Tales from the Borderlands is a 2014 'Telltale' style game based on the story of the Borderlands franchise, developed by Telltale Games. It followed a much different approach than previous Borderlands games where players would play as very notable and powerful characters in search of glory, money or power from a Vault, known as Vault Hunters. We follow Rhys, an insignificant employee for the Hyperion corporation who seeks to be the head of his corporation, and Fiona, a conwoman living on the streets of Pandora. I found this quite unique, as we take on looking at Vault Hunting from a common person's perspective - They didn't quite care for it until the cast were inevitably dragged into it to save something else that meant much more to them.

TFTB stayed true to Telltale's usual style of gameplay, being a 'Choose Your Own Adventure' type of game, while still being oriented to fit the Borderlands lore and being an addition to the canon, as seen with the appearance of noteworthy Borderlands characters from Borderlands 1, 2, Pre-Sequel and soon to be Borderlands 3. While I must say that there are very few choices that will actually impact your gameplay greatly throughout the story, its excuse-able due to the fact it has to be consistent with Borderlands lore. Overall, the storyline is very compelling - There will be characters to love and to hate, but rarely those to be indifferent about, depending on subjective opinions. A tale well written and well executed, it invites the player to empathize with the characters and be immersed into the story rather than simply dragging them along with information slapped on a screen.

The graphics are quite reminiscent of the Telltale signature, but it didn't stray too far from the original Borderlands concept. This enables players to feel comfortable and settle in something familiar yet strange at the same time. Some long landscape scenes can be incredibly beautiful, but some can also feel rather empty and devoid of anything - Just barren terrain. Overall, its pretty good.

The mechanics, as Telltale type games go, are well rounded for its style. The incorporation of various usage of buttons on the keyboard and time-based action and decisions add up to the game's flavor of excitement. It succeeds in giving the feeling of involvement from the player from having done something that would help or not-help the scene. Items that can be interacted with will light up with an icon on the object, which is useful for discerning which is part of the background and which we can interact with. However, this placement of icons is not 100% visible sometimes with how the camera angle works and can lead to a player being stuck in a level without knowing how to proceed without careful inspection or a walk-through. I haven't encountered any game or immersion breaking bugs through my play-through, however, so in my opinion, the game plays quite stable.

Overall, Tales from the Borderlands is a wonderful Telltale style game that excellently delivered to the Borderlands franchise and its fans. The story of Rhys and Fiona won't be forgotten so easily by those who have played, and for those who haven't, I highly recommend it.

tl;dr 9/10 would definitely play again

Tales from the Borderlands is a 2014 'Telltale' style game based on the story of the Borderlands franchise, developed by Telltale Games. It followed a much different approach than previous Borderlands games where players would play as very notable and powerful characters in search of glory, money or power from a Vault, known as Vault Hunters. We follow Rhys, an insignificant employee for the Hyperion corporation who seeks to be the head of his corporation, and Fiona, a conwoman living on the streets of Pandora. I found this quite unique, as we take on looking at Vault Hunting from a common person's perspective - They didn't quite care for it until the cast were inevitably dragged into it to save something else that meant much more to them. TFTB stayed true to Telltale's usual style of gameplay, being a 'Choose Your Own Adventure' type of game, while still being oriented to fit the Borderlands lore and being an addition to the canon, as seen with the appearance of noteworthy Borderlands characters from Borderlands 1, 2, Pre-Sequel and soon to be Borderlands 3. While I must say that there are very few choices that will actually impact your gameplay greatly throughout the story, its excuse-able due to the fact it has to be consistent with Borderlands lore. Overall, the storyline is very compelling - There will be characters to love and to hate, but rarely those to be indifferent about, depending on subjective opinions. A tale well written and well executed, it invites the player to empathize with the characters and be immersed into the story rather than simply dragging them along with information slapped on a screen. The graphics are quite reminiscent of the Telltale signature, but it didn't stray too far from the original Borderlands concept. This enables players to feel comfortable and settle in something familiar yet strange at the same time. Some long landscape scenes can be incredibly beautiful, but some can also feel rather empty and devoid of anything - Just barren terrain. Overall, its pretty good. The mechanics, as Telltale type games go, are well rounded for its style. The incorporation of various usage of buttons on the keyboard and time-based action and decisions add up to the game's flavor of excitement. It succeeds in giving the feeling of involvement from the player from having done something that would help or not-help the scene. Items that can be interacted with will light up with an icon on the object, which is useful for discerning which is part of the background and which we can interact with. However, this placement of icons is not 100% visible sometimes with how the camera angle works and can lead to a player being stuck in a level without knowing how to proceed without careful inspection or a walk-through. I haven't encountered any game or immersion breaking bugs through my play-through, however, so in my opinion, the game plays quite stable. Overall, Tales from the Borderlands is a wonderful Telltale style game that excellently delivered to the Borderlands franchise and its fans. The story of Rhys and Fiona won't be forgotten so easily by those who have played, and for those who haven't, I highly recommend it. tl;dr 9/10 would definitely play again