Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands review – a teen psycho dungeonmaster, goblin revolts and lute-shredding

PlayStation 4/5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PC; Gearbox Software
This fun D&D-infused cooperative shooter treads a line between fourth-wall prodding and juvenile, with unicorn queens and hi-tech weaponry

Every step of the way through Tiny Tina's Wonderlands, a D&D-infused spinoff of Gearbox's cooperative shooter-RPG Borderlands, you think to yourself: this would be so easy to get wrong. The voice acting is exactly one decibel away from irritating at all times. Every joke walks a tightrope between exuberant fourth-wall prodding and juvenile gags. And after copious Borderlands games, spinoffs and add-ons, there ought to be a sense of over-familiarity about turning up at an enemy camp, shooting everything that moves, then watching your foes explode like scowling pinatas, before you hoover up all the loot they drop. But truthfully, there isn't.

Likable teen psycho Tiny Tina acts as the dungeonmaster in a game of Bunkers and Badasses, the Borderlands universe's own brand of D&D. You are the fictional fantasy hero created by Valentine, one of Tina's party of players, putting you Inception-level deep into fictionalised video game worlds: you play an imaginary character, created by a video game character, in a world invented by another video game character. There's more conceptual abstraction here than those expensive candles with names like Afternoon Escape".

Tiny Tina's Wonderlands is out 25 March; 54.99