there are some other, lesser-known "Walking Dead" video games that are set in the world of the AMC series. One of those, 2013's "The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct," acts as a prequel for Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus) and his brother Merle (Michael Rooker).
At the time, Daryl was already a fan favorite, and his standing in the fandom has only grown since, with a standalone "Daryl Dixon" spin-off series arriving in 2023 that's run for two seasons and counting. All of that might compel you to go back and give "Survival Instinct" a try if you're a dedicated fan of the franchise, or of Daryl in particular. But unfortunately, that's not something I can recommend. While Reedus and Rooker did voice their show characters in the game, it was a disaster back in 2013, and it only looks worse now in retrospect. So instead, let me save you the time.
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The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct Was Critically Panned Upon Release
The pitch for "The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct" sounds like a good idea on paper. It takes place very early on in the zombie outbreak, showing how Daryl and Merle Dixon arrived in Atlanta, where we meet them at the beginning of the AMC series. Narratively, the game provides some extra context for the Dixon clan, explaining how the brothers' father and uncle both died. It also sets up the tension between the brutal Merle and the more sympathetic Daryl, playing out over the course of a series of encounters with other survivors. Oh, and we also get a bit of an origin story (or, at least, return story) for Daryl's weapon of choice, the crossbow.
Gameplay-wise, "Survival Instinct" is a first-person shooter where the player must balance stealth and gunplay, while constantly hunting for supplies and fuel for the various vehicles Daryl uses on his journey. Again, it sounds like a natural fit. Unfortunately, the execution was severely lacking.
The game's highest average score on Metacritic is a 38/100 for the PC release, with the Xbox 360 version rating the lowest at 32/100. Critics and players alike called the game boring, tedious, and half-baked, with little fun to be had within the various gameplay systems. You'd hope that the connections to the larger franchise would redeem it somewhat, but even that aspect of the game was panned.
"As awful as Survival Instinct is mechanically, the really depressing thing about it is that it offers no meaningful information or commentary on the characters it revolves around," game critic Alex Navarro wrote in his ⅕ review at Giant Bomb back in 2013. "The storytelling is spartan to the point of very nearly not existing."
While Bad, Survival Instinct Did Get Norman Reedus His Start In Games
The one fascinating kernel of "Survival Instinct" looking back is that it was the first video game role of any sort for Norman Reedus, who has gone on to become one of the biggest acting stars in the medium thanks to his starring role as Sam Porter Bridges in Hideo Kojima's "Death Stranding" series. Reedus' work on "Death Stranding" is arguably his second-biggest role to date in terms of cultural impact, placing just behind Daryl Dixon. But while you could try to draw a direct connection between the games, Reedus being cast by Kojima apparently had more to do with his more traditional acting work.
The two were actually introduced by Guillermo del Toro. "Guillermo gave me my SAG card and my first acting job, and I trust him with everything," Reedus told The Hollywood Reporter in 2019. "I knew this guy would be good if Guillermo was saying this." At the time, the plan was to work together on a new game in the "Silent Hill" horror franchise -- one that's also familiar to moviegoers courtesy of its film adaptations -- but that project wound up getting canceled. They finally got the chance for a full collaboration on "Death Stranding."
The work with Kojima was leagues different from what Reedus had experienced previously on "Survival Instinct," and it ended up being a major success. "I've been in several video games with 'Walking Dead,' and they just kind of came with the territory," Reedus told THR. "But nothing like this. I never dreamed that I would be wearing a motion capture suit with Velcro all over me. It was a blast, I have to admit."
A live-action "Death Stranding" movie is currently in the works, but as of this writing, no cast members have been announced.
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