Borderlands 3
BIGGER, BETTER-LOOKING AND REASSURINGLY FAMILIAR STEVE BOXER
PUBLISHER 2K GAMES / DEVELOPER GEARBOX SOFTWARE / RELEASE DATE OUT NOW / COST £49.99/$59.99
finding every distinctive aspect of
Borderlands 3 where they expect
it to be, more or less unchanged.
Plus, they will love the changes and
improvements that Gearbox has made:
Borderlands 3’s game world, extended
beyond Pandora to a bunch of planets
(mini-city hub Sanctuary is now a fully
operational spaceship) is huge and
refreshingly diverse. The guns and
other loot items are more plentiful
and outrageous than ever. And that
unmistakable gameplay has never
been more satisfying.
Borderlands 3 starts in a familiar
fashion: you must choose to play as
one of four Vault Hunters. There’s
Amara, the Siren, with telekinetic-style
melee skills; FL4K, the Beastmaster,
who takes Borderlands 3’s wild beasts
into battle; Moze, the Gunner, who
can call in a mech; and Zane, the
Operative, who wields technology such
as a hovering turret or a digi-clone
which actually fires at enemies.
There’s no real way of switching
classes once you get stuck into a
game, which is a shame (their skillFor bands, it’s that
second album which
is generally held to
be ‘difficult’. We
reckon the same
thing applies to the
third iteration of a videogame. That
marks its transition from game to
franchise (although with spin-offs like
The Pre-Sequel and Tales From The
Borderlands, Gearbox’s shooter had
clearly become a franchise long before
Borderlands 3). But when crafting the
third main instalment of a popular
game, developers face the stark
dilemma of whether to stick or twist.
With Borderlands 3, the good news
is that Gearbox has shied away from
any reboot ideas. Anyone who has
played a previous Borderlands game
will find it reassuringly familiar, to
such an extent that series first-timers
will find elements like the sprawling
inventory and character progression
systems bafflingly impenetrable, at
least at first.
But existing Borderlands fans
will luxuriate in the comfort of
trees are even more complex than
in Borderlands games of yore), so
it’s worth experimenting with them
before you decide. A new, super-hard
unlockable Mayhem Mode encourages
that experimentation, as does
Borderlands 3’s two-player co-op
mode, which cleverly scales so that
two people at wildly different stages
of the game can still play together.Seeing red
Story-wise, you’re cast as the token
Vault Hunter in the Crimson Raiders,
a faction led by Lilith the Siren. The
Crimson Raiders embark on a huge
interplanetary quest to locate and raid
the Great Vault, where they hope to
find the means to end the corporate
authoritarianism and oppression
which is rife across the galaxy. The
trouble is that the fanatical Calypso
Twins and their cult, the Children Of
The Vault, are trying to do the same
thing, so they dog you all the way.
The story is about what you would
expect from a Borderlands game. It’s
chock-full of unsubtle humour andshort
cutWHAT IS IT?
The third iteration of
the post-apocalyptic,
comic book-style
franchise that
defined the
loot-shooter.
WHAT’S IT LIKE?
Classic Borderlands,
only bigger,
better-looking and
with some new
character classes.
WHO’S IT FOR?
Anyone who prefers
their shooters packed
with mayhem,
amusing and
thoroughly
over-the-top.072 THE OFFICIAL XBOX MAGAZINE