Lou-13 also dies pretty unceremoniously and from what I can tell he dies the same way in any playthrough. He goes OMG NO OCTAVIO and then has his head cut off, because he has to give the incredibly undeserved and 20 second long "You guys.... are my... FAMILY!!!!" speech shit before a grenade blows him up. Staple-Face very, and I mean very stupidly after not appearing since episode 1, nearly 8 fucking hours later just "TAADAAAAA!!!" appears disguised as a Teidore solider to help you escape and then also dies 2 minutes later. Every other side character with 3 minutes of screen time from episode 1 also simply never, ever appears again except for 10 seconds with no dialogue during episode 4's intro. (Side note: Tediore has taken over and is capturing people, yet everyone is then, uncaptured for some reason. Fucking Rhys has his company taken over at the start and Tediore was going to kill him by the sounds of it, but next time we catch up with Rhys, its like it never happened, they just moved on?)
Octavio and Fran's death is chosen by passed events even though what those choices are have nothing to do what happens in the moment for why they would die. I think it is suppose to be implied they died when the space ship crashed even though that is not at all what the scene would even make you think is what was suppose to happen. It is only there to hit the "SAD EMOTIONAL ENDING!!!" even though even after spending hours with these characters, you don't care, and further more, it's off fucking screen. Also in one ending, it seems implied Anu and Fran are together now? I tried going back so it is very possible I missed something (but to be honest, I feel like I didn't) but that felt incredibly random considering this game did not have a romance plot.
This entire game is a check box board of story beats with 0 clue how to reach them, but thinking as long they are checked it totally works. There is 0 coherency.
I think my biggest questions really is why the fuck Fran or Octavio die off screen. It is actually so comical that it happens and is serious… more. Last scene is "Good job. We saved the world guys!" one year later "YOOO FRAN FUCKIN DIED YO!!!!"
WHAT? That's how they handled character deaths? That seems like a very important part of a story that you'd think they want people to see.
Finished episode 1, right now I'd just call it "fine", with some caveats (Rhys being out of character being the big one), there's been a few jokes where I've smiled on the inside to myself, but mostly it's either fine jokes or eyerolling ones. I think my issue on the humor is the same as that 18 minute gameplay, they just don't commit to the jokes enough, frequently retreating for a safer joke and then doing that a few times. Predictably, LOU13 is the best character who tends to get the funnier lines (although they also gave him the biggest stinker to compensate). Other than him, though, the game doesn't really do a good enough job in getting you invested into the characters, despite the decent setups for where these characters are at. I'll have to see if it can setup character relationships better, but I doubt it. It really does go to show how good of a job Telltale did at getting you immediately invested in Rhys and Fiona and the relationships to the rest of the cast within their introductions
I just read the Game Informer review. My guy says the story is " gets distracted, is loose, random, has unimportant subplots, and was confused" and then slaps a 7/10 in the narrative based video game.
Episode 1 is easily the best episode because it actually has something of a plot. Episode 2 is really short and is basically just part 2 of episode 1. 3 - 5 is where I think the plot stops existing in favor of absolute randomness being what drives things forward.
But I will always look forward to Dojo's updates on this game.
Finished episode 1, right now I'd just call it "fine", with some caveats (Rhys being out of character being the big one), there's been a few… more jokes where I've smiled on the inside to myself, but mostly it's either fine jokes or eyerolling ones. I think my issue on the humor is the same as that 18 minute gameplay, they just don't commit to the jokes enough, frequently retreating for a safer joke and then doing that a few times. Predictably, LOU13 is the best character who tends to get the funnier lines (although they also gave him the biggest stinker to compensate). Other than him, though, the game doesn't really do a good enough job in getting you invested into the characters, despite the decent setups for where these characters are at. I'll have to see if it can setup character relationships better, but I doubt it. It really does go to show how good of a job Telltale did at getting you immediately invested in Rhys and Fiona and the relationships to the rest of the cast within their introductions
Finished episode 2, continuing to be fine, as expected its role was to establish the lead dynamics and get the McGuffin to kick to plot into gear. Character dynamics are okay, but as expected, not really a huge investment into them, jokes between them range from the eyerolling to the inward smile once again. The design of The Devourer was pretty cool, at least.
Played and finished the game, felt I had to play it given how much the first one has meant to me. If I'm gonna give it any credit it's that the gameplay trailer unfortunately was accurate. Bad writing, bad direction and a step backwards in gameplay. I still felt it was something I wanted to get through, if not for anything else so at least for a cathartic feeling of playing another TFTB game, which I never thought would be made. I'm not sure if I regret it or not but I can at least say it's not worth the money they're asking for it.
