New Tales from the Borderlands Reviews

New Tales from the Borderlands, as a spiritual successor to Telltale’s series, is a cavalcade of peaks and valleys. It expands on the franchise’s complex lore with a terrifically produced five-episode stint that will, for most, be a one-and-done experience that sadly fails to iterate on or improve the tired formula these types of games all rode into the ground.

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A beautiful, great-sounding narrative adventure that loses its way with annoying and idiotic characters, drawn out exposition, and a distinct lack of challenge.

New Tales from the Borderlands is a vapid vision of its remarkable predecessor, bogged down by exasperating choices from beginning to end.

New Tales from the Borderlands may not hit the highs of the original but it does deliver an oft laugh filled adventure with a great cast that fit right in with the Borderlands series.

A welcome sequel to the original Tales From The Borderlands, that negotiates the franchise’s loud mouth humour to deliver a surprisingly nuanced and intelligent slice of interactive storytelling.

New Tales from the Borderlands is confusing, messy, and accomplishes nothing over the course of 10 hours. The game meanders from incident to incident hoping you’ll laugh at a constant barrage of bad jokes, and lacks any heart.

Good jokes are undermined by too many QTEs.

Borderlands has always been known for its likable characters, and the protagonists introduce in New Tales From The Borderlands continue this grand tradition alongside a well written story. The characters play very well off of one another and grow before our eyes as they each dive deeper into their own psyches. But the lack of innovation in the gameplay is disappointing after this many years, which makes New Tales From The Borderlands mainly worth checking out for fans of the series.

Like the three protagonists it features, New Tales From the Borderlands is a hot mess. If you don't take the game too seriously, there's a fun, heartfelt adventure buried somewhere beneath the layers of erratic writing and misplaced humor. It's an oddball romp with a bumbling cast of characters who deserve more substance than they were given. If the original Tales From the Borderlands is ice cream, New Tales From the Borderlands is frozen yogurt. And at the end of the day, even Fran admits that frozen yogurt just isn’t as good.

Despite some dodgy pacing, unsatisfying mini-games, and the occasional attempt at dated humor, New Tales from the Borderlands is a funny and sometimes hilarious story full of charming characters. A game featuring performances of this quality is a true rarity and the potential replayability inherent in a choice-based game such as this makes it worth checking out.

There’s an argument to be made that 2014’s Tales from the Borderlands is actually the best game in the Borderlands series. Now, hold on. Don’t go typing up your angry comments just yet. Hear us out.

With a narrative that offers more hits than misses, New Tales From The Borderlands is a modern, gorgeous glimpse into what the nobodies of the Borderlands universe get up to on their shittiest days.

You wait 8 years for a sort-of sequel to your favourite Borderlands narrative adventure game and when one finally turns up it's an unfunny disappointment

As stated in the opening, New Tales from the Borderlands doesn't top the amazement of the original game. That still doesn't stop it from delivering an impressive adventure game in its own right, however, filled with an enjoyable story about family, a lot of great bits of comedy, a deeper look into different parts of the Borderlands universe, and of course, the sheer joy that is L0U13. New Tales from the Borderlands ends up being a mostly worthy successor to one of the all-time greats...now here's hoping we just don't have to wait another seven years for a sequel.

New Tales from the Borderlands' smaller-scale focus on three 'nobodies' and their relationship with each other makes this a tale worth hearing.

I can't rave enough about how much I loved playing New Tales from the Borderlands. It's likely the most I've ever laughed while playing a video game - with the previous champion being Tales from the Borderlands.

The Borderlands series seems like it’s stuck in a rut right now. Borderlands 3 had great shooting and mechanics, but an abysmal story and dialogue. New Tales From the Borderlands suffers from those same issues, but the big problem is the focus on a lackluster narrative. For every rare good joke or exciting moment, there are hours of insufferable gags that make you cringe and wince.

Telltale’s Tales from the Borderlands is a story that’s grown in stature with time. While not a huge hit when it was first released, the series has gained a dedicated fanbase due to its twist-filled plot and surprisingly grounded, likable characters. Despite the series’ cult status, few expected a sequel, but earlier this summer Gearbox announced New Tales from the Borderlands, a fresh story-driven adventure featuring a cast of mostly new characters.

It’s no secret that I’m a bit joke-averse when it comes to the Borderlands franchise. Hell, I’m a bit gameplay-averse when it comes right down to it, something that’s kept me away from the franchise’s core trilogy and had me feeling a bit dismayed with spin-offs like Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands. Narrative-driven, visual novel-style titles, though? They’re right up my alley.

When the word “Borderlands” is uttered, it most likely conjures up images of the looter shooter trilogy, not the 2014 narrative adventure Tales from the Borderlands. Though they are set in the same universe, the two contain very different playstyles, with Borderlands being a first-person shooter with RPG mechanics whilst Tales is a point-and-click episodic adventure. The original Tales was also developed by the once-defunct and newly-resurrected Telltale Games, who specialise in point-and...

One of my biggest gripes with the mainline Borderlands series is its humor. I’ve had some good laughs while playing, but Borderlands’ jokes land more like a shotgun blast where some hit and others don’t. That’s okay in bursts, but shotgun blast after shotgun blast can get exhausting. Telltale Games’ take on this universe, Tales From The Borderlands, remedied this by providing a more nuanced and subtle take on the humor coursing through the franchise’s veins. It became one of my favorite Borderlands games, with a great story and memorable characters.

It's hard to do anything but recommend New Tales from the Borderlands with a toothy grin and a hearty backslap. Everything you loved about the original Telltale game is here only bigger, better, and this time, there's a vengeful talking gun. Seriously. What else do you need?

“New Tales from the Borderlands' story, characters, and visuals trump a lack of genre innovation.”