This year's Summer Game Fest kicked off with the official announcement of Tiny Tina's Wonderlands. While the game may feel familiar to fans of the Borderlands franchise, the reveal hinted that Tiny Tina's Wonderlands may be distinguishing itself from Borderlands in a few key ways.
Borderlands fans were first exposed to Tiny Tina in the Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep DLC for Borderlands 2. In the DLC, players navigate through a Dungeons and Dragons-inspired fantasy campaign. Now, the announcement at Summer Game Fest confirmed that Tiny Tina's Wonderlands will be a spin-off game that acts as a standalone experience.
While Tiny Tina's Wonderlands will obviously diverge from Borderlands in terms of flavor—fantasy versus post-apocalyptic—it will also change a few key features of the series. The first will be the introduction of spellcasting. Since Tiny Tina's Wonderlands draws inspiration from Dungeons and Dragons, it's likely that the spells will be inspired by the casting classes within Dungeons and Dragons, but suited to an action roleplaying pace, meaning fans can expect laborious, drawn-out spells to be left by the wayside.
In the Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep DLC, gamers were able to play with a variety of grenade mods inspired by tabletop RPG spells. For instance, one grenade mod drew inspiration from the famous Magic Missile spell from Dungeons and Dragons. Since Tiny Tina's Wonderlands will likely act as a love letter to traditional fantasy RPGs, fans should anticipate a variety of classic spells to make their way into the game. While there is a variety of ways that Tiny Tina's Wonderlands could play out, fans should bet on two things. First, that the game will draw inspiration from the Borderlands 2 DLC. Second, that Tiny Tina's Wonderlands will take a lot from Dungeons and Dragons in terms of enemies and abilities.
A brief discussion after the announcement trailer confirmed not only that Tiny Tina's Wonderlands will be a standalone game, but also that it will offer a greater degree of character customization than the Borderlands franchise. While details were scarce, this focus on customization fits directly with the tabletop RPG inspiration for the game since games like Dungeons and Dragons are centered around character creation. This could manifest in a variety of different ways, but it seems to suggest that players will be able to craft their own character to some degree rather than pick from a roster of vault hunters like in Borderlands 3.
Tiny Tina's Wonderlands is in development for unspecified platforms.