This week on Zero Punctuation, Yahtzee reviewed Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin. www.escapistmagazine.com/stranger-of-paradise-final-fantasy-origin-zero-punctuation/ Watch it early on TH-cam and support our content via TH-cam Memberships for just $2/month. th-cam.com/channels/qg5FCR7NrpvlBWMXdt-5Vg.htmljoin
Why isn't there just a game where I can play as Ed 209 yet, I mean its been fucking years since 1986 and the the RoboCop satire is so ripe right now, like a game where Ed is just going to work then has a short circuit crisis of conscience and has to fight Snake and other paramilitary greed hooks like some Pixar dystopian society that actually makes fucking sense bro.
I don't think Yahtzee's gone soft. I've noticed the relative reduction of unmitigated anger but it's felt healthy. You can still criticize something without sacrificing your peace of mind in the process.
@@Sonichero151 that and its not like most of these games are giant disappointments its not like dead rising 4 where its basically against what the whole series was about now I didn't watch the p okemon legends one he (I assumed did) so I assume its just "its another pokemon game"
a part of it i think is also that's become more focused, before it was mostly vitriol, certainly entertaining and content-worthy, but rarely really conducive to progress, this feels more measured and accurate. Might also be that games have become just a bit better on average compared to 8-10 years ago.
@@Sonichero151 AVGN is the peak comparison. The balance between exposition and negativity is what makes gold, rather than just hamming it up Doug Walker style. There's a time and place where the Doug Walker approach is fun, but it'll never be as genuine as Yahtzee and James because especially in recent years, both feel very earnest, and that wins big points by me.
I think Yahtzee would admit it, and might go as far as saying all of ZP could fit the formula for Borderlands's "jokes." He started ZP in his late teens, when his sense of humor was different, and he thought a trilby was both a quality substitute for an interesting personality and a distinguished way to hide the early male pattern baldness. If you throw a self-deprecating comment or a non-sequitur on the end of that, you get a Borderlands joke. It writes itself. I believe Yahz might think he does the formula better, though, and I think I'd agree.
Unironically followed up with a turbo-charged tirade involving inflating a person with farts until they float away and enjoying it. Yahtzee is brilliant, but I feel like he's missing the point that Borderlands comedy is preeeeeeeeetty similar to his own.
@@BlueProphet7 the delivery and context is very different though. Invariably, jokes in Borderlands games don’t land. There’s some good ones, and there’s a general sense of ‘comedy’ that I don’t mind at all, but I enjoy Borderlands for the gameplay and the world building. In BL2, I think these two were strong. BL1 basically lacked a story and after BL2 the world building was definitely weaker.
Honest it reminds me of a lot of video games, like Sunset Overdrive and those stupid webcomics like Penny Arcade. Basically anyone trying to be meta and internetty
Nah, Let him be the Villain, write his own lines & responses to the world/characters. The contrast would kill. He'd be a villain with so much genuine disdain for the protagonist & chatty psychos, corporations, etc
Honestly, I feel like swapping out the seamlessly-interconnected open world for a more abstract representative overworld is the way a lot of open-world games should go. After all, you can devote more detail to the actual level-spaces by freeing up devtime otherwise vored by making an open world. And of course, scrapping the seamless four-digit square-footage not only respects the time of the devs, but also the time of the players, since you can easily trim the dead air in-between the other areas, meaning that while there's less game-time, there's a much better killer-to-filler ratio.
Fair, but then discovery is less of a thing. It's a lot less impressive to discover an overworld map dot because you changed the camera angle, than it is to make a trek through a forest maze and find a cave of wonders. YMMV on whether you care, but I do, and it's the reason I prefer immersive worlds over overworlds, at least if they have an actual open world. The games that have interconnected "worlds" that are illusions to hide the meandering rail tunnel (looking at you FF10/13) can go meander themselves.
It was an interesting opinion up until you said "killer-to-filler ratio". If you want an endless hack-and-slash, there are so many amazing games that can oblige. The whole point of an open-world is to get away from games that think fun gameplay is uninterrupted hours of combat.
Personally it depends, if the game is fun and you can actually get lost doing side objectives.. go Open World If you got a "Open World" that gameplay sucks, it feels shoddy or for some bizarre reason want to tell a cinematic story in a open world game, that wheb rat tunnels is good.
Everyone goes through that phase where they'll consistently laugh at a string of obscure words rapidly spoken. Then you get old and context matters. Nothing's funny in a vacuum.
Shit back in 2012 the game either had me laughing or contemplate the nearest bridge. I really wish that they stuck to the original Borderlands style where it was fairly serious but ridiculous like the first two SAINTS row games
Ashe is fairly funny, I do like the insane way she tends to describe things. But in the Borderlands series there's a decent character for every 20 shit characters unfortunately. BL3 was really fucking cringe worthy, they were really pushing the "joke must be funny eventually if I keep repeating it" mentality.
@@StevenLong gotta wonder if you guys watched the whole thing or are just being sarcastic. I might be an idiot and you guys are just being sarcastic… but sometimes you can’t tell.
@@maninblack3410 it's mostly a joke. It's his most glowing borderlands review and I bought it already. Do all the jokes land? No. But not all the jokes from Differently Morphous landed either. But I enjoy both. 😁
I really loved OG Borderlands' tone, being that of a broken dystopia where cynical humor was used to prevent things from getting too depressing. Borderlands 2 hit a solid middle ground between cynical dystopia and over the top idiocy that made it enjoyable. Problem was that Tiny Tina was such a popular character that Gearbox decided to let her tone define the series ever since, and it's just difficult for me to enjoy. I had to force myself through the pre-sequel, and I haven't finished 3 yet because I just don't care.
Less that and more, they changed writers. The dude(Burch) who worked on 2 & Tales only outlined the Pre-Sequel. 2K Australia did the rest. Burch didn't work on BL3. I wouldn't say Tina set the tone, more so the overall praise of BL2 decided that'd be the tone moving forward. Even with the antagonists of BL3, You can see they're trying to emulate Handsom Jack again.
@@KrodaStagg I think Jack is possibly the most inexplicably popular villain in gaming history. Yes, he's quite often reasonably funny, but that's because he's TRYING to be funny because he's convinced he's so cool and witty and awesome, when he's actually one of the most evil villains I think I've ever seen in a game, which is something so many people seem to overlook because "LOL he bought a diamond pony and called it 'Butt Stallion'!" He's absolutely vile to his core, with even what would normally be considered a possible redeeming feature (his supposed love for his daughter) being completely subverted by what a self-absorbed and sociopathtic monster he is (his daughter hates him so much that she'd rather die than have anything to do with him and her dying words are "Dad... you're an asshole!"). Mind you, I never played any game after 2 (and I never actually finished 2 either, as much as I REALLY wanted to kill Jack, it was just dragging out too long and wearing me down, so I just... stopped), so I don't know if they gave him any further characterisation, but I find it impossible to believe that ANYTHING could make me not hate his guts down to the last molecule.
@@KrodaStagg Honestly, for me, Handsome Jack is the reason I stopped playing Borderlands 2. The fact that he couldn't shut the fuck up and kept trying to shove the lame Butt Stallion joke down my ear ground me down until I couldn't go on.
@@ArcaneAzmadi that's what's called a problematic fav. You can think Jack's funny AND an evil asshole. To answer your quandary though, they try to redeem Jack by basically making everyone around him awful. There's a sidequest to "rescue" his mother but you find out Jack is the one who hired the people that killed them and he just wanted you to have to look at his "work" of getting revenge on her. The main characters as well as others are shown to betray Jack in Tales and Pre-Sequel. It doesn't *REALLY* make what he did okay but it's at least supposed to give you a better idea of why he's so fucked up and give motivation for why it seems so personal in BL2 when he's doing shit like mutating homeboy's bird so one is forced to kill the other.
I've played through the first Borderlands recently and it may become my favorite of the series just for its aesthetic alone. Back then, the vault was just a legend that few people thought was actually real and Pandora was a desolate wasteland of a planet that would drive its inhabitants insane just from being there. It took it's story and characters much more seriously while still having that quirky, dark humor that's just lazily spewed out in these later games. You see it more in the DLC's , they're hilarious. Also S&S made the BEST guns!
