Can you find your missing mother and solve the mysteries ahead?
The Council – Episode 1: The Mad Ones is the first chapter in a 5-part episodic series where you come across famous faces who make up the Golden Order, these include people like George Washington and Napoleon Bonaparte. Your character makes it to a mansion on an island where your mother has gone missing and it seems that everyone is hiding something. Your decisions will make repercussions or give you new opportunities to pursue. Think of it as a Telltale game with a more complex decision-based system, plus RPG elements and you’ve got it in a nutshell.
You’ll come across clues about characters that you can use in conversation battles and eventually, learn the weaknesses of those you grow to know. It’ll be interesting to see if you can expose more in future episodes or just how different your experience will be depending on what paths you take. The episode is broken up in to chapters called Quests and at the end of each, you’ll get a summary of what path you’ve taken and clues as to what you have missed as a result. I’ll definitely be going through a second or third time when the series is fully released.
The story itself is gripping so far and the mysteries surrounding your mother’s disappearance, plus what else is going on in the mansion along with whatever is going on with certain characters will certainly keep you intrigued enough to try out the next episode, whenever that arrives.
Visually, the game looks quite detailed and the mansion itself has lots to explore. The character models are interesting, though I can imagine quite a few being drawn to a certain character’s assets. Voice-acting is actually well done and like I said, the script is decent thus far. The soundtrack is also pretty good, all of which bodes well for future episodes.
The Verdict
The Mad Ones establishes a strong start for The Council with an intriguing story, interesting characters and some twists that will make the wait for Episode 2 all the harder.