Borderlands is back this time packing another four new vault hunters on the quest to travel over Pandora and stop Handsome Jack, a self-absorbed ass with some devilishly good looks. The story isn’t one of the games strongest points but it is easy to understand and helps make the first games story make actual sense. Jack as a character is possibly one of the most marmite like characters, as you’ll either love him or hate him. He does provide a lot of creepy charm and has a few good lines here and there and as you progress towards the final Jack takes an easy plunge into psychotic rage
With the story aside Borderlands strongly focuses on shooting and looting; side quests and main quests are still obviously present with areas to grind out for XP, and there are many exciting new characters as well as returning faces. Customisation is now present, even though still fairly limited it offers a few nice features to make you character stand out from the rest. None of the formula has really been changed and it plays almost identical to the first, which makes it feel like home for returning players to Borderlands 2. This does mean however that players looking for anything different from the first game’s mechanics will be disappointed. Borderlands 2 is an all guns blazing game, managing to improve on what made the first game so successful.
The game has many aspects which are certainly better than the previous edition. One of the first things returning players will have realized is the revamped skill tree system. The skill trees are a lot more in-depth and are far more varied adding more to specialized customization The various options with each class adds a lot of room to mix up different skills depending on your playstyle. Amongst leveling up there’s a new feature known as challenges which reward players with Badass Tokens, used to unlock certain bonus stats e.g slower recharge rate for shields, more health or even faster reload times. The challenges are also very fun and varied and majority of the time you will earn a Badass Token by not even trying to. Another nice addition to these extra stats is the fact they carry over to whatever character you decide to choose next.
Quests have also had a much needed renovation, feeling less tedious, more vigorous, and a lot more varied than the first game. There’s a number of tweaks in terms of the design and format which also mixes up the gameplay dramatically, feeling less repetitive than before. Among the main story quests there are also a ton of side quests to keep players busy. Gearbox have gone all out this year with Easter egg themed missions as well, and you’ll come across numerous references to other games, films and TV shows. A few of the most memorable Easter eggs you will find is a Top Gun inspired mission, asking you to go and collect volleyballs, jet fuel, and then killing a bunch of shirtless men. One Easter egg closer to my heart that opened up the possibility to venture off and find… A Minecraft Easter egg. This Easter egg is fantastic as Borderlands 2 has given the beloved title its own area where vault hunters like yourselves have smash their way through Minecraft themed blocks to eventually face some creepers who will drop some nice Minecraft themed loot. It’s the little touches like this that show how dedicated Borderlands 2 is to fans alike.
The world of Pandora has also broken away from the deserted dust filled wasteland, offering up many different locations including a snow arctic tundra, grasslands, mechanical and robot environments, as well as a trip into the sky. The enemies are also completely fresh with a whole lot more on offer to slaughter on your adventure.
Following the original Borderlands fashion the game isn’t short of peculiar and assorted characters, ranging from the less annoying and humorous Claptrap, the pretentious Sir Hammerlock who of course has a British accent, to the insane Tiny Tina. The writing for all of the characters you come across in the game is some of the best work in a video game for some time. All the characters have their own personality and you will grow to love a fair few characters during your playthrough. One thing that is disappointing however is some of the characters are only around for a few missions, after that they will have no more sidequests, though the game is very balanced with various missions and characters so either way I can’t really complain as the game delivers with its NPC characters.
Sadly, Borderlands 2 does have a few disappointments that keeps this instalment from being perfect. The new characters are very similar to the original Borderlands characters. Maya is very similar to Lilith but with a better Siren skill, Zer0 is also similar Lilith, but this time they have given him a sword, Axton is pretty much identical to Roland and Salvador is essentially Brick. The only difference here however is Salvador will wield two guns instead of punching his way through enemies like Brick did. It’s a shame that Borderlands 2 didn’t offer any new character classes unless you pre-ordered the title which gained you early access to the Mechromancer class. Hopefully if Gearbox make a third instalment we will be able to see a completely brand new bunch of vault dwellers.
As I previously mentioned Pandora is diverse, but even though it offers a lot of variety of locations the game feels far to big for its own good, and with many of the locations not utilising the vehicle functionality, traveling across various terrain on numerous quests walking around can be a little frustrating, with locations at times being difficult to find on the map. The option for more vehicles such as the ability to fly the Buzzard would of really opened up the title on a different level making it feel less frustrating to travel to various points on the map.
The last questionable issue with Borderlands 2, and this was also seen in Borderlands is the fact the developers almost force players to play in co-op or online with players. There are many missions in the game that are very difficult to complete alone and if you did attempt the quest it will take you twice the time alone than it would in co-op. As you can imagine bosses are already a pain in co-op, imagine doing them alone. A scaled down of difficulty would have been appreciated for solo players.
Overall
Borderlands 2 is one of the best co-op games on the market and is possibly the best FPS/RPG series around. I have had endless fun with this title with friends online and offline. Playing online is the best way to play Borderlands 2, as the single player experience is very challenging. There is so much to experience here, providing a great experience for multiple playthroughs with different classes, not to mention the awesome loot that is waiting for you to acquire. Borderlands 2 does have a few issues like I mentioned before but none of them are game breaking by any means. Expect Borderlands 2 to also have numerous upcoming DLC updates along with the fifth class, the Mechromancer, coming out in October for those who didn’t pre-order. If you enjoyed Borderlands, there is no doubt here you will love Borderlands 2. Now what are you waiting for? Go grab the game and get ready for some wubwubwub.