So the subtitles mentions "laying the cultural foundations for ethnic genocide" instead of the harvesting retina at the end. I'm really curious how that happened, and the person or AI making the subtitles thought that it is a better or worst thing?
@@NobodyEvenReadsNames Yeah, i kinda knew that is the most reasonable (boring) explanation: Yahtzee changed it but the subs were made with an older draft. I was just hoping some AI shenanigans. On the other hand, i' don't know if it was toned down. I mean sure animals "just" animals not humans, and PETA kills them by the dozens as far as i know (i mean animals, at least for now), but still, many animals are cute, and we love them. On the other hand ethnic genocides doesn't seems to bother people too much nowadays, if it happens far enough.
@@HUNbullseye i think it's a refuge in audacity kind of thing; the retina harvesting, while still horrific, is also absurd, while the genocide thing... not so much.
I think they're both allusions to the Russian invasion if the Ukraine. Like 300 dogs starved to death due to siege blocking food imports and, potentially, their caretakers being killed. That news drops right about the same time as the "the Russians killed a bunch of civilians execution style while they withdrew from regions to regroup". Given Yahtzee's dark humor he may have been unsure which to go with and so instead did both to help soldify the allusion.
"...or knitting." Aww, he has softened up! Don't worry, Yahtzee, you can still do plenty of damage in a moment's notice with knitting needles. Or the yarn if you're creative.
@@goodsocksproductions9397 reference to the Captain Scott expedition to the South Pole. One of the men by the name of Oates felt that he was slowing the return journey through illness and injury so committed suicide by leaving the tent into a blizzard and his last words were "I'm going for a walk and I may be some time."
@@goodsocksproductions9397 My comment was carried over from the early-access posting of the video, probably. I don't keep track, I just watch ZP whenever Yahtzee graces us with his snarkwisdom.
I will die on this hill that Borderlands 2 was peak in Borderlands humor. It striked a balance between absurd humor and playing things completely straight faced. Subsequent games in the franchise progressively went too far into the absurdist direction that at times made the game frustrating. An example is the Boner Farts side quest in BL2 and the side quest where you get a coffee in BL3. The infamous Boner Farts quest is funny because Hammerlock gets more and more angrier when his suggested names keep getting rejected for his almanac so he just calls the Bullymong, Boner Farts. There's build up to it and takes an absurd left turn. The joke of the coffee side quest in Borderlands 3 is it takes a long time to get a coffee and the barista being snarky and insufferable. That's not a joke, that's at best an exaggerated observation.
As an American, that's sadly our humor in a nutshell, it starts great but then it never knows when to stop until and it circles right around into being unfunny. Like the Office US.
I only played the Second game before I got bored but I will admit, the dialogue wasn’t the worst thing about it. It’s not great but I expected it to age poorly and came away surprised that it was decent. Not funny mind you as it’s very much “12-year-olds attempting stand-up” but not cringy to where I needed to seek a chiropractor, much to their disappointment.
With my reference for borderlands humor being the entire concept that is "Face McShooty": I put borderlands humour squarely within "the Marmite zone": you will ether find it an enjoyable thing despite being in desperate need of some toast to spread it on (which one could argue Handsome Jack provides well enough) or you will devote you body and soul to LOTHING it As for me... eh obviously not high art but sometimes mindless fun is just what you need
Not true at all. BL1 was kind of funny, BL2 made an effort to be funny and was actually a fucking riot. PRE SEQUEL was actually fucking funny. BL3 was fucking TERRIBLE. awful. Unfunny garbage. Wonderlands? Unfunny garbage. A committee of writers who were hired purely on their resume.
It felt like those moments where a person is being emotional and then stops talking and you wonder if they are about to cry and panic because you were not prepared at all for it
The summarization of BL humor was so on point, wow. Although I admit that... I laugh, sue me. Also, the auto equip mechanic explanation works for pretty much any game with that functionality, which makes it even more hilarious
I think there's a weird disconnect over quality that's often lost in the sea of things, particularly as time goes on. Just because something isn't peak comedy or high art constantly all the time forever doesn't mean it can't be *entertaining* for a brief time. It doesn't make it *good* by an objective measure, but it can still be fun and satisfying. And you can still laugh at bad jokes and horribly written dialogue, it just is less likely to grab you. Like, I can *enjoy* eating at Taco Bell, but I wouldn't dare claim that it's a good restaurant or that anything I ingested there qualified as *food.* Nor that I wouldn't vastly prefer something else, though on occasion much like a Call to the Void, one *does* crave something... familiar and trashy. Sorry, this went on a bit and got navel-gazey.
Yeah, the Borderlands style of comedy may be dumb and formulaic, but "dumb and formulaic" isn't always automatically a bad thing if that particular dumb formula works for you. And I'll agree - Borderlands does occasionally get a chuckle or smirk out of me, dumb and formulaic as it is. And in the end, that's really all that matters.
People who hate on Borderlands humor are sorta stuck-up imo. In some cases it feels performative as if they want everyone to know that their sense of humor is sooooo developed and complex. sorta ironic considering comedy was traditionally looked down on as a form of art. it's OK for things to be silly!
The first red flag I got when I first met my roommate was when he told me he thought that borderlands was funny. The second was the moldy cheesecake that's sat on his desk for the better part of 2 weeks...
"... make me want to break wind into the mouths of the writers and not stop until they can be used as dirigibles." God, what a tremendously on theme joke for a Borderlands game. I could actually see this happen in these games. Fart into the mouths of the writers of this game until they swell up into floating balloons and hand them over to this video game critic that gave you the quest so they can take the writer fart balloons to a 4th Wall themed theme park.
I was not prepared to chuckle as i did at the image of a gang of snorlax plushies wielding smgs blasting at a bored yahtzee in a gun battle. Thank you again for the great laughs over all these years you glorious bastard! Got a legit laugh out loud too from ‘Teeny Wonders Tittybar’ 😂
😂 My partner and I disagreed on the ZP for Arceus. He said it was really harsh, and I thought it was quite favourable for a ZP. Love to see my opinion shared.
It's very odd to see the direction the lives of both Ashly and Anthony Burch have taken since "Hey Ash, Whatcha Playin?". Ashly is a recognised and popular voice actor, while Anthony is a meme for his wife actually cucking him and taking the Wii U with her.
All the gross and nasty jokes are friggin dime a dozen but the silence was like the kind of thing you use on a elder god to make it cry like a anime girl on prom night.
To this day, I say the best Borderlands game is still Tales of the Borderlands. It’s amazing how you can get a really interesting story in that world when you’re not trying to be a sci-fi version of Commando reimagined by a TikToker.
@@UnagiTempura OH YEAH! I remember that. My personal favorite was when they were trying to sabotage a car while the executive was busy trying to calibrate the gun he had.
I can never get over how they butchered the Tales characters for Borderlands 3. Like how they took the incredibly simple concept of "Vaughn is weirdly ripped but is still a massive nerd" and went "Ahh, right, so he's obsessed with fitness, got it." "He's basically just a normal guy in over his head" "Ahh, so he's yet another comically psychotic over-the-top raider, got it!"
That last gag got me. I ain't even ashamed to admit it. My silly shields were down and you nailed me square in the balls Yahtz! I was about to click the next video and I hear this tiny voice go "...or knitting" and I just lost it.
I never really grasped Borderlands’ humour, and Yahtzee’s opening here I think explained to me why. It also made me realise I use that kind of humour excessively. Guess we’re all the most critical of our own sins, huh?
People who find Borderlands funny mystify me. The first game had its moments and I laughed exactly once playing Borderlands 2 so I knew I was never playing them again. I don't count Tales from the Borderlands because people who cared and had something to say made that game (under the surface you realise Hyperion is just the Telltale company as viewed by the people working there).
The first game, IMO, was genuinely funny when it came out because it took itself relatively seriously and actually had characters that lent themselves to humorous situations without being the source of it. General Knoxx is where the absurdist, over the top comedy vibes that would eventually define Borderlands started coming to the forefront but it worked there because Knoxx was the eternal straight man to everything going on around him. That's really what Borderlands lacks, is intelligent characters that could easily fit into any other story having to deal with being in Borderlands. There is no straight man in Borderlands 2. It's just a bunch of wacky psychopaths quipping at each other. Even the characters that were straight men in Borderlands 1 (like Tannis) become haha look at the funny personality quirk in 2.
