New Tales from the Borderlands Evaluate (PS5)

There’s an argument to be made that 2014’s Tales from the Borderlands is definitely the very best sport within the Borderlands sequence. Now, maintain on. Don’t go typing up your indignant feedback simply but. Hear us out.

Typically you simply need a capital V capital G Video Sport that’s about operating and leaping and taking pictures and looting and the right Borderlands video games are a protected possibility to choose up and play on that entrance. Nevertheless it’s exhausting to disregard that the franchise has a considerably inversely proportional relationship between the tightness of the gameplay and high quality of the writing: because the taking pictures obtained higher, the dialogue obtained worse and the jokes grew extra irritating.

Inside their respective genres, taking into consideration what they got down to do, Tales might be probably the most profitable sport within the sequence: it’s humorous, with an fascinating story, likeable characters, and at instances it’s genuinely transferring. No person was as stunned as us about that. A Telltale Borderlands sport? Insanity! Nevertheless it labored.

Quick-forward eight years and right here we’re with New Tales From The Borderlands, much less a sequel to the Telltale unique and extra of an alternate actuality model of the identical thought. What would have occurred in 2014 if as a substitute of partnering with Telltale of their prime to make a extra story-focused sport within the Borderlands franchise, Gearbox simply made it themselves? Effectively, that is the outcome. And it’s garbage.

Going down after Borderlands 3 however with out actually requiring any information of any earlier Borderlands video games to grasp the story, New Tales has three playable characters that you simply’ll management at varied factors all through the ten hour journey.

There’s Anu, a wise however anxious scientist who’s a pacifist inexplicably working for a weapons producer. There’s Fran, a frozen yogurt vendor in a hoverchair who has anger administration points. And there’s Octavio, a hipster moron who’s launched to us in a cutscene through which he rebukes a pizza vendor for his or her “problematic” exaggerated-a Italian-a accent-a. It’s as cringe inducing because it sounds.

The three heroes aren’t a lot characters as they’re merely vessels for the following insipid gag. Anu, for instance, is the intelligent one within the gang proper up till she must be an fool for a joke to land. One minute she’s fixing sophisticated physics issues, and the following she doesn’t know the way a door deal with works. And that’s the punchline. LOL.

Fran and Octavio are equally troubled. Fran’s total character is predicated round her speaking about frozen yogurt, creepily providing to present folks mouth-to-mouth once they clearly don’t want it, and punching folks actual exhausting. That’s it. Octavio simply does the stupidest factor possible in each state of affairs to tug the story out just a little longer. At one level he forgets what the place he works at — the place he is spent half the sport, by the way in which — seems to be like. They get about ten minutes out of that zinger.

The aspect characters are a blended bag. There’s a robotic murderer going via an ethical quandary about how they make their residing and so they’re most likely probably the most well-rounded and fascinating character within the sport. There’s a lady who shouts rather a lot. There’s a speaking gun that claims “Bang!” each time it shoots. A lot of the aspect characters both disappear for half the sport after which flip up for the final chapter or just go nowhere.

Rhys from the unique Tales from the Borderlands has a small function within the first chapter and when you suppose what they did with him in Borderlands 3 was a slap within the face to followers of the Telltale sport then this isn’t going to make you’re feeling any higher. Not content material with ruining their very own characters, New Tales from the Borderlands retroactively ruins the unique Tales from the Borderlands by turning its protagonist into simply one other Borderlands gag™. So thanks for that.

Each once in a while between inane comedy routines there’s a narrative to be advised. It includes a magic rock that has the ability to assist humanity however there’s baddies who need to use it for their very own nefarious ends. It’s a slight, low stakes narrative and even at solely ten hours it feels drawn out, with lengthy, boring sections the place nothing remotely fascinating occurs to push the story ahead.

By the ultimate chapter we simply didn’t care any extra. Not one of the development feels earned or deserved. After which as a remaining insult, once we obtained to the ending we have been advised that one of many important characters had died, off display screen, with no rationalization by any means for the way or why. It was like Poochie flying off to his dwelling planet and dying in a crash in that episode of The Simpsons. Utter nonsense.

Every thing about New Tales seems like a poor model of the unique, even all the way down to the music. The primary sport featured a licensed soundtrack that was at instances expertly employed. Right here, there’s licensed music however it’s thrown collectively seemingly at random. There’s a tacky montage scene of the gang attending to know one another backed by a low key, nearly dream-pop observe, and later a quiet, extra reflective scene backed by a jaunty, extra upbeat piece.

Gameplay-wise, you’ll primarily be strolling about and fixing quite simple puzzles, speaking to folks, and making decisions. There’s minigames, too, for issues like hacking and fixing issues, however these are borderline unattainable to fail so we’re unsure why they exist. There’s quick-time occasions to maintain the motion scenes however these are equally forgiving, and even help you hit the unsuitable button after which simply strive once more till you get it proper.

One such fast time occasion — which we’ve got to say as a result of it’s so absurd — includes a personality preventing sharks. However as a substitute of seeing them struggle the sharks, we see Octavio commentating on how the struggle goes whereas button prompts pop up on display screen. It goes on for means too lengthy and it’s so wildly unfunny that we do not know if it’s even meant to be a joke.

We’re unsure if the developer simply couldn’t be bothered to animate the struggle with the sharks or if this complete bit is a few kind of subversive commentary on the futility of fast time occasions that simply doesn’t land, however regardless of the motive for it, let your ol’ friends at Push Sq. offer you a fiver’s price of free recommendation: when you have a shark struggle, you present the shark struggle. Everybody needs to see the shark struggle. It is a f****** shark struggle!

Conclusion

We are able to scarcely recall an event the place we have been extra dissatisfied by a sequel than New Tales from the Borderlands. We needed to like this. We would have accepted liking it. However we hate this sport. It is a ten-hour narrative journey that feels 4 instances so long as it must be, with dreadful characters, and appalling, relentlessly unfunny jokes. It is a spectacular misfire, its solely success to talk of being the uncommon instance of a sequel so unhealthy that it ruins the unique, too.