REVIEW – I really thought that the first episode of Tales from the Borderlands was promising when it dropped in back in the middle of November. I still don’t understand though why did the sequel take four months to be done and no, the reference to it in the revision of the first episode in the beginning doesn’t help it at all!

References and memes

This game refers to some people and games quite often, sometimes using memes as well by some characters. To not spoiler anything (this is difficult to avoid who said what, really! I try my best…), there will be a Mortal Kombat reference, a wink towards Pewdiepie, a Duke Nukem sentence, and there’s also going to be a meme sentence to top it off. These will happen unexpectedly, so they ended up good. But the amount…

They also added a revision of what happened in the first episode – to me, it looks very good – I hope I am not spoiling things, so I’d like to quote what actually was said in the beginning of this segment: „Yes, yes, it’s been a while. Everyone knows. […] But unfortunately… plans don’t often go… you know…” And they did the same thing during the staff roll as in the previous episode. It’s really not taking itself seriously!

Rhys

In this episode, we won’t really walk around a lot. Rhys however will have a slightly bigger role. First off, there’s going to be a return of a character, followed by another one who wants us dead, then his ECHOeye implant will discover something… which will end up triggering a decision of whose help we should go for in the end of the episode. Because yes, they did the same thing as in… hm, maybe one of the Season One episodes of The Walking Dead. Hopefully we don’t have to wait that much for the results of that decision, because that’d be a bit annoying. (Probably you shouldn’t have several marshmallows held into the fire simultaenously, dear Telltale…)

Fiona

The other lead character won’t be just sitting around either, but I think she is a bit less active compared to Rhys in Atlas Mugged. I’d like to see how our decision in the middle of the episode will affect things later on – hopefully we’ll see the results in the third episode already. In her plotline, there will be no less than FOUR new characters. Three of them will want us dead (this is going to be a trend here), and the fourth one will end up helping us with his skills and… his hillbilly accent. There’s also going to be some detective parts with her. A good idea there.

Another great song

Somehow Telltale seems to have the knack of finding decent songs. So far, my favorite was In The Water from Anadel, heard during the staff roll of Season Two, Episode One of The Walking Dead. This might have been thrown down from the throne by the staff segment around 20-25 minutes in the episode. This song really has that Borderlands feeling to it. Nicely done – sets up the ambience perfectly!

Lacks visuals?

I still say the game can look better than that, despite using the cel-shaded technology in Tales from the Borderlands (too). This doesn’t push the score down that much, don’t worry about that. The story here and there will be interrupted as Fiona and Rhys remember what happened to them previously. These are done in a funny manner and those quick time events and shooting segments won’t be left out either. The story also seems to kick in very strongly. I wonder how our last-second decision will change things later on.

Good, but how much time to continue it?

If Telltale won’t throw Episode Three at us in September, then no problem. This episode is great, although I don’t understand a few references’ presence. (Maybe because they wanted to be adverti… oh, I see, that’s why.) For Borderlands– and Telltale-fans, it’s strongly recommended, but I think it’s worth a look in general.

-V-

Editor: Telltale Games

Developer: Telltale Games

Genres: Adventure, action

Publication: 2015 March