It's astounding how unlikable and unfunny almost everyone and everything is. The pauses between characters talking seen in the trailers seems to some times be left there for you to collect yourself from laughing so much, and sometimes due to technical problems, both ruining any chance of comedic timing. Not that it would've helped much given the lines the voice actors were given. Scene transitions and auto-saving seemed to be difficult for the game as well, given the audio being cut for a split second at many of those instances. I did play on last gen hardware (PS4) but for a game like this it should not be a problem. A few jokes not landing here and there isn't necessarily the worst thing, the reason I love the first game isn't primarily for it's comedy but for it's characters. But in New Tales I don't care about a single one of them, they are uninteresting at best and obnoxious and borderline unbearable at worst.
And the less said about the one dimensional portrayal of Rhys the better. I am not looking forward to whatever they have in store next for this series.
Played and finished the game, felt I had to play it given how much the first one has meant to me. If I'm gonna give it any credit it's that … morethe gameplay trailer unfortunately was accurate. Bad writing, bad direction and a step backwards in gameplay. I still felt it was something I wanted to get through, if not for anything else so at least for a cathartic feeling of playing another TFTB game, which I never thought would be made. I'm not sure if I regret it or not but I can at least say it's not worth the money they're asking for it.
It's astounding how unlikable and unfunny almost everyone and everything is. The pauses between characters talking seen in the trailers seems to some times be left there for you to collect yourself from laughing so much, and sometimes due to technical problems, both ruining any chance of comedic timing. Not that it would've helped much given the lines the voice actors were given. Scene transitions and auto-savin… [view original content]
It’s just hard to understand the business pitch for New Tales. I guess maybe the success of Detroit, Until Dawn and Life is Strange was what drove the decision to make this game, but even then it’s easy to see the difference between those original IPs that started out with this kind of gameplay, to this game that branches out from the main gameplay as far as possible. It couldn’t really capitalize on the original Tales either because it barely connects to it outside of a stinger and one of the protagonists from it being an out-of-character douche.
I’m usually the first to hold up passion over profit, but when you focus on profit and end up with something like this, it’s kinda hard not to ask if they know what they’re doing.
New Tales ruined Rhys beyond repair and I will never be happy again...Games okay. I beat it over the last couple days and despite not vibing with the first few episodes. Episode 3 was fun and I genuinely enjoyed the finale cause in one or two scenes they let the characters feel sad without them throwing stupid quips left and right. It was nice. Game is inoffensive in terms of the new cast. It's extremely gearbox and it gets to be way too much at times but I dunno I had a good time by the end. I wish they would stop touching the original tales characters tho. God you already ruined Rhys! Leave Queen alone!!!
Can confirm this isn't the case. For some reason one of the characters died for me in both final decision branches. Your choices throughout the game do determine aspects but its so damn confusing that I quite don't understand why they died.
As someone who did enjoy the game. This is an aspect that seriously bothered me. The skateboard rating system makes no sense! I don't understand how the percentages add up to the choices I made and its one of the more annoying aspects of the game.
Rhys doesnt actually die, they just show him "die" with everyone else who "dies" before Anu brings them back. It just doesn't specifically s… morehow Rhys be brought back, but no he is not actually dead.
I think my biggest questions really is why the fuck Fran or Octavio die off screen. It is actually so comical that it happens and is serious. Last scene is "Good job. We saved the world guys!" one year later "YOOO FRAN FUCKIN DIED YO!!!!"
It honestly does the worst kind of "choice changes the ending" where it just takes random things you did and have 0 rhyme or reason, and then all of sudden this is your ending. Character dies off screen, the end, bye.
In general it is something I am not a fan of of choice based games doing things like this and I feel it happens a lot, but I do think New Tales is the worst offender because not only is the ending changed seemingly randomly, it also skips over the execution.
Also what choices did you think mattered? After seeing a few comparisons of choice now I feel like the only choice that actually felt like it changed the direction of the scene was to fuse with the gem thing or not. Telltale had a ton of Choice A for Scene A or Choice B for Scene B, and then went right back on track. New Tales felt like every choice was "20 seconds A or 20 seconds B" and then got on the regular track. Just wondering if there was any choices you made that you felt did something.
As someone who did enjoy the game. This is an aspect that seriously bothered me. The skateboard rating system makes no sense! I don't understand how the percentages add up to the choices I made and its one of the more annoying aspects of the game.
Not any big ones tbh. I just enjoyed the ride for what it was I guess. Obviously stuff is affected but the ways they're are so arbitrary I couldn't even tell you.
In general it is something I am not a fan of of choice based games doing things like this and I feel it happens a lot, but I do think New Ta… moreles is the worst offender because not only is the ending changed seemingly randomly, it also skips over the execution.
Also what choices did you think mattered? After seeing a few comparisons of choice now I feel like the only choice that actually felt like it changed the direction of the scene was to fuse with the gem thing or not. Telltale had a ton of Choice A for Scene A or Choice B for Scene B, and then went right back on track. New Tales felt like every choice was "20 seconds A or 20 seconds B" and then got on the regular track. Just wondering if there was any choices you made that you felt did something.
