Tales From the Borderlands Episode 3 is Action Packed

Even though I love big RPG's with a strong story and enthralling characters, sometimes it's nice to take a break.  Simple point-and-click story games have earned themselves a special place in my gaming library and are worth playing.  Tales From the Borderlands has become my fun little escape from the heavy content that I usually play.  Each new episode gets better and better.

(This is where the spoilers begin.)

Episode three starts off with our slightly inept heroes being trapped in the Atlas facility where they were searching for the mysterious Gortys project.  The story involves them trying to figure out what exactly Gortys does.  This episode had a lot of action--many gunfights and great, but still sort of goofy, action sequences.  There are a lot of cameo's by the characters from the Borderlands series--Athena, who seemed like she was pursuing the group earlier actually saves their bacon and joins in, while Brick and Mordecai show up later.  Gortys, which seems like nothing but a small metal ball, turns out to be a cute little robot!  Once the group has managed to escape from the Atlas facility, Gortys informs them that there are other locations with parts that can upgrade it and could possibly lead to a vault.  It then points them in the general direction where they need to search.

The opening title sequence features another great musical entry that I enjoyed.  One of the big plot points involves Rhys choosing whether to listen to Handsome Jack or ignore him.  Seriously?  Why would you trust that whack job?  I opted to not trust Jack....this could be a bad decision.  After a long trek across Pandora the group arrives at another hidden Atlas base that seems to be some sort of weird agricultural research station.  There are some funny scanning descriptions as the group explores the station and opportunities to interact with different members of the group  Eventually the group comes to a sort of control room where they discover that someone has been living in the facility.  After some exploration, a mysterious man stumbles into the room and you have to make some decisions about trusting him.  He seems very scholarly but a little dubious.  Gortys tells the group that they will have to traverse through the jungly facility to find the part it needs.  They decide to split up with Fiona and Athena heading to where the part is located and Rhys and Sasha heading towards a central core to disable any security (there are lots of turrets in this episode).

The story then bounces back and forth between Rhys and Fiona.  Rhys and Sasha seem to almost have a sort of little flirtation going on as they explore more of the facility.  It's kind of cute.  There are some genuinely funny moments as they are forced to navigate a broken catwalk.  Fiona and Athena's branch seems to be more about toughening up Fiona and making her more like a true vault hunter.  Athena bestows some handy advice...and lots of bullets...on Fiona and gives her ample opportunity to practice her skills.

Vallory, the new villain.

Eventually Fiona and Athena reach the location of the hidden Gortys part.  They find out that Rhys and Sasha haven't deactivated the security measures.  The story then switches back to Rhys and Fiona as they unwittingly flee from a storm or cute, but possibly deadly critters, that they managed to set off.  There is a short puzzle sequence to match nodes and deactivate the security.  Fiona and Athena grab the part and make their way out.  Unfortunately they are met by Brick....who seems to be after Athena.  As Brick and Athena tangle, Fiona is forced to tangle with a hidden sniper who is taking potshots.  It's Mordecai and he's accompanying Brick on his quest to capture Athena.  The fighting doesn't look like it's going to turn out well as the new villain and her squad turn up.  Vallory was mentioned in episode two and seems to be some sort of criminal mastermind tied somehow to Felix.

The Gortys upgrade piece ends up being taken by Vallory and it comes down to Rhys and Sasha trying to chase down the bandits and get it back.  There's a really fun chase sequence toward the end of the game that involves riding on half of LoaderBot (he has difficulties in this episode) and trying to take down August in a vehicle.

There's probably a lot of things that I am missing--I only played it once and am already having a hard time remembering all the details.  I found this episode to be a lot of fun with tons of great action sequences but enough humor spread throughout to keep it light and goofy.  I am still very surprised at how much I am enjoying this game.