At its peak, the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 era produced many ongoing franchises, but few have endured as interestingly as borderlands. Gearbox Software’s shooter and role-playing game series has been so definitive and so infamous for so long in ways that will never quite go away. At the same time, he has always been himself: for better or worse, borderlands He has no interest in changing what he is, or at least not for long.
Gearbox and 2K released the first borderlands on October 20, 2009 for both consoles (and a week later on PC), and it was almost not what it is now. While it always seemed destined to be “Halo meets devils” and focuses on four Vault Hunters searching for alien vaults on the planet Pandora, its initial presentation had a more brown and tan palette similar to radioactive dust either Crazy Max. Now it’s a cel-shaded classic art style was chosen when the developers decided it needed a more distinctive visual hook, much to the dismay of the game’s original art director. But the new look did its job: in addition to making it different, it inspired the team to become more extravagant, such as rejecting “boring” class abilities in favor of more magical, RPG-like powers.
The end result is a shooter that felt like a breath of fresh air compared to others of the time. At the time, borderlands He entered the scene with a lot of confidence and personality. From their still iconic opening set to “There is no rest for the wicked“In addition to the flashy, clever title cards of key characters and bosses, it was clear that the goal here was to have fun shooting and looting. Audiences largely enjoyed that; it sold two million copies in two months and that number grew over the years. It didn’t hurt that four good-sized DLC packs gave it a long queue and a reason to return, possibly with some newcomers joining the fun.
In 2012, borderlands 2 It came out with more: more story, new classes with more ridiculous abilities, more variety of locations and, most importantly, more weapons. There’s a lot of gameplay in that game, even before its own DLC expansions were added to the stack. The acclaim for the new release was even greater than the first, and it wouldn’t be wrong to say that it’s the biggest (and possibly even the best) entry in the series. But that definitive status has a double effect, particularly when it comes to writing. borderlands 2 It’s where the cast gets especially… chatty, to put it charitably, and that doesn’t always go well. Humor can be a lot and not for everyone. When reviewing some of the games from the last few years, I found myself not paying much attention to the story. If there’s any series of games that will help you reduce your queue of podcasts or YouTube essays, it’s this one.
do the borderlands Do games deserve to be beaten so often? Probably not; his sense of humor is not so much offensive as simply excessive, to the point of disengaging from the dialogue it becomes second nature. Really, the only time people fully enjoyed writing was the first time. Tales from the borderlands, partly because TellTale decided to go back several levels. The shadow of that beloved episodic narrative adventure looms over the larger franchise, with Gearbox finally removing characters from the original. Stories in Borderlands 3. But this isn’t an expansive megafranchise; The gearbox has been careful to maintain borderlands big, but not so large could cause the fall of the studio. Last summer’s bad movie may not have happened, and it’s easy to imagine it won’t affect the series in the long run.
Unlike other franchises from the PS3/360 era, borderlands hasn’t had some kind of critically and commercially catastrophic low point. Everyone may have a specific entry they don’t like, but that hasn’t resulted in an installment that exists primarily to apologize for the previous game, as is the case with Mass Effect, Assassin’s Creed, either Halo. Gearbox was also at the forefront in terms of preservation: the studio made a continuous effort to not only expand the franchise to other systems, but also to ensure that older entries and their DLC make it to the current generation of consoles to exist for always. Whether intentionally or by complete accident, this has become a bulletproof and future-proof franchise.
Vault hunters and locations may change, but borderlands Otherwise, it has stuck to the same manual during its 15 years of operation. It’s quite remarkable that a major non-sports triple-A franchise from a Western studio doesn’t worry about reinventing the wheel with each new installment. As the beginning of the current era of looters and shooters, this is even more notable; has not lost itself as Destination sometimes it does, and attempts to compete with both have been hampered by an inability to fully understand what makes them so important. Gearbox isn’t interested in making these games follow current trends, like a post-launch seasonal model or a battle pass, even with more recent entries like the 2022 spinoff. Little Tina’s Wonderland. Instead, players are incentivized to keep chasing loot and stats that are there in the game itself, waiting to be found.
If there is a word that best fits borderlands, It is “reliable.” Across the three main games and the two spin-off shooters, it can be fun to play with friends and watch bandits and monsters get blown up or set on fire (or both) and develop a variety of wacky abilities. It is not for everyone and you are more than aware of that; but he’s comfortable in his own skin and it’s perfectly fine to get wet while his devoted audience keeps coming back for more. And as someone who moves in and out of that demographic, I say: bring it on! Borderlands 4, which is currently planned for 2025.
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