By: Robert Murphy
My recent playthrough with the Games of Thrones and Telltale Game Series experience that it brought forth, peaked my interest in this genre of gaming in a way I never really expected. Enter Tales from the Borderlands, another recent game adaptation that Telltale Games took on and as a long time fan of the Borderlands game series, I was psyched to give it a whirl. The major formula that some of you may or may not know from Telltale is still present with it's large amounts of dialogue, quick puzzle solving and narrative decision making as you control your character or characters. What makes this even more enjoyable for me as a Borderlands fan is the fact that what makes those games so great are often the goofy and psychotic characters you meet in the inhabitants of Pandora. Things get a more personal with an open dialogue game like this and I looked forward to meeting the people in this first chapter entitled Zer0 Sum.
The story follows two different characters whose stories intertwine with one another, Rhys is a wanna be big shot up at Hyperion who after the death of Handsome Jack is about to get a big promotion that will set him up for a bright future. However, his arch rival is found sitting in his would be office and has just thrown the former boss out of an airlock, leaving you soundly defeated and demoted to a lowly janitor. This leads you to poach a deal that he was setting up, the deal by the way is for a Vault Key and for those of you who don't know, this means big money and rising up the corporate ladder at Hyperion. Enter our other main character, Fiona, shes's lived her whole life on Pandora and grew up pulling cons with her sister and doing whatever it takes to stay alive. That's quite a big list too when you think of the lawless chaos behind Pandora and adding in Hyperion who despite not having Handsome Jack around, they're still a force to be reckoned with and are bringing the people to their knees. You can perhaps see where the story is going though with a very valuable key in the mix, a con artist and a sarcastic power seeker in the mix.
The players perspective changes from one character to another but is handled quite well, the overlapping story between the two creates dialogue and back story for their individual stories, leading up until they end up meeting. This, of course, leads to standard Pandora calamity, the case of money to by the Vault Key is stolen and no money for Fiona doesn't make her a happy girl. The pair team up and track down the thieves which leads to motor death rally and some quick time action events. Zer0 makes his appearance here, looking at him from the outside as he performs his amazing skills and takes out enemies one by one is both interesting and terrifying. The whole thing in fact is one big crazy joy ride filled with laughs and banter for the your characters and those around you.
The pain staking decision making is still very much present with this game, I agonized over decisions for Game of Thrones because I know what can happen if you say the wrong thing in that series. Things in Tales from the Borderlands did not feel as dire but the weight of decision making is still important, if not more humor based. My first death though proved that things are real in this world and you have to make the smart choices, it is Pandora after all and people don't mess around. The humor was more than welcomed too, the text book Borderlands feel is captured to perfection with this game. Characters are all bat shit crazy and other famous faces return and more are just around the corner to be sure.
In the end, I do have a few issues with Tales from the Borderlands, characters often don't move their lips to the matching dialogue that takes place so it looks like they're not actually speaking. There are also some transitioning scene issues that keep the game from being 100% golden in my book but these are some of the same issues I experienced with Telltale Games before so it didn't come as a big surprise. Outside of this, Zer0 Sum was a great experience. Everything that I loved from Borderlands was present here and also what is great about the Telltale experience is that I got to know more of Pandora's character personally and not as just screaming Psychos trying to murder me or sell me something to murder them. This first episode was a great start to this five part series and I look forward to seeing what is in store next.
Good:
- Rhys and Fiona are fantastic characters
- The classic Borderlands humor is present
- Deeply engaging story
Bad:
- Still some development issues, characters looked as though they weren't speaking and their mouths needed time to catch up
Scully Rating: 8.8 out of 10
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