Borderlands

Have you ever experienced the joy of jumping into a dungeon with a friend or two, tackling quests and imposing enemies? Sharing loot and skill point placement strategies? Pushing on into the wilderness for one more hour, just so you can level up and use that awesome piece of equipment you just found? Trade in the jungles and dank dungeons for sprawling deserts and huge fortresses, and you can easily describe Borderlands this way. Drawing inspiration from the Diablo series and other similar games, Borderlands is an amazing combination of RPG-esque leveling and questing and the FPS qualities of guns, grenades, and carnage.

At the beginning of the game, you are greeted with a cut scene detailing the local legend of the Vault, a mysterious location that calls to adventurers with promises of wealth, women, and fame. Many speculate if the Vault actually exists, but that doesn't stop treasure hunters from searching far and wide for its whereabouts. After the back story, you are allowed to choose from four different characters, all with very different appearances and skill sets.

Roland, the Soldier, is mainly support. His special skill is a shielded turret that lays down gunfire on enemies and can later be upgraded to shoot rockets, heal teammates, regenerate ammo, as well as being equipped with a variety of other abilities. Next is Lilith, the Siren. Her action skill is called a Phasewalk, and it allows her to enter a different dimension, moving through it to avoid enemies in her own dimension. Then, much like an assassin, she is able to position herself and attack while coming out of the Phasewalk, dealing even more damage. She is also skilled with using sub-machine guns, as well as any weapons with elemental effects.  Third is Mordecai, the Hunter. Much like a rogue, he is well-versed in long range attacks with his sniper rifle, but can also lay out a ton of hurt with pistols and revolvers. His special ability is command over Bloodwing, a pet bird that can attack enemies. Lastly, we have Brick, the Berserker and also the tank equivalent in Borderlands. Although he is experienced with shotguns and explosive weaponry, much of his power comes from his action skill, a berserk rage during which you basically use your fists to beat up any enemies nearby.

Before the launch of Borderlands, what was most heralded as the best gameplay mechanic was the random gun generation system which, in Gearbox's own words, had limitless potential. While this is true and sounds amazing on paper, the end product is quite lackluster. Yes, there are a ton of guns in this game, each one a bit different than the last. The only problem is each one is only slightly different. What ultimately happens is you get lucky and find two or three powerful guns you love, and end up using them for most of the game. And because each character can basically use any gun type without a disadvantage or penalty, save for a few skills that make some choices better than others, it makes it hard to feel unique in your choice of guns to use. A system to upgrade and customize your weapons personally would have added a bit of much needed variety to the weapon list.

There's one more disappointment I found in Borderlands, but that's easily fixed: the single-player experience. If you faithfully complete quests as you gain them, you should be a bit over-leveled towards the end of the game, and find very little challenge even against the final boss. But like I said before, this is easily fixed. Even with the addition of only one extra player, the game takes on a whole new life. Enemies are strengthened and multiplied and loot drops yield greater rewards, two huge factors that make it feel like an entirely different game. And with friends, the bare-bones story and hugely underwhelming final boss take a backseat to the incredibly entertaining multiplayer experience.

One of my favorite parts of Borderlands is the other ways you can customize your character. Although there are only four different classes to choose from, each one has three specific skill trees through which they can level up. You aren't limited to choosing skills from one set, but getting a certain amount of points in a specialization will unlock higher leveled skills for you to choose from. On top of that, there are items you can find later in the game called class mods, which add points to skills as well as giving your character a specific class name past the usual Soldier, Hunter, Berserker, or Siren. This makes it so that people you are playing with can easily identify which tree you are specializing in and what types of skills you are bringing to the table. Add that to artifacts that imbue your action skills with different elements and grenade mods that change what type of grenades you throw, and you have a wide range of customizable options for your character that the weapon system lacks.

All in all, Borderlands is the most fun video game experience I've had all year. While the single-player can become a bit boring and stale as the game goes along, multiplayer is a whole new ball game. Driving around Pandora, killing bandits, turning in quests with a few friends, sharing tips and facts, trading weapons…it can't get much better than this. And while the promises Gearbox made about the weapon system were technically true, the customization through skill sets and class mods is where the variety and fun is truly found. So, if you have a few friends with similar interests, grab Borderlands and get treasure hunting. You won't regret it.

Likes

• Few classes, but tons of customization.
• Huge list of side-quests to keep you busy.
• In-game challenges help leveling immensely.

Dislikes

• Random gun system is less than impressive.
• Single-player experience is dull and repetitive.
• Very little story and horrible ending boss after the awesome quests leading up to it.

Level 42 Review Score

/

The review scale at LevelFortyTwo is between 1 and 5. A score of 5 is considered an amazing game, 4 is a well-done game with only a few issues, 3 is in the middle; not great, but not bad, 2 is a very problematic game, and 1 is absolutely terrible.

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