Telltale Games Explains How Borderlands, Game of Thrones Titles Came About

If Telltale Games seemed to be the star of the Spike VGX Awards – and not because the program itself was subpar – then it was due to two major announcements in the form of Tales from the Borderlands and Game of Thrones. But how did the developer team up with Gearbox Software and HBO respectively to work on both games?

Speaking to Polygon, senior vice president of publishing Steve Allison stated that, “We were backstage at the [2012] Spike VGAs and Gearbox was sitting at table one and we were sitting at table two — we were there for The Walking Dead. We got to talking a little bit, and I don’t remember when it became, ‘we should do this thing,’ but it happened over a few cocktails.

“We could have easily left it and chalked it up to too much tequila. but we followed up when we got home, and they remembered the conversation. The Borderlands universe has so much story potential, all those great characters. There’s a narrative there in Borderlands 2 but it serves a certain purpose, and we can serve a difference purpose with it for fans of the franchise.”

As for Game of Thrones, it was Telltale that ultimately approached HBO. In an internal meeting, the studio “Looked at things we wanted to work on and the most important things are what are we passionate about. After that we ask, is there enough of an audience at the end of day that would play this thing?

“We want franchises that are really difficult to translate into traditional gaming, we don’t want to make another Walking Dead first-person shooter. What works with the franchises we have it the characters, the story and drama and the relationships. We look for franchises that are huge and have all those elements.”

Tales from the Borderlands is expected to arrive next year. Game of Thrones will be part of a multi-year, multi-game deal, with the first title to release in 2014. Stay tuned for more details.