So in the final ending which would be considered the best, everyone lives including Louie who they say was brought back because they simply got his parts back from the rubble. (which really begs the question why in the second best ending where everyone lives but Louie why did they not get his parts). I really do not like how the ending really is the only thing that changes, but how you get it is just taking a collection of choices that have very little reason for why the ending would end the way it does.
Anyway, Rhys appears in a phone call one last time to thank you but also still chastises you. It is pretty clear this will be the canon ending going forward. (Again, I also really don't like it when a choice based game has a developer chosen "correct" ending when the purpose of the game was making story choices) Also going forward, I have no idea what the Fiona set up will be for in terms of next game it will be followed up in. It seems because the shard heals people and Felix's watch also healed people this is connected in someway. If I had to guess Sasha got warped to the galaxy the shard is going to or something. Not sure how this works outside a solo Tales game as I cant see BL4 focusing much on this, unless it gets sidequested. Or DLC'd or something.
Now its Gearbox and they don't know what's next either so no real point in thinking about it too hard. Could even end up like every other Borderlands ending where they forget the ending set up to the next game anyway. That war is still coming right guys? I think its canonically been what, 9 years now? lol
It’s the one constant I see in BL games, and it was something even in the original Tales is guilty of…sequel bating with no idea of what comes next. Gearbox always does it, which wouldn’t be a problem if they had a roadmap or a consistent development team making these games. They don’t meet either of those criteria. The original BL had a different director/writer/team as BL2, so did the Pre Sequel, so did Tales, so did BL3, and so did New Tales (not counting Wonderlands). They set something up, playing it off as hugely important, meaningful, and symbolic, but end up having a completely different creative lead take over and force them to rectify it somehow. It gets infuriating because of the lack of consistency, a failure to follow through, and putting future writers into a box that they need to work out of.
The MCU benefits from a single figurehead in Kevin Fiege to connect everything together. Casey Hudson for Mass Effect, the sole director of all three games and a consistent leading figure, even when other people left he could oversee everything. Hideo Kojima with Metal Gear, same thing. With Borderlands, who is that one person? I guess Randy Pitchford, but that’s not a good thing.
So in the final ending which would be considered the best, everyone lives including Louie who they say was brought back because they simply … moregot his parts back from the rubble. (which really begs the question why in the second best ending where everyone lives but Louie why did they not get his parts). I really do not like how the ending really is the only thing that changes, but how you get it is just taking a collection of choices that have very little reason for why the ending would end the way it does.
Anyway, Rhys appears in a phone call one last time to thank you but also still chastises you. It is pretty clear this will be the canon ending going forward. (Again, I also really don't like it when a choice based game has a developer chosen "correct" ending when the purpose of the game was making story choices) Also going forward, I have no idea what the Fiona set up will be for in terms of next game it will be followed up in. It seems be… [view original content]
Tales 1 does not sequel bate as hard as the rest though. Tales 1 I would say simply ends more ambiguous, there isnt a real set up for a sequel. BL1 is the only one that ends that actually is directly followed up on in the sequel with Angel and the Hyperion Satellite. BL2 ends with the idea of vaults on other planets and we did get there, but def not in the same way it was being presented there. Pre-Sequel's ending is easily the worst in terms of following up as it very clearly says a war is coming and then that didnt go anywhere. BL3 surprisingly doesn't outside hinting Lilith didnt die and then the last DLC basically confirming that. Now new Tales throws Fiona in for another set up that will probably be greatly changed by the time they get to it.
Fairly certain BL4 will follow up on the War thing as I remember I think I saw someone tweeted (probably Randy) that seemed to hint they'd actually follow it up. Where Fiona finding Sasha fits in, not sure how it would work out in a mainline game.
I really have no idea who heads creative direction at Gearbox, I don't know how it worked at Telltale either for comparison. Just in general I hope the creative team actually looks at BL2 and Tales and tries to capture that style of writing and world building, because right now a lot of it feels like throwing everything and anything into the story with no regards of what it means for the greater universe. Or better yet, actually collaborate with the original creative team leads from Tales.
It’s the one constant I see in BL games, and it was something even in the original Tales is guilty of…sequel bating with no idea of what com… morees next. Gearbox always does it, which wouldn’t be a problem if they had a roadmap or a consistent development team making these games. They don’t meet either of those criteria. The original BL had a different director/writer/team as BL2, so did the Pre Sequel, so did Tales, so did BL3, and so did New Tales (not counting Wonderlands). They set something up, playing it off as hugely important, meaningful, and symbolic, but end up having a completely different creative lead take over and force them to rectify it somehow. It gets infuriating because of the lack of consistency, a failure to follow through, and putting future writers into a box that they need to work out of.