@Mister Mister honestly after playing the game for years I can definitely understand getting bored with the game, there’s only so many times you can slog through it and not notice how uneventful it can feel.
@Mister Mister Yeah, the gameplay might have some novelty on the first playthourgh, trying to do replays of the games with new characters/builds makes me realize how linear (or should I say samey) the game /sidequests are despite the huge maps
If BL2 was the "objectively best" one then I'm glad I gave up on the series after playing BL2 for a few hours and deciding I'd rather listen to 1877Kars4Kids on an infinite loop in a Guantanamo Bay detention cell than have it take up space on my hard drive for another minute. "It gets good later" isn't enough to go on when the first few hours of gameplay show nothing redeemably interesting
That "borderlands method" part after the intro was incredibly accurate. You know its gonna be a good video if it starts with that level of absolutely annihilation
It's a looter shooter that doesn't feel like it's taking itself too seriously and isn't trying to milk me for every cent after I already bought it. 10 stars
@@Nekomancer1983 ? Thats like saying every game that has a season pass is bad battle pass sure but most SP are usually discounted (only like 5-10$ though) from buying dlc one by one.
@@noisekeeper how so? If you know your going to like a game and put a good amount of hrs playing it its just factually cheaper to buy the season pass. Only argument I think you could make is if its not enough content to warrant being a dlc like dark souls 3s 1st which was really small or something like skyrim's hearth fire or fallout nvg's gun runner dlc but that's more about what the minimum amount should be in any given dlc.
I believe Borderlands is the only game series that improves by two-three fold whenever you mute the dialogue in sound options and turn off subtitles. Except when you are playing Krieg from the 2nd game, I think a sane man sick of being trapped in a body that spews out random profanities for no reason and all the time perfectly captures the experience of being the player in a Borderlands game.
I definitely enjoyed my time with Tiny Tina's Wonderlands *a lot* more than I enjoyed Borderlands 3, in fact I endured Borderlands 3. Having finished the story I'm now waiting for the DLC and some friends to play it with for a second go-around.
@@KrodaStagg "forcing gayness" yall do realize gay people do exist, right? That there are more than just straight people in the world? Saying that they "forced gayness" sounds about as lame as "forcing straightness" on people.
@@KrodaStagg TBH, I feel like Jakobs was a good gay character. Being gay isn't the focal point of his character, it was a detail that made him a bit more interesting.
"I leave it to personal taste whether the self-aware comedic tone ameliorates the dullness of the grind or only worsens it somehow." Looks like someone forgot about Sacred 3.
I feel there was a bit of a shift in *how* dialogue was written in this game that feels a lot closer to how Borderlands 2 presented its shenanigans. Not much fundamentally changed between the writing of 3 and TTW, but instead more just how scenarios are presented, and how characters react to them. Borderlands 3 had this awful obsession with winking at the camera every time something even mildly wAcKy happened on screen, but TTW rolls with the "cringe" of it all a lot smoother, which helps fit the narrative that the wasteland is just this weird and wild place, and all the weirdness is just something people live with in this world. Still not that funny, but I could respect its sincerity enough for it not to drag the gameplay down too much.
Love that we call it a wasteland... For five fucking games now. Despite this one taking place on a tabletop and 3 taking place in several "worlds". Gearbox should just pack it in.
Yeah, the gameplay in BL3 is still mostly fun (especially co-op) but it definitely is trying way too hard to be "wacky lol random xD", its better jokes are usually the environmental details and things like that.
This type of "comedy" which is described by Yahtzee through the whole video reminds me a lot of - "The Typical Comedy Anime, With Long Name Describing The Plot And You Don't Understand Why Everyone Likes It". Yeah, let's talk about that: Why It didn't makes me laugh? Why the maximum thing of me, from watching almost all comedy anime is a little one grinning through the whole season? Maybe I just can't understand this type of humour? It's the type of comedy, which makes only laugh poor assembly line anime makers after 23 hours of hard work? Or it's just all around bad comedy? Please, help me to understand, my dudes!
I think the first thing you have to consider is that any comedy anime is written by Japanese people, for Japanese people. There are sufficient cultural differences that not all the jokes are going to land for non-Japanese audiences at best, and at worst just aren't going to even going to appear to be comedy. A good example is manzai, a 2-person setup where one straight man (boke) feeds lines into the responder (tsukkomi), which often relies quite a bit on misunderstandings (because the Japanese language is a nightmare of interpretation, and a single phrase might have half a dozen possible meanings) which is pretty reminiscent of British comedy acts going back to the music halls (see Morecambe and Wise for a fairly modern example, which you can actually find footage of)
I just imagine the developers saying “we are not funny , how do we make it funny?! YES, I GOT IT! Make Tiny Tina scream constantly in a forced annoying voice this way they have to think it’s funny!
that pause at the end there might have been the longest in ZP history where there was still some speech after it. The longest pause without that qualifier was also for a borderlands game actually.
They’re about the same vintage. The OG Borderlands came out about the same time Homestuck dropped. It’s like a snapshot at a particular brand of Internet humor of the late 00s to early 10s. …at least homestuck more frequently uses purely visual gags and actual slapstick
Well after a life of seen something he love so much videogame, becoming these depressing thing, that no longer give you anything, maybe he i getting old, and ust dont care, i kind of understand how he feel
@@Krysnha I think that or having to play the drivel that would count as Cruel and Ususual Torture if you forced Prisoners to grind in say Avengers live service game.
Yahtzee has a talent of creating mocking names that sound kind of awesome. "Teeny's Wonder Titty Bar" sounds like the kind of spot you come across in the middle of nowhere on a road trip that is either the setting for the next "Hills have Eyes" movie or an amazing venue that will has enough self awareness that it just adds to the atmosphere and creates memories that will last a life time... Well I suppose the first option would also create memories that would last a life time but it would be a much shorter life time.
I love how the borderlands method of comedy writing unintentional describes my first impressions on most humans in a semisocial setting... And how i execute humor when anxious as a coping mechanism.
Your opening summary of the comedy style of Borderlands is PERFECT. It's unbelievably sophomoric and forced. I thought they were hilarious when I was 20, but absolutely can't stomach their writing at 30
I must say the visuals and overall quality of this episode makes it a standout for me. Fun jokes that lay naturally in to the review and the review not only criticizing gameplay but the non gameplay moments like writing, visuals, and player emotions. Love it~
Short version: personal preference rules the day when all is said and done. Simple as that. Longer Version: Given that I love comedy, specific characters that were put into the game as others, the references put into the game, Tina, and the Borderlands franchise, and have over 500 hours between 2 and TPS, around 850 adding in 3, I uh.... yeah, this game is awesome for me, it's my personal taste, especially since I also love 5e DnD... so... yeah. Given that you basically said 'it is your personal taste in the end' makes me very happy, because that's what game reviews don't tell you, a game can be complete shit, or it can be the same game as the first with a new gimmick (both Borderlands AND Pokemon fall into this category) and still love it, even with it all spoiled (see gen 7's release), it's all down to personal preference at the end of the day now isn't it? Even longer addition to the long version to help make my point, using some games I play and know: I fall into the latter category, I have a specific level of standards, and well... if the gameplay, story or otherwise feels like shit, I ain't playing it. Simple as that. I don't even care about graphics, I just care about gameplay at the end of the day, and Borderlands, Pokemon, and even Fire Emblem, Ace Attorney, and Etrian Odyssey are satisfying gameplay loops, why do you think Pokemon is on Gen 9 and has... at least 4 or 5 spinoff titles, minimum? Depending on how you count it, Etrian Odyssey has 5, 2 remakes of games 1 and 2, and a major "celebration title" and the Persona Q1 and Q2 titles, and even Etrian Mystery Dungeons, also having a 1 and 2 title, which ups the count to... counting all of them individually, to 12 (They changed stuff in the remakes including a story mode, which is not really present in 1-5 or any other title, it's more the "FF1"-style of "generic characters that go and save the world. With an Emphasis on map making." Quick Fire Emblem Anecdote: Oh and Fire Emblem, not counting warriors, I believe has 15 games, 2 of which are remakes, and we've only gotten 7 of the last 8 -no translation for "Mystery of the Emblem." Looping back to Borderlands: Oh and Borderlands has 4 mainline games, a "card-based boardgame" and a spinoff, no one is playing these games expecting something groundbreaking and new, we go in expecting the same old thing we always have. To Yahtzee: So... yeah, you're not hard on this one (haha, I said "hard on") because it isn't bad, it's just personal preference, and you don't like this game, but you like it slightly more than the others.
