Guardians of the Galaxy Season 1 Review

"Episode 1: Tangled up in Blue"

Campaign (Spoiler Free)

Guardians of the Galaxy has quickly blossomed into one of the Marvel's largest properties over recent years due to one stellar movie. Sure the crew existed before the film, but it really turned this unlikely group of a human; green lady, blue dude, a raccoon and a tree into heroes. While that sounds silly, that's the team if you didn't know with the names to match as Starlord; Gamora, Draxx, Rocket and Groot (I am Groot!).

While the movie was an origin story for the team, this Telltale series brings us a much more weathered and partnered group. They still have many fights, but you can tell they've been in many battles and are established. This episode is also quick to deal with one of their core enemies and then the series focuses on what comes next which is interesting. You get to dive into the lives of these characters with changes that impact the flow of the story. You generally follow the perspective of Starlord, but get some sequences where you use the others. This makes sense as he is the one that keeps the crew together and is the most relatable.

Gameplay

Telltale titles play with a cinematic focus having you mostly just control narrative by selecting from choices and additionally quick time events. They seem to have grown their detective mode from the Batman series having Starlord fly around at times to discover things. The game ran very smooth on the console which is great, there's usually some sort of issue and this one was solid throughout with no issues present. The graphics also continue to use a smoother look to them and that was pleasant. I also felt that they nailed the characters here not only in their attitudes, but also with the voices as well.

The Conclusion

It would seem that Telltale really gets the Guardians, or at least my idea of the group and its fun. The music is good, the action/comedy mix worked well and they've set up an interesting story to tell within the universe. This was a solid starting base for the group to work from with smooth gameplay to match. I'm very impressed with how they've treated the characters capturing them perfectly and I look forward to seeing how this tale of universe manipulation will work unfold over the next set of episodes. The length was also decent for the episode and it would appear that there are a wide range of arcs available with multiple split-off decisions.

Guardians of the Galaxy Review on Xbox One
Review Code Provided by Sandbox Strat

Rating Overall: 9.0