The MCU benefits from a single figurehead in Kevin Fiege to connect everything together. Casey Hudson for Mass Effect, the sole direct… [view original content]
I think 6k is actually a more accurate estimate. SteamDP's VG Insights I would say is the most accurate estimation vast majority of the time and it has New Tales as 5.9k on Steam.
So if we estimate each console sold 6k and even say Epic sold 6k, after splits, and let's say everyone bought the 50 dollar deluxe edition, New Tales in its first week has made about 893,940 dollars. (I didnt include Switch because I have no idea what an accurate estimation would be, but I feel very safe in saying it probably has sold the least)
This also isn't related but I actually cant find anyone making commentary videos on this game in a playthrough or livestream that isn't sponsored. That post mentions it a little, but seriously pretty much all coverage has been sponsored to a point where it feels sad, like the only way for this to get any traction is to pay people to play it. I think the only person I've seen so far who has been fully playing it without sponsorship and is commentating on it is DomTheBomb, (who I think ended at episode 3 for now and said he finds it very meh) like I can't even get a general feeling for how others feel because I cant find anyone.
Not that we didn't already know, but yeah, this game was a huge flop.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Borderlands/comments/yeij3m/new_tales_from_the_borderlands_was_a_massive/
I gave it a little bit more of a chance, I watched some clips.
It’s just… not good guys. I could give points for effort in some parts, but it’s just not good.
It’s uncanny. On one hand you have the crew behind Tales 1, who put their heart and soul into a game that was close to being shelved for not making money (with a skeleton crew no less), and on the other you have New Tales, backed by Gearbox itself, and this is what they come up with. They literally do not animate the shark fights! Do you know how many more complicated things Telltale animated in Tales with a crappier engine? Look at the intro for episode 5 or 4!
I keep seeing a lot of people mention how Anthony Burch was a part of the game and this for whatever reason negates any criticism of the game because he was lead for BL2 and worked on TFTBL1. I feel like there is a lot of misinformation about it like so many thinking Burch was responsible for Tales 1's story direction. At the start sure, (and I believe he is credited in a video somewhere as this) but pretty much everything changed from the original story pitch he sent off to Telltale with the only real thing remaining was a Pandorian Con Arts and Hyperion Lackey team up to find Atlas treasure. (Burch has also said for the most part this all started with him sending stuff off to Telltale for them to handle, but that isn't the exact quote just my memory)
He is also listed under external writers, which I assume would be a bit more contract based. I don't really want to assume just how involved he was as an external writer because we really don't know if this means he was more of a consultant or a contractor who was writing a lot. But worth nothing out of the 3 external writers, he isn't even the lead writer among them. So I am a bit surprised so many people think 1 guy in a position like this seemingly negates the entire writing team consisting of people who did not work on the original. I mean it takes 2 seconds to look up the writers of Tales 1, including the season lead which you'd think would be important considering Tales was the only other post TWD game to keep consistent creative leads between episodes.
Lastly this is all just subjective criticism, but I do think Burch's writing simply hasn't been as good as time went on. I think right now a lot of people are kind of looking back in nostalgia simply because BL3 and NTFTBL's writing is so bad. I like BL2's writing overall and I think it is his best work. I mean don't forget BL2's writing was being criticized all those years ago too. I think once Tales came around it really complimented BL2's storytelling. Pre-Sequel is the thing I see being brought up a lot saying how well written it is, but I feel again everyone is forgetting that when it came out, people felt the writing wasn't the best. Lot of annoying/forgettable characters and the overall Handsome Jack origin story that felt kind of off especially considering his relationship with characters like Lilith and Roland. I don't think Pre-Sequel is bad in any way, but I do think if we are comparing it to BL2 it isn't nearly as good, and like I was saying I think right now that writing is being more fondly remembered simply because the writing now is so poor that "okay" writing looks amazing.
Also I really wish I wasn't so negative about pretty much everything about NTFBL, but just... damn. How is Wolf this close to concurrent players of this brand new game?
I thought Anthony Burch helped write the dialogue for Handsome Jack? I vaguely remember either him or Telltale saying he was brought in specifically for that.
I keep seeing a lot of people mention how Anthony Burch was a part of the game and this for whatever reason negates any criticism of the gam… moree because he was lead for BL2 and worked on TFTBL1. I feel like there is a lot of misinformation about it like so many thinking Burch was responsible for Tales 1's story direction. At the start sure, (and I believe he is credited in a video somewhere as this) but pretty much everything changed from the original story pitch he sent off to Telltale with the only real thing remaining was a Pandorian Con Arts and Hyperion Lackey team up to find Atlas treasure. (Burch has also said for the most part this all started with him sending stuff off to Telltale for them to handle, but that isn't the exact quote just my memory)
He is also listed under external writers, which I assume would be a bit more contract based. I don't really want to assume just how involved he was as an external writer because we really do… [view original content]
Honestly, the fact that they haven't advertised his involvement at all makes me think he wasn't really involved that much, because "Written by BL2 lead writer" would have been a decent selling point for some people.