I laughed at the same gag, both because it was hilarious but also because it was a throwback to the borderlands 2 DLC that started this. I wouldn't have remembered the reference at all if I hadn't just replayed the standalone of that DLC they put out a few months back. Also Mr. Torque is by far my favourite character
Yahtzee not completely hating it is probably the tipping point in getting me to try it. I've always disliked the series for feeling extra generic under it's very transparent mask of poorly executed lol randomness and that's from someone who likes lol random humor. Always had a soft spot for Tina though and I love D&D.
The combat options and builds are actually pretty cool too. I've got a character who duel wields spells and the guns are set dressing and a necromancer that just destroys things with a claymore.
I had grown to really dislike the writing and characters of the borderlands series after greatly enjoying the telltale games version; Tales from the Borderlands. I actually felt something for the characters in that spin-off more than I ever did in the trilogy which had some good moments but just smothered by the annoying trying too hard to be funny/cool parts.
There is a certain hilarious irony to Yahtzee breaking down the Borderlands joke method, then at the very end of the video following up with one of his own repeated joke formulas. Step 1: say something normal Step 2: say something really edgy or messed up Step 3: intentional pause Step 4: say something normal for comedic effect
Ah, Tiny Tina: the character that cretins thought was a memorable, hilarious character because they think 'child swears' is the peak of comedic writing
No, a memorable personality and occasional improvised acting from a competent voice actress is. Okay, maybe not necessarily the "peak of comedy", but at least a good direction to take. And Tiny Tina (along with Claptrap and Hammerlock) arguably had that at least in previous games. Tales from the Borderlands is where things started to drop
True tho I liked what they did in the proto version of this game in the BL2 dlc and it's slowly revealed to be her coping mechanism for dealing with Roland's death. The ending and her coming to terms with it is probably the best character moment in the series imo
4:20, good lord my Nostalgia. Lufia 2 for the SNES had that. Use the tools for solving puzzles in the dungeons to shoot the enemies (who will generate a “random encounter” when you touch them) to stun them for a few steps, so if you don’t want to deal with that bullshit OR attack their sprite from behind for a free ambush round, you can do that. Unfortunately the difficulty scaling AND money scaling in the game meant unless you murdered EVERY random encounter in a dungeon at least one time, you’d be nerfed on levels and be scraping through the discount bin at the next shop in the next town you stopped by before diving into the next dungeon. Still a REALLY fun game though.
This week on Zero Punctuation, Yahtzee reviewed Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin. www.escapistmagazine.com/stranger-of-paradise-final-fantasy-origin-zero-punctuation/ Watch it early on TH-cam and support our content via TH-cam Memberships for just $2/month. th-cam.com/channels/qg5FCR7NrpvlBWMXdt-5Vg.htmljoin
I thought it was Tiny Tina whatever
You should make him play borderlands 2 tiny tina DLC, I bet he would like it more.
I like how you yoused snorlax as a innuendo for bullet sponges lol
the fuck is that title?
Why isn't there just a game where I can play as Ed 209 yet, I mean its been fucking years since 1986 and the the RoboCop satire is so ripe right now, like a game where Ed is just going to work then has a short circuit crisis of conscience and has to fight Snake and other paramilitary greed hooks like some Pixar dystopian society that actually makes fucking sense bro.
I don't think Yahtzee's gone soft. I've noticed the relative reduction of unmitigated anger but it's felt healthy. You can still criticize something without sacrificing your peace of mind in the process.
That's what the AVGN did and I liked it. Gave him more chances for making colorful jokes
@@Sonichero151 that and its not like most of these games are giant disappointments
its not like dead rising 4 where its basically against what the whole series was about
now I didn't watch the p okemon legends one he (I assumed did) so I assume its just "its another pokemon game"
a part of it i think is also that's become more focused, before it was mostly vitriol, certainly entertaining and content-worthy, but rarely really conducive to progress, this feels more measured and accurate. Might also be that games have become just a bit better on average compared to 8-10 years ago.
@@Sonichero151 AVGN is the peak comparison. The balance between exposition and negativity is what makes gold, rather than just hamming it up Doug Walker style. There's a time and place where the Doug Walker approach is fun, but it'll never be as genuine as Yahtzee and James because especially in recent years, both feel very earnest, and that wins big points by me.
Also has a wife and kids so that'll soften anyone
The way Yahtzee describes the whole "quirky random lol" strand of video game comedy is absolutely spot on
Yeah it's been insufferable and the same for like a decade, TV shows do it too.
it is really is the first quirky random lol strand type video game
I am strangely reminded of Dr. Diablerie.
Also kind of explains modern humor too.
Let's try and think of classic Yahtze term for it
I didn't think "or knitting" would be the ZP joke to get me that hard but man was that delivery good.
Glad it got you hard
So... what else gets you hard?
"Or harvesting retinas from unwanted shelter animals..."
".........."
*longer pause*
"Or knitting :)"
*VIOLENT HEAVY METAL*
What this guy said. Yes.
And thats how you do the 'borderlands humor' formula correctly, short and with a good punchline
He'd never admit it, but his last joke would fit in a Borderlands script.
That...that was the point...
@@AngryGerbils and yet, it was the only thing I exhaled at.
@@lunalesombras1150 Wandered here from the do it yourself ice pick lobotomies videos didn't you?
I honestly can't help but feel his whole comedic style is pretty much the exact formula he described.
I think Yahtzee would admit it, and might go as far as saying all of ZP could fit the formula for Borderlands's "jokes." He started ZP in his late teens, when his sense of humor was different, and he thought a trilby was both a quality substitute for an interesting personality and a distinguished way to hide the early male pattern baldness.
If you throw a self-deprecating comment or a non-sequitur on the end of that, you get a Borderlands joke. It writes itself.
I believe Yahz might think he does the formula better, though, and I think I'd agree.
0:38 Holy crap, he's right. That sounds exactly like something out of Borderlands.
I know right? He absolutely nailed it
I could actually hear that with Tiny Tinas voice in my head and the last BL game I played was 2. That formula also feels a lot like Big Bang Theory.
Unironically followed up with a turbo-charged tirade involving inflating a person with farts until they float away and enjoying it. Yahtzee is brilliant, but I feel like he's missing the point that Borderlands comedy is preeeeeeeeetty similar to his own.
@@BlueProphet7 the delivery and context is very different though. Invariably, jokes in Borderlands games don’t land. There’s some good ones, and there’s a general sense of ‘comedy’ that I don’t mind at all, but I enjoy Borderlands for the gameplay and the world building. In BL2, I think these two were strong. BL1 basically lacked a story and after BL2 the world building was definitely weaker.
@@BlueProphet7 there is a huuuuge difference. Jesus christ
0:12 I love how the beginning has Yahtzee sum up exactly why he hates Borderlands writing in a quick nutshell.
There are some good jokes in there, but for every actually good joke, there's 9 - 99 bad ones.
Honest it reminds me of a lot of video games, like Sunset Overdrive and those stupid webcomics like Penny Arcade. Basically anyone trying to be meta and internetty
Becaus it's doing the same type of comedy he is?
@@simple-commentator-not-rea7345 no, not really
@@simple-commentator-not-rea7345 Sure man, Yahtzee is definitely "lol quirky so random"
Honestly I want them to hire Yahtzee as the next main villain of a borderlands game as both voice actor and writer. That would make it a lot better.
Nah, Let him be the Villain, write his own lines & responses to the world/characters.
The contrast would kill. He'd be a villain with so much genuine disdain for the protagonist & chatty psychos, corporations, etc
Honestly, I feel like swapping out the seamlessly-interconnected open world for a more abstract representative overworld is the way a lot of open-world games should go. After all, you can devote more detail to the actual level-spaces by freeing up devtime otherwise vored by making an open world. And of course, scrapping the seamless four-digit square-footage not only respects the time of the devs, but also the time of the players, since you can easily trim the dead air in-between the other areas, meaning that while there's less game-time, there's a much better killer-to-filler ratio.
