Given the episodic nature of Guardians of the Galaxy, each review for each episode will just showcase its fun factor score. Once all five episodes are out, a proper full review, with WTMG’s good ol’ traditional scoresheet, will be revealed. For now, enjoy the first episode!

Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy was a nice theme for Telltale games to tackle, given how everybody loved the banter and the dialogue the movies offered us. With the first episode finally out (and the second episode coming out in a few days, sorry about the delay), just how entertaining is Star-Lord’s adventure so far?

I’ll try to make this as spoiler-free as possible, but be assured that Thanos isn’t the main bad guy in this story, or at least in this episode. That would have been kind of a bold move, given how this game isn’t set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This time around, Star-Lord and crew are fighting against a Kree called Hala the Accuser for the possession of this week’s new super important McGuffin (which will most likely be way more important in the next episodes) in an episode that features alien temple explorations, drinking in bars, flashbacks, and weirdly (and “awesomely”) enough, a licensed soundtrack containing songs from artists like Hall & Oates, Buzzcocks and Electric Light Orchestra.

 

The voice acting, as you should expect, is pretty good. Nolan North (aka the guy who’s in every game ever) did a fantastic job as Rocket, bringing back his best work from the time he was Deadpool mixed with Bradley Cooper’s portrayal of the furry freak. Everyone else’s voice acting was also good, but North’s portrayal of Rocket easily takes the cake.

One good thing about this episode was that it allowed for every single hero (except Groot, who was, well, busy during this episode) to have enough time for a bit of character development. Gamora had her moment, Quill had lots of moments, and so did Drax and Rocket. There was a fine mix of both drama and hilarity, but given the fact this was the first episode, there weren’t many decision-making moments. We’ll likely see a lot more crucial decisions and forks in the road popping up in future episodes.

However, this episode was far from flawless, as its gameplay was, well, not that enjoyable. For starters, Tangled Up in Blue was quite short, being beatable in less than two hours. Even for an episodic series, it would be nice to see a little more content per episode. And exploration opportunities were rather lacking in this episode, with the exception of the initial area. The episode relied heavily on quick-time events and linear sections, with little room for more open areas for you to explore or the actual point-and-click gameplay that Telltale games are known for. Thankfully enough, the QTE’s weren’t punishing or hard to pull off, and the dialogue was entertaining enough to keep me invested. Here’s to hoping that the next episodes feature better gameplay and more content than this one.

Tangled Up in Blue was a nice set-up for the future episodes, and provided some delightful laughs every once in a while. But, in the end, it was just that. A set-up. There were some bold decisions from Telltale’s side regarding the story’s development that were actually interesting, and moments of dialogue that were funny and engaging. But overall this episode, as a standalone experience, was very brief and quite uninteresting in some bits. Let’s just hope the other episodes deliver more in the gameplay department, while continuing to be funny!

Be sure to check out Episode II, Under Pressure, and its review, coming soon!

Reviewed on PS4
Also available on: Xbox One, PC, Android, iOS