I keep seeing a lot of people mention how Anthony Burch was a part of the game and this for whatever reason negates any criticism of the gam… moree because he was lead for BL2 and worked on TFTBL1. I feel like there is a lot of misinformation about it like so many thinking Burch was responsible for Tales 1's story direction. At the start sure, (and I believe he is credited in a video somewhere as this) but pretty much everything changed from the original story pitch he sent off to Telltale with the only real thing remaining was a Pandorian Con Arts and Hyperion Lackey team up to find Atlas treasure. (Burch has also said for the most part this all started with him sending stuff off to Telltale for them to handle, but that isn't the exact quote just my memory)
He is also listed under external writers, which I assume would be a bit more contract based. I don't really want to assume just how involved he was as an external writer because we really do… [view original content]
I thought Anthony Burch helped write the dialogue for Handsome Jack? I vaguely remember either him or Telltale saying he was brought in specifically for that.
A lot of this is my memory but if I remember this all correctly, Gearbox and Telltale partnered up in 2013. From there Burch gave a general outline of what the story should be. And then pretty much all of that changed outside the idea of hunting down Atlas stuff. This was also with the first original team, as neither Burch or the team that ended up being the Tales team were the ones to name Rhys and Fiona, just to give context of how many changes were going on in terms of team members and stuff (not to mention the original/one of the original storylines that had 3 characters).
So by the time the team that made Tales got to it, so much was already changed, and really by this point Telltale was the one steering the ship fully. Burch then joined the writing team at episode 3 as another writer, but was not the lead writer, but I think it would be safe to say was probably move involved with Tales 1 than New Tales. If he helped write Handsome Jack dialogue before joining in episode 3 that wouldn't surprise me, but if we are talking overall storyline, not a lot of what Burch first pitch remained.
I thought Anthony Burch helped write the dialogue for Handsome Jack? I vaguely remember either him or Telltale saying he was brought in specifically for that.
They literally do not animate the shark fights! Do you know how many more complicated things Telltale animated in Tales with a crappier engine? Look at the intro for episode 5 or 4!
Telltale didn't have the budget for a massive gunfight in Episode 4 and yet they still made a hilarious massive gunfight in Episode 4.
I gave it a little bit more of a chance, I watched some clips.
It’s just… not good guys. I could give points for effort in some parts, bu… moret it’s just not good.
It’s uncanny. On one hand you have the crew behind Tales 1, who put their heart and soul into a game that was close to being shelved for not making money (with a skeleton crew no less), and on the other you have New Tales, backed by Gearbox itself, and this is what they come up with. They literally do not animate the shark fights! Do you know how many more complicated things Telltale animated in Tales with a crappier engine? Look at the intro for episode 5 or 4!
I can’t even man…
Comments
Lou-13 also dies pretty unceremoniously and from what I can tell he dies the same way in any playthrough. He goes OMG NO OCTAVIO and then has his head cut off, because he has to give the incredibly undeserved and 20 second long "You guys.... are my... FAMILY!!!!" speech shit before a grenade blows him up. Staple-Face very, and I mean very stupidly after not appearing since episode 1, nearly 8 fucking hours later just "TAADAAAAA!!!" appears disguised as a Teidore solider to help you escape and then also dies 2 minutes later. Every other side character with 3 minutes of screen time from episode 1 also simply never, ever appears again except for 10 seconds with no dialogue during episode 4's intro. (Side note: Tediore has taken over and is capturing people, yet everyone is then, uncaptured for some reason. Fucking Rhys has his company taken over at the start and Tediore was going to kill him by the sounds of it, but next time we catch up with Rhys, its like it never happened, they just moved on?)
Octavio and Fran's death is chosen by passed events even though what those choices are have nothing to do what happens in the moment for why they would die. I think it is suppose to be implied they died when the space ship crashed even though that is not at all what the scene would even make you think is what was suppose to happen. It is only there to hit the "SAD EMOTIONAL ENDING!!!" even though even after spending hours with these characters, you don't care, and further more, it's off fucking screen. Also in one ending, it seems implied Anu and Fran are together now? I tried going back so it is very possible I missed something (but to be honest, I feel like I didn't) but that felt incredibly random considering this game did not have a romance plot.
This entire game is a check box board of story beats with 0 clue how to reach them, but thinking as long they are checked it totally works. There is 0 coherency.