Fair, but then discovery is less of a thing.
It's a lot less impressive to discover an overworld map dot because you changed the camera angle, than it is to make a trek through a forest maze and find a cave of wonders.
YMMV on whether you care, but I do, and it's the reason I prefer immersive worlds over overworlds, at least if they have an actual open world. The games that have
interconnected "worlds" that are illusions to hide the meandering rail tunnel (looking at you FF10/13) can go meander themselves.
Please never use "vored" in casual conversation again.
It was an interesting opinion up until you said "killer-to-filler ratio". If you want an endless hack-and-slash, there are so many amazing games that can oblige. The whole point of an open-world is to get away from games that think fun gameplay is uninterrupted hours of combat.
Personally it depends, if the game is fun and you can actually get lost doing side objectives.. go Open World
If you got a "Open World" that gameplay sucks, it feels shoddy or for some bizarre reason want to tell a cinematic story in a open world game, that wheb rat tunnels is good.
How torn up were you when tumblr committed suicide?
I remember laughing at Borderlands' humour as a teenager. Now, I'm in my twenties and the relationship is less cordial.
Everyone goes through that phase where they'll consistently laugh at a string of obscure words rapidly spoken. Then you get old and context matters. Nothing's funny in a vacuum.
I still laugh at it in my 20s because I am a simple man with a simple humor
I felt the same way about Dane Cook, and it's not a comparison you want to make
Shit back in 2012 the game either had me laughing or contemplate the nearest bridge. I really wish that they stuck to the original Borderlands style where it was fairly serious but ridiculous like the first two SAINTS row games
Ashe is fairly funny, I do like the insane way she tends to describe things. But in the Borderlands series there's a decent character for every 20 shit characters unfortunately. BL3 was really fucking cringe worthy, they were really pushing the "joke must be funny eventually if I keep repeating it" mentality.
A borderlands game that Yatzhee didn't completely hate, now that's something I've never expected.
It’s more he ran out of hate and now can just say it’s not as shit as the last one
yeah, I bought it after this comparatively glowing review :)
@@StevenLong gotta wonder if you guys watched the whole thing or are just being sarcastic.
I might be an idiot and you guys are just being sarcastic… but sometimes you can’t tell.
@@maninblack3410 it's mostly a joke. It's his most glowing borderlands review and I bought it already.
Do all the jokes land? No. But not all the jokes from Differently Morphous landed either. But I enjoy both. 😁
@@nyxvalentine809 Even in that regard it’s still pretty surprising
I really loved OG Borderlands' tone, being that of a broken dystopia where cynical humor was used to prevent things from getting too depressing. Borderlands 2 hit a solid middle ground between cynical dystopia and over the top idiocy that made it enjoyable. Problem was that Tiny Tina was such a popular character that Gearbox decided to let her tone define the series ever since, and it's just difficult for me to enjoy. I had to force myself through the pre-sequel, and I haven't finished 3 yet because I just don't care.
Less that and more, they changed writers.
The dude(Burch) who worked on 2 & Tales only outlined the Pre-Sequel. 2K Australia did the rest.
Burch didn't work on BL3.
I wouldn't say Tina set the tone, more so the overall praise of BL2 decided that'd be the tone moving forward.
Even with the antagonists of BL3, You can see they're trying to emulate Handsom Jack again.
@@KrodaStagg I think Jack is possibly the most inexplicably popular villain in gaming history. Yes, he's quite often reasonably funny, but that's because he's TRYING to be funny because he's convinced he's so cool and witty and awesome, when he's actually one of the most evil villains I think I've ever seen in a game, which is something so many people seem to overlook because "LOL he bought a diamond pony and called it 'Butt Stallion'!" He's absolutely vile to his core, with even what would normally be considered a possible redeeming feature (his supposed love for his daughter) being completely subverted by what a self-absorbed and sociopathtic monster he is (his daughter hates him so much that she'd rather die than have anything to do with him and her dying words are "Dad... you're an asshole!"). Mind you, I never played any game after 2 (and I never actually finished 2 either, as much as I REALLY wanted to kill Jack, it was just dragging out too long and wearing me down, so I just... stopped), so I don't know if they gave him any further characterisation, but I find it impossible to believe that ANYTHING could make me not hate his guts down to the last molecule.
@@KrodaStagg Honestly, for me, Handsome Jack is the reason I stopped playing Borderlands 2. The fact that he couldn't shut the fuck up and kept trying to shove the lame Butt Stallion joke down my ear ground me down until I couldn't go on.
@@CroatInAKilt but that was basically the best part of handsome jack. The dude taunted you through out the game and made you love to hate him haha
@@ArcaneAzmadi that's what's called a problematic fav. You can think Jack's funny AND an evil asshole.
To answer your quandary though, they try to redeem Jack by basically making everyone around him awful. There's a sidequest to "rescue" his mother but you find out Jack is the one who hired the people that killed them and he just wanted you to have to look at his "work" of getting revenge on her. The main characters as well as others are shown to betray Jack in Tales and Pre-Sequel. It doesn't *REALLY* make what he did okay but it's at least supposed to give you a better idea of why he's so fucked up and give motivation for why it seems so personal in BL2 when he's doing shit like mutating homeboy's bird so one is forced to kill the other.
Stuffed Snorlax’s carrying AR’s is my new favorite ZP visual.
Excuse me you beautiful plebeian, those are H&K UMP45 Submachine guns.
I've played through the first Borderlands recently and it may become my favorite of the series just for its aesthetic alone. Back then, the vault was just a legend that few people thought was actually real and Pandora was a desolate wasteland of a planet that would drive its inhabitants insane just from being there. It took it's story and characters much more seriously while still having that quirky, dark humor that's just lazily spewed out in these later games. You see it more in the DLC's , they're hilarious. Also S&S made the BEST guns!
"My favourite Borderlands game."
Ladies and gentlemen, we got him.
I don't know if this is a joke or you're the problem
You cherry picked that line just like EA. :P
See, I'm trying to tell from context clues which borderlands he disliked the least.
@@dac314 Probably the first Borderlands in historical context, it's aged like shit though.
@@hoagielamp6543 yeah, I always thought Game 2 was the best overall, but he seems to rag on it, and be more hate-neutral to game 3.
So the subtitles mentions "laying the cultural foundations for ethnic genocide" instead of the harvesting retina at the end. I'm really curious how that happened, and the person or AI making the subtitles thought that it is a better or worst thing?
Seems you got a peek behind the editing curtain. I guess that original line was toned down at some point
@@NobodyEvenReadsNames Yeah, i kinda knew that is the most reasonable (boring) explanation: Yahtzee changed it but the subs were made with an older draft. I was just hoping some AI shenanigans.
On the other hand, i' don't know if it was toned down. I mean sure animals "just" animals not humans, and PETA kills them by the dozens as far as i know (i mean animals, at least for now), but still, many animals are cute, and we love them. On the other hand ethnic genocides doesn't seems to bother people too much nowadays, if it happens far enough.
Trust me, nobody wants anyone bringing up the subject of genocide. The worst possible comments section is the only possible result.
@@HUNbullseye i think it's a refuge in audacity kind of thing; the retina harvesting, while still horrific, is also absurd, while the genocide thing... not so much.
I think they're both allusions to the Russian invasion if the Ukraine. Like 300 dogs starved to death due to siege blocking food imports and, potentially, their caretakers being killed. That news drops right about the same time as the "the Russians killed a bunch of civilians execution style while they withdrew from regions to regroup". Given Yahtzee's dark humor he may have been unsure which to go with and so instead did both to help soldify the allusion.
"...or knitting." Aww, he has softened up! Don't worry, Yahtzee, you can still do plenty of damage in a moment's notice with knitting needles. Or the yarn if you're creative.
Using the Needlekind strife specibus
ZP is a special kind of wonderful to get in an “I may be some time” joke with a disembodied finger.
