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> Results: Sam & Max: Season One
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The ESRB Says
Cartoon Violence: GamerDad got to bop people on the head with a boxing glove and other comedic violence. Crude Humor: Several jokes involving bodily functions and parts. Mild Language: The worst I heard was "giving lawlessness a 'boot in the ass'". Use of Alcohol and Tobacco: Not by the main characters, but there is smoking and drinking observed. Through reviews of individual games from the first season I have indicated the wonders of the return of Sam & Max to the gaming world. For those unable or unwilling to buy the digital download versions of the games through either GameTap or directly from TellTale games there is now a boxed version including all six episodes on a single CD and a second disc full of extras and bonus material. The games are all on a single disc and install using a simple unified system. The contents of the games themselves are identical to the digital releases; the only difference being that installing and running them is simplified. After a simple installation, you are greeted with a nice launch panel that allows you to select which episode to start. From there you are sent headlong into whatever episode you chose - and by the way, the individual episodes are all as crazy, funny and excellent as they were originally. For the full history of Sam & Max, check out our review of Episode 1: Culture Shock - but in a nutshell, the LucasArts game Sam & Max Hit the Road from 1993 was a great mixture of adventure and humor, and has become a deservedly classic milestone in gaming history. After a false start for a series revival by LucasArts and a passionate Internet campaign by the fans, TellTale Games (creators of the excellent Bone series) gained ownership of the license and got straight to work, crafting a series using their adventure builder to tell stories through a point-and-click adventure interface featuring full 3D animation. The move to episodic content was a concern, but true to their word TellTale continue to release new episodes on a regular basis, and in some ways it's better to be forced to spread the experience out rather than wolf it down in one go. The Sam & Max games use the TellTale tool that the company has developed and perfected over the years. The emphasis is on storytelling rather than delivering buzzword compliant technology, so expect loads of dialog and options, rather than the latest version of pixel shader models. This is actually a good thing, because so many games focus on delivering a great looking experience that they fail to deliver a great gaming experience. The TellTale Tool aims to do some of both - the game certainly is great looking, but in a 3D comic book style. This means that the world looks much like something out of Who Framed Roger Rabbit; everything looks real but exaggerated. The 3D styling makes everything look modern and the characters are all nicely animated, to the point where lip-syncing matched the dialog. The goal isn't realism so much as believability I mean, how real do you expect a detective dog and his psychotic lagomorph sidekick to be?! The realism is injected into the dialog - the voice acting is superb and gets better with each passing episode! The voice actors really bring a wonderful passion and humor to their characters that makes each of them leap out of the screen and adds tremendous depth to already great stories - and the timing and delivery of the humor is spot on throughout. The storytelling is where things really shine the interface just begs you to click things, talk to people and try all sorts of crazy things. Quite simply, this is one of the nicest interfaces I have ever used in an adventure game. Everything is easily accessible options and game saves are quickly located in a screen-level drop down and the inventory system is an ever-present box in the lower corner of the screen. Little things help - saves are done nearly instantly, with each one providing a clear caption and image to illustrate exactly where you were when you saved. Interacting with items is equally easy; the mouse-capture range is adequate for discerning small objects close to each other and you simply click on things to interact. This allows you to talk, flip switches, pick up items and so on - and to use an item in your inventory on another item by simply choosing the item from the box and then clicking on the desired object to interact with. It is incredibly intuitive and friendly - and allows you to focus on laughing!  In my review of Sam & Max Season 1 Episode 1: Culture Shock I noted "Complaining about the length of the episode is a sort of backwards compliment though, since Sam & Max Season 1, Episode 1: Culture Shock lasts nearly as long as SiN Episodes: Emergence or Half-Life 2: Episode One, provides more genuine replayability and costs less than half the price of those episodes. And, of course, the end of the first episode sets up the second one - not in a "we hope to resolve this someday" cliffhanger but in a "tune in next month and see" lead-in." Reflecting on the second game in the season, Episode 2: Situation Comedy I remarked "Episode 2 is full of even better executed jokes and setups, with loads of extra funny stuff to discover - but it is even shorter than the first. Regardless of the replayability, having a two to three hour game just feels abruptly short. It is like having a DVR record a favorite show and realizing that without the commercials the actual show portion was only about ten minutes long one week after being twenty minutes the week before. It doesn't matter how good it is - it feels short." By the third episode the team had really hit their stride, and in my review of Episode 3: The Mole, the Mob and the Meatball I said "With locations and characters that have become familiar, the duo work through a new mystery filled with familiar elements and techniques - yet it still feels fresh. I cannot stress enough the extent to which the writing just continues getting better and better, and the voice acting and animated characterizations are improving in step with the writing too. The actors have really