Finished episode 1, right now I'd just call it "fine", with some caveats (Rhys being out of character being the big one), there's been a few jokes where I've smiled on the inside to myself, but mostly it's either fine jokes or eyerolling ones. I think my issue on the humor is the same as that 18 minute gameplay, they just don't commit to the jokes enough, frequently retreating for a safer joke and then doing that a few times. Predictably, LOU13 is the best character who tends to get the funnier lines (although they also gave him the biggest stinker to compensate). Other than him, though, the game doesn't really do a good enough job in getting you invested into the characters, despite the decent setups for where these characters are at. I'll have to see if it can setup character relationships better, but I doubt it. It really does go to show how good of a job Telltale did at getting you immediately invested in Rhys and Fiona and the relationships to the rest of the cast within their introductions
I just read the Game Informer review. My guy says the story is " gets distracted, is loose, random, has unimportant subplots, and was confused" and then slaps a 7/10 in the narrative based video game.
Episode 1 is easily the best episode because it actually has something of a plot. Episode 2 is really short and is basically just part 2 of episode 1. 3 - 5 is where I think the plot stops existing in favor of absolute randomness being what drives things forward.
But I will always look forward to Dojo's updates on this game.
Can't wait for this game to go on sale in a week so I can get blitzed and see how bad it is. It'll be Life is Strange all over again.
Ah, one of those.
Finished episode 2, continuing to be fine, as expected its role was to establish the lead dynamics and get the McGuffin to kick to plot into gear. Character dynamics are okay, but as expected, not really a huge investment into them, jokes between them range from the eyerolling to the inward smile once again. The design of The Devourer was pretty cool, at least.
Played and finished the game, felt I had to play it given how much the first one has meant to me. If I'm gonna give it any credit it's that the gameplay trailer unfortunately was accurate. Bad writing, bad direction and a step backwards in gameplay. I still felt it was something I wanted to get through, if not for anything else so at least for a cathartic feeling of playing another TFTB game, which I never thought would be made. I'm not sure if I regret it or not but I can at least say it's not worth the money they're asking for it.
It's astounding how unlikable and unfunny almost everyone and everything is. The pauses between characters talking seen in the trailers seems to some times be left there for you to collect yourself from laughing so much, and sometimes due to technical problems, both ruining any chance of comedic timing. Not that it would've helped much given the lines the voice actors were given. Scene transitions and auto-saving seemed to be difficult for the game as well, given the audio being cut for a split second at many of those instances. I did play on last gen hardware (PS4) but for a game like this it should not be a problem. A few jokes not landing here and there isn't necessarily the worst thing, the reason I love the first game isn't primarily for it's comedy but for it's characters. But in New Tales I don't care about a single one of them, they are uninteresting at best and obnoxious and borderline unbearable at worst.
And the less said about the one dimensional portrayal of Rhys the better. I am not looking forward to whatever they have in store next for this series.
Good to see you after so much time, I wish the occasion was a bit less bitter sweet
One of the endings musters the words NFTs. Borderlands lore is so cool.
Also New Tales was 91st on best sellers for its launch day on Steam. It was 154 today.
Likewise, hopefully we will have a good experience with Wolf 2 at least.
We probably will, the trailer from February alone makes it pretty clear they're being faithful to the original game.
The boys getting ready to come back to the forums full time when TWAU2 comes out.
It is a very low blow, but the title is way too funny
That is pretty funny actually
It’s just hard to understand the business pitch for New Tales. I guess maybe the success of Detroit, Until Dawn and Life is Strange was what drove the decision to make this game, but even then it’s easy to see the difference between those original IPs that started out with this kind of gameplay, to this game that branches out from the main gameplay as far as possible. It couldn’t really capitalize on the original Tales either because it barely connects to it outside of a stinger and one of the protagonists from it being an out-of-character douche.
I’m usually the first to hold up passion over profit, but when you focus on profit and end up with something like this, it’s kinda hard not to ask if they know what they’re doing.
New Tales ruined Rhys beyond repair and I will never be happy again...Games okay. I beat it over the last couple days and despite not vibing with the first few episodes. Episode 3 was fun and I genuinely enjoyed the finale cause in one or two scenes they let the characters feel sad without them throwing stupid quips left and right. It was nice. Game is inoffensive in terms of the new cast. It's extremely gearbox and it gets to be way too much at times but I dunno I had a good time by the end. I wish they would stop touching the original tales characters tho. God you already ruined Rhys! Leave Queen alone!!!
7/10
Can confirm this isn't the case. For some reason one of the characters died for me in both final decision branches. Your choices throughout the game do determine aspects but its so damn confusing that I quite don't understand why they died.
As someone who did enjoy the game. This is an aspect that seriously bothered me. The skateboard rating system makes no sense! I don't understand how the percentages add up to the choices I made and its one of the more annoying aspects of the game.
In general it is something I am not a fan of of choice based games doing things like this and I feel it happens a lot, but I do think New Tales is the worst offender because not only is the ending changed seemingly randomly, it also skips over the execution.