What does that mean
And how is your comment a week old if this video has only been out for an hour
@@goodsocksproductions9397 reference to the Captain Scott expedition to the South Pole. One of the men by the name of Oates felt that he was slowing the return journey through illness and injury so committed suicide by leaving the tent into a blizzard and his last words were "I'm going for a walk and I may be some time."
@@goodsocksproductions9397 My comment was carried over from the early-access posting of the video, probably. I don't keep track, I just watch ZP whenever Yahtzee graces us with his snarkwisdom.
Just the quiet "...Or knitting." At the end had me laughing far harder than it should've.
I will die on this hill that Borderlands 2 was peak in Borderlands humor. It striked a balance between absurd humor and playing things completely straight faced. Subsequent games in the franchise progressively went too far into the absurdist direction that at times made the game frustrating. An example is the Boner Farts side quest in BL2 and the side quest where you get a coffee in BL3. The infamous Boner Farts quest is funny because Hammerlock gets more and more angrier when his suggested names keep getting rejected for his almanac so he just calls the Bullymong, Boner Farts. There's build up to it and takes an absurd left turn. The joke of the coffee side quest in Borderlands 3 is it takes a long time to get a coffee and the barista being snarky and insufferable. That's not a joke, that's at best an exaggerated observation.
Thank you for telling me which hill you are on. The mortar shells will begin falling on you presently.
As an American, that's sadly our humor in a nutshell, it starts great but then it never knows when to stop until and it circles right around into being unfunny. Like the Office US.
There are still some jokes in bl2 that aged poorly (e.g. all the 2012 meme references) but it’s still miles ahead of anything bl3 did
Handsome jack having a sidequest where he'll literally just pay you if you kill yourself is peak humor for the series
I think you need to replay it. The humor was funny to me as a young teen when it came out but go back today and it’s just as bad as today’s games
"Lowered the cringe to a tolerable background level". What's a greatly written line 😆
And accurate to in regards to 3, cause holy fuck was it Cringe O' Clock, when it wasn't half past Contrived.
Even years later, every time he says pawn shop I briefly mishear it as porn shop.
Oh, wait, is THAT what he said? I completely misheard it as the latter.
Not joking, I really did think he said porn shop.
@@Obversechaos You'll love his Animal Crossing: New Leaf review then. It's where the meme began.
The intro nailed Borderlands dialogue humor. Although my partner and I think it's fun, Borderlands humor is very much a like it or hate it dichotomy.
I only played the Second game before I got bored but I will admit, the dialogue wasn’t the worst thing about it. It’s not great but I expected it to age poorly and came away surprised that it was decent.
Not funny mind you as it’s very much “12-year-olds attempting stand-up” but not cringy to where I needed to seek a chiropractor, much to their disappointment.
Honeslty its really a love it or hate it.
With my reference for borderlands humor being the entire concept that is "Face McShooty":
I put borderlands humour squarely within "the Marmite zone": you will ether find it an enjoyable thing despite being in desperate need of some toast to spread it on (which one could argue Handsome Jack provides well enough) or you will devote you body and soul to LOTHING it
As for me... eh obviously not high art but sometimes mindless fun is just what you need
Not true at all. BL1 was kind of funny, BL2 made an effort to be funny and was actually a fucking riot. PRE SEQUEL was actually fucking funny. BL3 was fucking TERRIBLE. awful. Unfunny garbage.
Wonderlands? Unfunny garbage. A committee of writers who were hired purely on their resume.
@@combativeThinker my other half is nb, and prefers that title.
That has got to be, without a doubt, the long pause I've ever heard from Yahtzee
It felt like those moments where a person is being emotional and then stops talking and you wonder if they are about to cry and panic because you were not prepared at all for it
There was a "games I didn't do a ZP" on this year when BL3 came out, had a much longer pause (for reasons)
It was unsettling
The summarization of BL humor was so on point, wow. Although I admit that... I laugh, sue me. Also, the auto equip mechanic explanation works for pretty much any game with that functionality, which makes it even more hilarious
I think there's a weird disconnect over quality that's often lost in the sea of things, particularly as time goes on. Just because something isn't peak comedy or high art constantly all the time forever doesn't mean it can't be *entertaining* for a brief time. It doesn't make it *good* by an objective measure, but it can still be fun and satisfying. And you can still laugh at bad jokes and horribly written dialogue, it just is less likely to grab you.
Like, I can *enjoy* eating at Taco Bell, but I wouldn't dare claim that it's a good restaurant or that anything I ingested there qualified as *food.* Nor that I wouldn't vastly prefer something else, though on occasion much like a Call to the Void, one *does* crave something... familiar and trashy. Sorry, this went on a bit and got navel-gazey.
Yeah, the Borderlands style of comedy may be dumb and formulaic, but "dumb and formulaic" isn't always automatically a bad thing if that particular dumb formula works for you. And I'll agree - Borderlands does occasionally get a chuckle or smirk out of me, dumb and formulaic as it is. And in the end, that's really all that matters.
People who hate on Borderlands humor are sorta stuck-up imo. In some cases it feels performative as if they want everyone to know that their sense of humor is sooooo developed and complex. sorta ironic considering comedy was traditionally looked down on as a form of art. it's OK for things to be silly!
The silent resignation before "or knitting" just fucking got me. So perfect. 😆
The first red flag I got when I first met my roommate was when he told me he thought that borderlands was funny. The second was the moldy cheesecake that's sat on his desk for the better part of 2 weeks...
Yahtzee knitting stream when?
2:35 made me do a huge belly laugh. Thank you!
This ruined me
"... make me want to break wind into the mouths of the writers and not stop until they can be used as dirigibles."
God, what a tremendously on theme joke for a Borderlands game.
I could actually see this happen in these games. Fart into the mouths of the writers of this game until they swell up into floating balloons and hand them over to this video game critic that gave you the quest so they can take the writer fart balloons to a 4th Wall themed theme park.
i think u may like the new final fantasy spin-off since the main character hates all the long dialogue and punches everyone.
I find this review to be broadly positive.
Just like your STI screening panel!
@@mitchellhouser1572 Jokes on you! Don't need to screen for STI's when I don't have sex!
Love the use of the kids car rug as the map
Wow, you perfectly described the humor of these games.
"I hated it a lot less than i tough i would" It's a Yahtzee 9/10, people!
that's the nicest thing he's ever said about any game, so you know it's good.
Buzz buzz
I was not prepared to chuckle as i did at the image of a gang of snorlax plushies wielding smgs blasting at a bored yahtzee in a gun battle. Thank you again for the great laughs over all these years you glorious bastard!
Got a legit laugh out loud too from ‘Teeny Wonders Tittybar’ 😂
Wow. That 'go through that door' line felt like it was ripped straight from Borderlands 2. I can still here scooter's voice.
😂 My partner and I disagreed on the ZP for Arceus. He said it was really harsh, and I thought it was quite favourable for a ZP. Love to see my opinion shared.
I got to write that what makes Tiny Tina so effective as a character is the voice work from Ashly Burch.
Who also voices Aloy.
Damn I found her voice to be nails on a chalk board…
Oh yeah that chick who stole Rise from Laura Bailey.
oh yeah she's Enid
It's very odd to see the direction the lives of both Ashly and Anthony Burch have taken since "Hey Ash, Whatcha Playin?". Ashly is a recognised and popular voice actor, while Anthony is a meme for his wife actually cucking him and taking the Wii U with her.
5:11
This amount of silence in a Zero Punctuation episode made me supremely uncomfortable. Far more unsettling than the eyeball harvesting
All the gross and nasty jokes are friggin dime a dozen but the silence was like the kind of thing you use on a elder god to make it cry like a anime girl on prom night.
To this day, I say the best Borderlands game is still Tales of the Borderlands.
It’s amazing how you can get a really interesting story in that world when you’re not trying to be a sci-fi version of Commando reimagined by a TikToker.
The finger gun battle was a masterpiece
@@UnagiTempura OH YEAH! I remember that.
My personal favorite was when they were trying to sabotage a car while the executive was busy trying to calibrate the gun he had.
@@KrodaStagg I did that.
The game is too boring for that.
Dude Borderlands predates TikTok by like eleventy centuries....
