Before we get into the review of The Wolf Among Us Remastered, a bit of history. In the wake of LucasArts announcing that it will leave the adventure game genre, despite critical and commercial successes with Full Throttle, Grim Fandango, the Monkey Island and Sam & Max series, three developers left the company to establish Telltale: a brand-new studio based in San Rafael, California, dedicated to telling a tale to the player without the puzzles that so often were bundled together in the adventure games of the time. Telltale’s initial goal was to work on Sam & Max again, which they eventually achieved in 2006, just over two years after the studio’s founding in 2004.
After this milestone and working on other established IPs such as Wallace and Gromit, in 2011, Telltale was licensed to adapt comic book series The Walking Dead and Fables. Just a year later, the first season of Telltale’s The Walking Dead would release: a title which not only elevated Telltale’s status in the industry but also revolutionized and set the stage for the modern adventure game. A year after that, the Fables adaptation, entitled The Wolf Among Us came out with it, too, receiving critical acclaim and proving to be a commercial success.
In the years to follow, Telltale would both develop more seasons of their take on The Walking Dead and work on celebrated franchises such as Game of Thrones, Batman and more. However, over time, as the company took on more and more projects which required them to hit stricter and stricter deadlines, the games that they were shipping started to dip in quality. By October 2018, Telltale itself buckled and was shut down unceremoniously due to financial mismanagement and low sales driven by an outdated game engine and formula.
And yet, throughout 2019, LCG Entertainment started acquiring Telltale assets and eventually relaunched the company under the name Telltale Games. Since then, whereas for some this relaunch has proven to be controversial, roughly 50% of Telltale Games is composed of former Telltale personnel. What’s more, after being originally announced in 2017 and cancelled with Telltale’s closure, Telltale Games, during The Game Awards 2019, revealed their plans for a second season of The Wolf Among Us, this time in collaboration with AdHoc Games, a studio co-founded by some key Telltale alumni.
By 2023, though, these plans were put on hold due to layoffs at Telltale Games and AdHoc Games pulling out of the development of the game due to creative differences, despite working on it for about two years. In the aftermath, AdHoc Games went on to release the critically acclaimed narrative experience Dispatch and Telltale Games partnered up with Trick Studios to continue work on The Wolf Among Us 2, which they announced, for the third time, during a State of Play this summer and which is set to finally release sometime next year.
“Personally, I was thrilled to see The Wolf Among Us Remastered announced, due to how much love I have for the original, and I am even more thrilled now after having wrapped up credits with this new version in about ten hours.”
At the same State of Play, Telltale Games and Trick Studios unveiled The Wolf Among Us Remastered, a faithful celebration of one of Telltale’s most critically acclaimed titles. In addition to modernized visuals and reworks of beloved characters and settings, this new edition also includes an array of behind-the-scenes extras and a new “noir mode,” which allows players to experience the game in black and white. Most importantly, perhaps, the choices players make here will directly carry over into The Wolf Among Us 2.
Personally, I was thrilled to see The Wolf Among Us Remastered announced, due to how much love I have for the original, and I am even more thrilled now after having wrapped up credits with this new version in about ten hours. As could be gleaned from the trailer, this 2026 release indeed preserves everything that made The Wolf Among Us great in 2013. In fact, The Wolf Among Us Remastered is the definitive way to experience this bona fide classic, even if what’s added here might not be enough to sway existing owners of the game. Newcomers, on the other hand, will be in for a treat as they experience this story for the first time.
Said story serves as a prequel to the Fables comic books on which it is based and revolves around the Big Bad Wolf, a.k.a. Bigby Wolf, when in “human” form, as he tackles the unenviable job of being the sheriff of Fabletown: a secret community based in Manhattan where fairy-tale and folklore characters, such as Snow White, The Little Mermaid and more, live in exile. The game opens with Bigby responding to a violent domestic disturbance, an event which sets him on the path of uncovering the mysteries and web of lies which underpin all five episodes that make up this first season.
As the story remains untouched in this remaster and as it is best experienced going in blind, I will suffice by mentioning that The Wolf Among Us’ crowning achievement is how it uses the framework of a gritty detective story to subvert familiar fairy tales and explore themes of systemic corruption, identity, bodily autonomy, and control. It is now, as it was in 2013, a remarkably mature and sophisticated tale and one of the medium’s finest. What has changed since 2013 is The Wolf Among Us’ presentation, with this remaster preserving the 80s neon vibe and comic-book look while, at the same time, zhuzhing it up for a new generation of players.
The result, overall, is a mixed bag, with some clear improvements in areas such as backgrounds and environments, whereas the characters, at least some, end up looking overstuffed and slightly uncanny. To give two examples, The Woodlands Business Office looks much improved and packed with the kind of detail that was hard to implement back in the day, but the character model for Mr. Toad lost some of its timeless charm in the transition to more modern graphics. That being said, regardless of the results, The Wolf Among Us is very much still a looker. The soundtrack and sound design too, which, to the best of my knowledge, have been unchanged, are as superb as ever.
By contrast, The Wolf Among Us Remastered presents a remarkable improvement over the original in terms of performance. Like many of Telltale’s games, The Wolf Among Us suffered from infamous technical and performance issues such as long loading times, stuttering, and frame-rate hitches, especially on consoles. Things are much better this go-around, with the game playing very well on my modern PC and on high settings on the Steam Deck. It’s still by no means perfect, as I did encounter some stutters here and there, but it’s a day-and-night difference from how bad it was back in 2013. In addition, Remastered also has more bandwidth, so every given scene has more elements in it, which in turn makes Fabletown feel more lived in.
“Nonetheless, for diehard fans and newcomers, The Wolf Among Us Remastered is absolutely the best way to experience one of the best adventure games to date.”
Otherwise, The Wolf Among Us Remastered is quite light in terms of extras. The making-of videos and deleted scenes are welcome and interesting, but they do not justify the price of admission for current owners, arguably even with the generous 50% discount that Telltale Games is offering these players. The noir mode, as well, is neat in that it allows players to experience Bigby’s story in black and white, but it ultimately is more of a novelty item. In this sense, the only additive thing that might be worth the purchase is that the decisions the players make in the story will, as aforementioned, carry over to the sequel, The Wolf Among Us 2. At this moment in time, however, it is difficult to recommend picking up Remastered just for this, as the way that these choices will end up mattering remains to be seen.
Nonetheless, for diehard fans and newcomers, The Wolf Among Us Remastered is absolutely the best way to experience one of the best adventure games to date. The old version might suffice for some current owners as the art-style refresh and extras are not quite enough to justify purchasing it again, but, if that is not a deterrent, the game itself is as good as you remember. In other, more favourable circumstances, I would maybe have been disappointed that this was not a remake in The Wolf Among Us 2’s engine, but, considering how troubled the development of the sequel has been, I will personally take whatever The Wolf Among Us I can get. Onto the sequel, fingers crossed.