Also what choices did you think mattered? After seeing a few comparisons of choice now I feel like the only choice that actually felt like it changed the direction of the scene was to fuse with the gem thing or not. Telltale had a ton of Choice A for Scene A or Choice B for Scene B, and then went right back on track. New Tales felt like every choice was "20 seconds A or 20 seconds B" and then got on the regular track. Just wondering if there was any choices you made that you felt did something.
Not any big ones tbh. I just enjoyed the ride for what it was I guess. Obviously stuff is affected but the ways they're are so arbitrary I couldn't even tell you.
So in the final ending which would be considered the best, everyone lives including Louie who they say was brought back because they simply got his parts back from the rubble. (which really begs the question why in the second best ending where everyone lives but Louie why did they not get his parts). I really do not like how the ending really is the only thing that changes, but how you get it is just taking a collection of choices that have very little reason for why the ending would end the way it does.
Anyway, Rhys appears in a phone call one last time to thank you but also still chastises you. It is pretty clear this will be the canon ending going forward. (Again, I also really don't like it when a choice based game has a developer chosen "correct" ending when the purpose of the game was making story choices) Also going forward, I have no idea what the Fiona set up will be for in terms of next game it will be followed up in. It seems because the shard heals people and Felix's watch also healed people this is connected in someway. If I had to guess Sasha got warped to the galaxy the shard is going to or something. Not sure how this works outside a solo Tales game as I cant see BL4 focusing much on this, unless it gets sidequested. Or DLC'd or something.
Now its Gearbox and they don't know what's next either so no real point in thinking about it too hard. Could even end up like every other Borderlands ending where they forget the ending set up to the next game anyway. That war is still coming right guys? I think its canonically been what, 9 years now? lol
It’s the one constant I see in BL games, and it was something even in the original Tales is guilty of…sequel bating with no idea of what comes next. Gearbox always does it, which wouldn’t be a problem if they had a roadmap or a consistent development team making these games. They don’t meet either of those criteria. The original BL had a different director/writer/team as BL2, so did the Pre Sequel, so did Tales, so did BL3, and so did New Tales (not counting Wonderlands). They set something up, playing it off as hugely important, meaningful, and symbolic, but end up having a completely different creative lead take over and force them to rectify it somehow. It gets infuriating because of the lack of consistency, a failure to follow through, and putting future writers into a box that they need to work out of.
The MCU benefits from a single figurehead in Kevin Fiege to connect everything together. Casey Hudson for Mass Effect, the sole director of all three games and a consistent leading figure, even when other people left he could oversee everything. Hideo Kojima with Metal Gear, same thing. With Borderlands, who is that one person? I guess Randy Pitchford, but that’s not a good thing.
Tales 1 does not sequel bate as hard as the rest though. Tales 1 I would say simply ends more ambiguous, there isnt a real set up for a sequel. BL1 is the only one that ends that actually is directly followed up on in the sequel with Angel and the Hyperion Satellite. BL2 ends with the idea of vaults on other planets and we did get there, but def not in the same way it was being presented there. Pre-Sequel's ending is easily the worst in terms of following up as it very clearly says a war is coming and then that didnt go anywhere. BL3 surprisingly doesn't outside hinting Lilith didnt die and then the last DLC basically confirming that. Now new Tales throws Fiona in for another set up that will probably be greatly changed by the time they get to it.
Fairly certain BL4 will follow up on the War thing as I remember I think I saw someone tweeted (probably Randy) that seemed to hint they'd actually follow it up. Where Fiona finding Sasha fits in, not sure how it would work out in a mainline game.
I really have no idea who heads creative direction at Gearbox, I don't know how it worked at Telltale either for comparison. Just in general I hope the creative team actually looks at BL2 and Tales and tries to capture that style of writing and world building, because right now a lot of it feels like throwing everything and anything into the story with no regards of what it means for the greater universe. Or better yet, actually collaborate with the original creative team leads from Tales.
Not that we didn't already know, but yeah, this game was a huge flop.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Borderlands/comments/yeij3m/new_tales_from_the_borderlands_was_a_massive/
I think 6k is actually a more accurate estimate. SteamDP's VG Insights I would say is the most accurate estimation vast majority of the time and it has New Tales as 5.9k on Steam.
So if we estimate each console sold 6k and even say Epic sold 6k, after splits, and let's say everyone bought the 50 dollar deluxe edition, New Tales in its first week has made about 893,940 dollars. (I didnt include Switch because I have no idea what an accurate estimation would be, but I feel very safe in saying it probably has sold the least)
This also isn't related but I actually cant find anyone making commentary videos on this game in a playthrough or livestream that isn't sponsored. That post mentions it a little, but seriously pretty much all coverage has been sponsored to a point where it feels sad, like the only way for this to get any traction is to pay people to play it. I think the only person I've seen so far who has been fully playing it without sponsorship and is commentating on it is DomTheBomb, (who I think ended at episode 3 for now and said he finds it very meh) like I can't even get a general feeling for how others feel because I cant find anyone.