I can never get over how they butchered the Tales characters for Borderlands 3. Like how they took the incredibly simple concept of "Vaughn is weirdly ripped but is still a massive nerd" and went "Ahh, right, so he's obsessed with fitness, got it."
"He's basically just a normal guy in over his head"
"Ahh, so he's yet another comically psychotic over-the-top raider, got it!"
I vote we create a new measurement of social interaction involvement, the Tiny Tina/Aloy scale.
…since apparently it’s the same voice actor for both
The first rule I learned when I was learning a welder was "Fake it, til you make it".
Literally burst out laughing at the angry Yahtzee face
That last gag got me. I ain't even ashamed to admit it. My silly shields were down and you nailed me square in the balls Yahtz! I was about to click the next video and I hear this tiny voice go "...or knitting" and I just lost it.
I never really grasped Borderlands’ humour, and Yahtzee’s opening here I think explained to me why.
It also made me realise I use that kind of humour excessively. Guess we’re all the most critical of our own sins, huh?
Daymm that's deep
Eyyyyy, why you in my boat to? Lol
Well I haven't played every borderlands game but I would argue Tales from the Borderlands has the best dialogue
"My favourite Borderlands game!"
-Zero Punctuation
Still gonna say that i loved Pokemon Legends Arceus.
Aside from that, the last joke made laugh so damn hard XD
People who find Borderlands funny mystify me. The first game had its moments and I laughed exactly once playing Borderlands 2 so I knew I was never playing them again. I don't count Tales from the Borderlands because people who cared and had something to say made that game (under the surface you realise Hyperion is just the Telltale company as viewed by the people working there).
The first game, IMO, was genuinely funny when it came out because it took itself relatively seriously and actually had characters that lent themselves to humorous situations without being the source of it.
General Knoxx is where the absurdist, over the top comedy vibes that would eventually define Borderlands started coming to the forefront but it worked there because Knoxx was the eternal straight man to everything going on around him.
That's really what Borderlands lacks, is intelligent characters that could easily fit into any other story having to deal with being in Borderlands. There is no straight man in Borderlands 2. It's just a bunch of wacky psychopaths quipping at each other. Even the characters that were straight men in Borderlands 1 (like Tannis) become haha look at the funny personality quirk in 2.
The way they deal with the ocean is the best plot point in the entire game.
It's always kinda funny to hear Yahtzee's take on Borderlands series considering he never actually finished the objectively best Borderlands 2.
Or maybe Borderlands 2 just wasn't particularly good either, in his opinion.
@Mister Mister honestly after playing the game for years I can definitely understand getting bored with the game, there’s only so many times you can slog through it and not notice how uneventful it can feel.
@Mister Mister Yeah, the gameplay might have some novelty on the first playthourgh, trying to do replays of the games with new characters/builds makes me realize how linear (or should I say samey) the game /sidequests are despite the huge maps
If BL2 was the "objectively best" one then I'm glad I gave up on the series after playing BL2 for a few hours and deciding I'd rather listen to 1877Kars4Kids on an infinite loop in a Guantanamo Bay detention cell than have it take up space on my hard drive for another minute. "It gets good later" isn't enough to go on when the first few hours of gameplay show nothing redeemably interesting
The only one of the 3 I've played more than once is one. Two is a slog and 3 is too
That "borderlands method" part after the intro was incredibly accurate.
You know its gonna be a good video if it starts with that level of absolutely annihilation
It's a looter shooter that doesn't feel like it's taking itself too seriously and isn't trying to milk me for every cent after I already bought it. 10 stars
How the bar has fallen.
And yet, it still has a season pass.
@@Nekomancer1983 ? Thats like saying every game that has a season pass is bad battle pass sure but most SP are usually discounted (only like 5-10$ though) from buying dlc one by one.
@@coryyoung7544 It's still fucking bad no matter how you dress that shit up.
@@noisekeeper how so?
If you know your going to like a game and put a good amount of hrs playing it its just factually cheaper to buy the season pass.
Only argument I think you could make is if its not enough content to warrant being a dlc like dark souls 3s 1st which was really small or something like skyrim's hearth fire or fallout nvg's gun runner dlc but that's more about what the minimum amount should be in any given dlc.
I believe Borderlands is the only game series that improves by two-three fold whenever you mute the dialogue in sound options and turn off subtitles. Except when you are playing Krieg from the 2nd game, I think a sane man sick of being trapped in a body that spews out random profanities for no reason and all the time perfectly captures the experience of being the player in a Borderlands game.
Okay, even for you that ending was pretty dark.
"or knitting" + My Tea = spitting like a firehose and RIP my keyboard.
Devastating. Well played sir.
I definitely enjoyed my time with Tiny Tina's Wonderlands *a lot* more than I enjoyed Borderlands 3, in fact I endured Borderlands 3. Having finished the story I'm now waiting for the DLC and some friends to play it with for a second go-around.
Wonderlands is eveyrhing i liked about 3 without the stuff i hated.
@@KrodaStagg that character was already gay
@@KrodaStagg "forcing gayness" yall do realize gay people do exist, right?
That there are more than just straight people in the world?
Saying that they "forced gayness" sounds about as lame as "forcing straightness" on people.
@@SteelDawn7 Sadly, they do
@@KrodaStagg TBH, I feel like Jakobs was a good gay character. Being gay isn't the focal point of his character, it was a detail that made him a bit more interesting.
"I leave it to personal taste whether the self-aware comedic tone ameliorates the dullness of the grind or only worsens it somehow."
Looks like someone forgot about Sacred 3.
I feel there was a bit of a shift in *how* dialogue was written in this game that feels a lot closer to how Borderlands 2 presented its shenanigans. Not much fundamentally changed between the writing of 3 and TTW, but instead more just how scenarios are presented, and how characters react to them. Borderlands 3 had this awful obsession with winking at the camera every time something even mildly wAcKy happened on screen, but TTW rolls with the "cringe" of it all a lot smoother, which helps fit the narrative that the wasteland is just this weird and wild place, and all the weirdness is just something people live with in this world. Still not that funny, but I could respect its sincerity enough for it not to drag the gameplay down too much.
Tales from the Borderlands and Borderlands 3 I really did feel that way...
Wacky but not always funny...
Love that we call it a wasteland... For five fucking games now. Despite this one taking place on a tabletop and 3 taking place in several "worlds". Gearbox should just pack it in.
Yeah, the gameplay in BL3 is still mostly fun (especially co-op) but it definitely is trying way too hard to be "wacky lol random xD", its better jokes are usually the environmental details and things like that.
This type of "comedy" which is described by Yahtzee through the whole video reminds me a lot of - "The Typical Comedy Anime, With Long Name Describing The Plot And You Don't Understand Why Everyone Likes It". Yeah, let's talk about that: Why It didn't makes me laugh? Why the maximum thing of me, from watching almost all comedy anime is a little one grinning through the whole season? Maybe I just can't understand this type of humour? It's the type of comedy, which makes only laugh poor assembly line anime makers after 23 hours of hard work? Or it's just all around bad comedy? Please, help me to understand, my dudes!
I think the first thing you have to consider is that any comedy anime is written by Japanese people, for Japanese people. There are sufficient cultural differences that not all the jokes are going to land for non-Japanese audiences at best, and at worst just aren't going to even going to appear to be comedy. A good example is manzai, a 2-person setup where one straight man (boke) feeds lines into the responder (tsukkomi), which often relies quite a bit on misunderstandings (because the Japanese language is a nightmare of interpretation, and a single phrase might have half a dozen possible meanings) which is pretty reminiscent of British comedy acts going back to the music halls (see Morecambe and Wise for a fairly modern example, which you can actually find footage of)
I liked Wonderlands. First Borderlands game that I enjoyed since the first one.
I just imagine the developers saying “we are not funny , how do we make it funny?! YES, I GOT IT! Make Tiny Tina scream constantly in a forced annoying voice this way they have to think it’s funny!
that pause at the end there might have been the longest in ZP history where there was still some speech after it. The longest pause without that qualifier was also for a borderlands game actually.
The Borderlands brand of humor is just Homestuck brand humor for the newer age.
They’re about the same vintage. The OG Borderlands came out about the same time Homestuck dropped. It’s like a snapshot at a particular brand of Internet humor of the late 00s to early 10s.
