great review...I only made it thru episode 2...still need to finish this
Tales from the Borderlands Review
Game Review | February 1, 2016 7:37 pm
Like most here I am a huge fan of Borderlands and Borderlands 2 (not so much the pre-sequel). I myself am a huge fan of the Telltales Walking Dead series. With that kind of combination, I figured this game would have to be awesome. I had seen that episode 1 was free on the marketplace and figured why not? I can put some achievements into my Gamerscore and if I didn’t like it, no worries, I hadn’t invested a penny into it.
I’ll start off by telling you how the game starts to get your beaks wet and hopefully not ruin the rest of the story line with spoilers. The story starts off with one of its main protagonists, Rhys. He is in the role of a manager within the Hyperion corporation trying to make his way up in the ranks. After the death of Handsome Jack we find that Hyperion hasn’t changed much in its goals or the way it does business. Rhys is up for promotion, ready to make the big time and finds that his future position has been ripped away from him by another Hyperion bigshot, Vasquez (your Hyperion nemesis). As the events unfold you find yourself on Pandora trying to pull off a deal that will ultimately screw over the guy who screwed you over, Vasquez. If you pull this deal off, you’ll shoot right to the top of Hyperion. Just as everything is almost going to plan, bam! Everything goes south for Rhys and the story line really starts to heat up. It’s at this point the we are introduced to the second protagonist, Fiona. She’s a con-artist and lover of hats.
After the first episode concluded I found myself to be hooked. I had to get the season pass and play the remaining stories. Throughout the remaining episodes, each story gets better and all things come together. Well worth the investment and highly recommended.
During my adventure I saw quite a few familiar faces and locations. I found the dialogue to be really well written and its side humor to be right on point. Telltale did a fantastic job in creating memorable and high quality characters. It’s ensemble of characters was outstanding. There were quite a few familiar voices. Troy Baker (Saints Row 4) played as Rhys, while Laura Bailey (Halo) played Fiona, and both completely delivered. The pair were likeable and very, very funny.
Like all Telltale games, you have to make decisions. The decisions I made in this game didn’t really seem like they really had any influence on the game. Unlike those of TWD where when you made a choice it impacted whether or not a character would interact with you or support you. It felt that no matter what I chose to do would not impact how the story unfolded at all.
I’m hoping that Tales from the Borderlands will have a huge influence on what will happen in Borderlands 3. I’d like to see how those events shaped Pandora. I’d love to see the characters from this entry make their way into Borderlands 3 and get a little closure to see how the events they lived through transformed them into Vault Hunters.
On a scale from 1-10, 1 being poor and 10 being awesome. I’d rate this title a solid 9.
TL/DR: Great story telling. Good musical score. Amazing voice work. Easy 1000 gamerscore. Lack of consequences from your decisions or actions you choose. Tiny Tina not making an appearance. Worth the price of admission.
Rating: 9.0 of 10
Keywords: Telltale, Tales from the Borderlands; review