Gearbox releasing a narrative intensive game after 3 years of the writing being their biggest criticism, when the writing is greatly criticized.
I gave it a little bit more of a chance, I watched some clips.
It’s just… not good guys. I could give points for effort in some parts, but it’s just not good.
It’s uncanny. On one hand you have the crew behind Tales 1, who put their heart and soul into a game that was close to being shelved for not making money (with a skeleton crew no less), and on the other you have New Tales, backed by Gearbox itself, and this is what they come up with. They literally do not animate the shark fights! Do you know how many more complicated things Telltale animated in Tales with a crappier engine? Look at the intro for episode 5 or 4!
I can’t even man…
I keep seeing a lot of people mention how Anthony Burch was a part of the game and this for whatever reason negates any criticism of the game because he was lead for BL2 and worked on TFTBL1. I feel like there is a lot of misinformation about it like so many thinking Burch was responsible for Tales 1's story direction. At the start sure, (and I believe he is credited in a video somewhere as this) but pretty much everything changed from the original story pitch he sent off to Telltale with the only real thing remaining was a Pandorian Con Arts and Hyperion Lackey team up to find Atlas treasure. (Burch has also said for the most part this all started with him sending stuff off to Telltale for them to handle, but that isn't the exact quote just my memory)
He is also listed under external writers, which I assume would be a bit more contract based. I don't really want to assume just how involved he was as an external writer because we really don't know if this means he was more of a consultant or a contractor who was writing a lot. But worth nothing out of the 3 external writers, he isn't even the lead writer among them. So I am a bit surprised so many people think 1 guy in a position like this seemingly negates the entire writing team consisting of people who did not work on the original. I mean it takes 2 seconds to look up the writers of Tales 1, including the season lead which you'd think would be important considering Tales was the only other post TWD game to keep consistent creative leads between episodes.
Lastly this is all just subjective criticism, but I do think Burch's writing simply hasn't been as good as time went on. I think right now a lot of people are kind of looking back in nostalgia simply because BL3 and NTFTBL's writing is so bad. I like BL2's writing overall and I think it is his best work. I mean don't forget BL2's writing was being criticized all those years ago too. I think once Tales came around it really complimented BL2's storytelling. Pre-Sequel is the thing I see being brought up a lot saying how well written it is, but I feel again everyone is forgetting that when it came out, people felt the writing wasn't the best. Lot of annoying/forgettable characters and the overall Handsome Jack origin story that felt kind of off especially considering his relationship with characters like Lilith and Roland. I don't think Pre-Sequel is bad in any way, but I do think if we are comparing it to BL2 it isn't nearly as good, and like I was saying I think right now that writing is being more fondly remembered simply because the writing now is so poor that "okay" writing looks amazing.
Also I really wish I wasn't so negative about pretty much everything about NTFBL, but just... damn. How is Wolf this close to concurrent players of this brand new game?
I thought Anthony Burch helped write the dialogue for Handsome Jack? I vaguely remember either him or Telltale saying he was brought in specifically for that.
Honestly, the fact that they haven't advertised his involvement at all makes me think he wasn't really involved that much, because "Written by BL2 lead writer" would have been a decent selling point for some people.
I believe he wrote specifically the Jack-O-Pedias?
A lot of this is my memory but if I remember this all correctly, Gearbox and Telltale partnered up in 2013. From there Burch gave a general outline of what the story should be. And then pretty much all of that changed outside the idea of hunting down Atlas stuff. This was also with the first original team, as neither Burch or the team that ended up being the Tales team were the ones to name Rhys and Fiona, just to give context of how many changes were going on in terms of team members and stuff (not to mention the original/one of the original storylines that had 3 characters).
So by the time the team that made Tales got to it, so much was already changed, and really by this point Telltale was the one steering the ship fully. Burch then joined the writing team at episode 3 as another writer, but was not the lead writer, but I think it would be safe to say was probably move involved with Tales 1 than New Tales. If he helped write Handsome Jack dialogue before joining in episode 3 that wouldn't surprise me, but if we are talking overall storyline, not a lot of what Burch first pitch remained.
Telltale didn't have the budget for a massive gunfight in Episode 4 and yet they still made a hilarious massive gunfight in Episode 4.
Step the hell up, Gearbox
Dojo really changed the name of the thread and then didnt say what he thought of the rest of the game
I have to actually finish episode 3 to give more thoughts, lmao
"So in this scene, there is a gun fight happening!"
"So in this scene there is a giant monster!"
"So in this scene, there is this living god thing that can kill everything with their mind beams!"
Every character in said scene
Ok but, Froopy is the worst character in the game right.
-and then the door is a frogurt machine and the Foop thing comes back and everyone starts doing ballet!
Noooo! Turn back now! You will find only pain that way! Don't do it!