…at least homestuck more frequently uses purely visual gags and actual slapstick
That last line was honestly funnier than anything I've ever heard in a Borderlands game. Bravo.
Or knitting
The visual of a foggy cloud surrounding borderlands with the text "HA?" floating in it is just wonderful.
Yahtzee has finally broken down! That depressed pause before "or knitting" killed me xwx
Well after a life of seen something he love so much videogame, becoming these depressing thing, that no longer give you anything, maybe he i getting old, and ust dont care, i kind of understand how he feel
@@Krysnha I think that or having to play the drivel that would count as Cruel and Ususual Torture if you forced Prisoners to grind in say Avengers live service game.
@@Subject_Keter Same thing, i remember when he critizie the gaming industry in hunt down for Freemen show how is he feeling now
Yahtzee has a talent of creating mocking names that sound kind of awesome. "Teeny's Wonder Titty Bar" sounds like the kind of spot you come across in the middle of nowhere on a road trip that is either the setting for the next "Hills have Eyes" movie or an amazing venue that will has enough self awareness that it just adds to the atmosphere and creates memories that will last a life time... Well I suppose the first option would also create memories that would last a life time but it would be a much shorter life time.
I'll be honest chap, vocalising 'Tiny Tina's Underpants' may have seen you placed on a list
There is nothing wrong with channeling your rage into knitting. Its more productive than most things, and you can make cool hats.
There's a certain irony of a bloke who is known for talking lots, complaining about characters that talk too much.
I love how the borderlands method of comedy writing unintentional describes my first impressions on most humans in a semisocial setting... And how i execute humor when anxious as a coping mechanism.
Your opening summary of the comedy style of Borderlands is PERFECT. It's unbelievably sophomoric and forced. I thought they were hilarious when I was 20, but absolutely can't stomach their writing at 30
I must say the visuals and overall quality of this episode makes it a standout for me.
Fun jokes that lay naturally in to the review and the review not only criticizing gameplay but the non gameplay moments like writing, visuals, and player emotions.
Love it~
Criticizes borderlands dialogue; has been using the same criticism technique for years
2 seconds is quite the world record of a pause. Borderlands can take notes from Yahtzee
Short version: personal preference rules the day when all is said and done. Simple as that.
Longer Version:
Given that I love comedy, specific characters that were put into the game as others, the references put into the game, Tina, and the Borderlands franchise, and have over 500 hours between 2 and TPS, around 850 adding in 3, I uh.... yeah, this game is awesome for me, it's my personal taste, especially since I also love 5e DnD... so... yeah. Given that you basically said 'it is your personal taste in the end' makes me very happy, because that's what game reviews don't tell you, a game can be complete shit, or it can be the same game as the first with a new gimmick (both Borderlands AND Pokemon fall into this category) and still love it, even with it all spoiled (see gen 7's release), it's all down to personal preference at the end of the day now isn't it?
Even longer addition to the long version to help make my point, using some games I play and know:
I fall into the latter category, I have a specific level of standards, and well... if the gameplay, story or otherwise feels like shit, I ain't playing it. Simple as that. I don't even care about graphics, I just care about gameplay at the end of the day, and Borderlands, Pokemon, and even Fire Emblem, Ace Attorney, and Etrian Odyssey are satisfying gameplay loops, why do you think Pokemon is on Gen 9 and has... at least 4 or 5 spinoff titles, minimum? Depending on how you count it, Etrian Odyssey has 5, 2 remakes of games 1 and 2, and a major "celebration title" and the Persona Q1 and Q2 titles, and even Etrian Mystery Dungeons, also having a 1 and 2 title, which ups the count to... counting all of them individually, to 12 (They changed stuff in the remakes including a story mode, which is not really present in 1-5 or any other title, it's more the "FF1"-style of "generic characters that go and save the world. With an Emphasis on map making."
Quick Fire Emblem Anecdote:
Oh and Fire Emblem, not counting warriors, I believe has 15 games, 2 of which are remakes, and we've only gotten 7 of the last 8 -no translation for "Mystery of the Emblem."
Looping back to Borderlands:
Oh and Borderlands has 4 mainline games, a "card-based boardgame" and a spinoff, no one is playing these games expecting something groundbreaking and new, we go in expecting the same old thing we always have.
To Yahtzee:
So... yeah, you're not hard on this one (haha, I said "hard on") because it isn't bad, it's just personal preference, and you don't like this game, but you like it slightly more than the others.
Knitting is a lovely hobby.
borderlands is my favorite game series that is also very bad that nobody should play
I laughed at the same gag, both because it was hilarious but also because it was a throwback to the borderlands 2 DLC that started this.
I wouldn't have remembered the reference at all if I hadn't just replayed the standalone of that DLC they put out a few months back.
Also Mr. Torque is by far my favourite character
Its allways been very strange to me that he doesn't like borderlands humor, because his own humor is very similar. Then again, that might be why.
0:23
All current adult animated sitcoms in a nutshell
Borderlands becomes much more tolerable once you find the mute button.
"A heady mixture of high impact violence and data validation."
🤣🤣🤣
Holy shit that's exactly what Borderlands is...
It's still hard to believe that Tiny Tina has the same voice actress as Aloy.
I'm sorry who has the same what as WHAT?!
I'm going to be thinking of this fact every time I play Horizon from now on. o__o'
I appreciate that little beat of self awareness before the “or nitting” line
Yahtzee not completely hating it is probably the tipping point in getting me to try it. I've always disliked the series for feeling extra generic under it's very transparent mask of poorly executed lol randomness and that's from someone who likes lol random humor. Always had a soft spot for Tina though and I love D&D.
The combat options and builds are actually pretty cool too. I've got a character who duel wields spells and the guns are set dressing and a necromancer that just destroys things with a claymore.
5:20 ah, a good trope. "Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick" is a classic.
If Yahtzee says “I didn’t hate it”, it must be a contender for game of the year
You know he’s going to take revenge for you saying that.
"Didn't hate it as much as I thoughy I would"- Yahtzee, Zero Punctuation.
Hurrrgghh. My daughter is currently playing this game and it's just....hell. I came to watch this video so I could nod sullenly.
I had grown to really dislike the writing and characters of the borderlands series after greatly enjoying the telltale games version; Tales from the Borderlands. I actually felt something for the characters in that spin-off more than I ever did in the trilogy which had some good moments but just smothered by the annoying trying too hard to be funny/cool parts.
Same thing happened to me played that telltale game first before boderlands 2 and was disappointed
I think the reason why the humor in the first borderlands is good the first time we played it is the humor hops up during an overall dark atmosphere.
There is a certain hilarious irony to Yahtzee breaking down the Borderlands joke method, then at the very end of the video following up with one of his own repeated joke formulas.
Step 1: say something normal
Step 2: say something really edgy or messed up
Step 3: intentional pause
Step 4: say something normal for comedic effect
Visual gags are usually the way to go.
Ah, Tiny Tina: the character that cretins thought was a memorable, hilarious character because they think 'child swears' is the peak of comedic writing
No, a memorable personality and occasional improvised acting from a competent voice actress is. Okay, maybe not necessarily the "peak of comedy", but at least a good direction to take. And Tiny Tina (along with Claptrap and Hammerlock) arguably had that at least in previous games. Tales from the Borderlands is where things started to drop
True tho I liked what they did in the proto version of this game in the BL2 dlc and it's slowly revealed to be her coping mechanism for dealing with Roland's death. The ending and her coming to terms with it is probably the best character moment in the series imo
4:20, good lord my Nostalgia. Lufia 2 for the SNES had that. Use the tools for solving puzzles in the dungeons to shoot the enemies (who will generate a “random encounter” when you touch them) to stun them for a few steps, so if you don’t want to deal with that bullshit OR attack their sprite from behind for a free ambush round, you can do that.
Unfortunately the difficulty scaling AND money scaling in the game meant unless you murdered EVERY random encounter in a dungeon at least one time, you’d be nerfed on levels and be scraping through the discount bin at the next shop in the next town you stopped by before diving into the next dungeon.
Still a REALLY fun game though.
I'M FAST AS FUCK BOYEEEE
Comedy in the sense that Owen Wilson is an actor actually made me laugh out loud for the first time in a while. Thanks.