found their rhythm in this episode and you really care about getting as much interaction with each of the characters as possible - from the career-hopping Sybil to the ever-paranoid Bosco, you relish spending as much time possible exploring their dialog trees." Things keep getting weirder and weirder - Episode 4: Abe Lincoln Must Die! is the best episode yet, and I commented "This installment continues the trend of the writing and jokes getting better each time and thankfully reverses the trend of each episode being shorter than the last. There are also new items around to click on and some of the old items have been repurposed. Of course, most things are the same, but the added variety combined with a longer playtime and the best writing yet makes for the most enjoyable overall experience of the series so far." While the team avoided taking too many easy pot-shots at politics in the previous episode, how could they resist having fun at the expense of geeks and technology? Episode 5: Reality 2.0 "unfolds largely in the same manner as the previous four, but with a whole new twist - you need to infiltrate the 'new' Reality 2.0, which is a wild combination of just about every popular social networking buzzword out there - Sam & Max are in a video game featuring Sam & Max in a video game! This provides a great new landscape for familiar territory, with puzzles that can bridge two sets of reality, since some items behave differently depending on which reality you're in. There are plenty of puzzles, most of which are fairly straightforward but add a twist by occasionally occurring across two planes of reality. The second reality really adds a tremendous amount - as does the very interesting ending!" The season finale certainly didn't disappoint! Episode 6: Bright Side of the Moon brings it all together as the "action in this episode is fast and furious from the very start right up to the end. The general feeling throughout Episode 6 is that even after having everything plotted out, the writers just started tossing in random jokes, references and asides that they still had left over from previous episodes. The writing remains tight and sharp, but they allow for more of a rapid-fire joke style this time around, where you are hit with five jokes at once and perhaps three make you laugh - well, actually, most of the time all five are pretty funny! The episode is still rather short, but there is a ton of fun to be had and a sense of joyous overload throughout (yes, even compared to the other episodes). There are new settings and interesting new challenges, plus just about every character we've met thus far makes a glorious return. Make sure you stay through the credits too, because there are some little treats along the way, as well as a reminder of some of the excellent stuff you have seen along the way during the whole season." As if the excellence of the episodes wasn't enough value to make you immediately buy this game, the second CD is full of extras and bonus material. This includes the trailers for all six episodes , a "Making Sam & Max" behind the scenes video featuring Steve Purcell and others from the TellTale team, character bios, concept art, tons of desktop wallpapers in a variety of resolutions, and even a sampling of MP3's from the game soundtrack. You also get access to other Sam & Max goodies, such as an online web comic and comic generator for making your very own comic strips. The package also includes a full-sized printed poster featuring artwork by Sam & Max creator Steve Purcell. There is only one 'downside' question that came to me as I was poring over the extras - if you already have the entire first season purchased through GameTap, TellTale or Steam, is this collection of stuff worth the additional price? Definitely not - but if you have only played a couple of episodes or have been holding out waiting for the season on physical media, this makes the already budget pricing for the collection even more irresistible. But if you are a true Sam & Max 'fanboy' who wants to get everything, consider that even buying everything twice you are paying less than the price of a 'next gen' game and getting considerable value for your money. There are any number of amazing things I could rattle off about the triumphant first season return of Sam & Max, but the two that come to mind as I lavish in this wonderful recap are quality and value. The quality and consistency of the writing and pacing and just plain fun contained in all six of the episodes is exemplary and all too rare these days. The quality of the gameplay and characters and the way the season unfolds neatly with each passing episodes. And the value - there are about twenty hours of game time in the episode, but there is so much extra stuff crammed into each episode to keep you laughing while you replay! As I commented in a review, some items had the same comments and descriptions in a couple of episodes and then suddenly got new descriptions later in the season! It is enough to send you back clicking on everything just to see what has changed! Sam & Max are back - and have erupted in a glorious (and violent) fashion that has gamers everywhere rejoicing and anticipating another excellent season of episodes of the adventure of the Freelance Police.  
When the original Sam & Max Season 1 episodes were released individually they were not rated by the ESRB, but I estimated them as E-10+ based on the comic mischief, mild language and mild violence throughout. Now released as a 2-CD collection, the ESRB has rated Sam & Max Season 1 as T for Teen. This is based largely on observed alcohol and tobacco use in The Mole, the Mob and the Meatball where members of the Toy Mafia are around a card table smoking and there is alcohol consumed. The 'crude humor' falls more in line with 'comic mischief' I mentioned as it is still pretty much in line with material that kids in the 10+ age group would expect to see on Cartoon Network or Nickelodeon. Therefore I still give this series a GamerDad Age Seal of 10+ based on the fact that nothing that happens is out of whack with Loony Tunes or other cartoons that kids that age will be fine watching.
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