The second of three Telltale Games releases this holiday season, the first episode of Tales from the Borderlands is a step in a different direction for the developer. Usually preferring slower-paced story-telling with a focus on dialogue, “Zer0 Sum” smashes theatrically through the walls of Telltale’s comfort zone and takes you on a pacey, action-oriented caper comedy full of snark and spirit.
Those familiar with Gearbox’s Borderlands series will have no trouble immersing themselves into the insane world of Pandora, with it’s Mad Max-esque villains and scheming corporate overlords. Borderlands games usually have you playing as a Vault Hunter, seeking a massive payday but Tales from the Borderlands eschews this in favour of classic caper-gone-wrong story.
You play as two characters over the course of the episode, the first being Rhys (voice-over man of the hour Troy Baker), a Hyperion employee who has been working hard with his friend Vaughn (Nerdist podcast host Chris Hardwick) to earn a significant promotion. He is immediately screwed over by new Hyperion boss, Hugo Vasquez (Patrick Warburton), and together with Vaughn decides to take revenge.
Meanwhile, down on Pandora, we meet Fiona (Laura Bailey), a con artist who runs scams and dirty jobs with her sister Sasha (Erin Yvette), under their adopted mentor Felix (Norman Hall). The way that Telltale weave these two stories together is one of the best things about Tales from the Borderlands. It is so smartly written – the story takes several wild twists and turns and keeps you guessing as to each characters motives the entire time, even though you’re in control of two of them. It also perfectly captures the lunatic spirit of Gearbox’s FPS titles while bringing something of it’s own to the table.
It’s very much in the vein of Firefly or Star Wars Expanded Universe fiction. Even the title is reminiscent of classic the Star Wars book Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina. In the same way many EU novels were determined to keep away from sort of settings and Jedi antics you’re used to, the game goes to great pains to create a divide between Vault Hunters and everyone else. You’re the little guy in a much larger world.
Special mention must be given to the game’s voice cast who turn in A-list performances and wring just the right amount of humour and drama from the story. Fantastic work from all concerned.
In terms of gameplay, Tales from the Borderlands features much of the same controls and interactivity we’ve seen in Telltale games before. You get into conversations and have a short time to choose a reply or make a decision and some areas ask you to walk around and inspect certain elements of the environment for you to progress. The area that’s recieved the most attention are the quick time events. They have been polished to a reflective shine here. It’s forgiving within reason on misclicks and they give you just the right amount of time to see the prompt and react without getting yourself killed. They also add a degree of interactivity that feels far more fluid and natural than usual. One sequence involved Rhys describing how the team were going to infiltrate a building and the game uses QT-events during his super-slick hypothetical to great effect.
As with all Telltale games, you are asked to be careful about the things you say and do in the game because characters will remember if you go back on your word or behave poorly and that may come back to haunt you if you aren’t careful. That is especially important here because running a con means keeping your story straight and towing the party line. It’s a smart new way to spin Telltale’s memory system.
The graphics perfectly match the look and feel of the main Borderlands games with cartoony, expressive character models and environments. Each area looks and feels really different and contain plenty of references for eagle-eyed Borderlands fans to pick up on. I played this on PC and it all ran incredibly smoothly, gliding along at a problem free 60 frames a second. Like many Telltale games, it’s not spec intensive so even lower end computers can comfortably run the game.
Given that this is only the first episode in a five episode series, it doesn’t feel fair to give it a full review score just yet. That said, this is an incredibly strong first chapter in a very interesting new story and one of the most impressive titles in Telltale’s increasingly prestigious library. For Borderlands fans, this is a must play. For those who aren’t familiar with the games, it’s not going to be hard to find something to like as well. I absolutely loved this game and I’m pumped to see where they take it from here.
Oh, and best of all? Not a single goddamned Claptrap in sight…yet.
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