The Official Borderlands Thread of Critical Hits (Xbox 360, PS3, PC)

I thought a dedicated thread would be the best place for this. Here we can discuss classes, weapons, quests and arrange some co-op action possibly.

I'll be picking this up tomorrow probably for PS3. Who else is getting in on the face-blasting wasteland action?

 

I said it before, I'll say it again. This is the best game of 2009 so far, and one of the best games I've played this generation. It's very, very addicting, outstanding gunplay with a great cel-shaded style that sets it apart from the game it's sure to be compared to the most, Fallout 3. Personally, I think it's better, but I know a lot of people will disagree with that and that's fine. I'm just having more fun with this game than I did with that one, and I had a blast playing Fallout.

 

I'm guessing this is a little more of a guided experience than Fallout 3? I just couldn't get into Fallout for some reason, I guess I felt it was just too big and sparse.

 

Yeah, I would say it is more guided in that you don't really have to look for new missions. There is a Bounty Board in Fyrestone, which is the settlement that you start the game out in where new missions pop up regularly as you complete old ones. Each mission has a certain level of difficulty that is gauged by your character's level. So say you're at Level 13, one mission will be at Level 15 and labeled Hard while another mission will be at Level 13 and dubbed Normal. And the missions scale with you, so you won't be at Level 15 and find Level 40 missions available. So I would say that it's more accessible than Fallout 3, which basically just threw you into the world on your own and said "Here you go, do what you want," and you really had no direction. In Borderlands, you have a certain objective from the start, and you have this sort of Cortana-like AI that guides you throughout as you reach certain checkpoints within the story.

It did take me a couple of times playing to really get a rhythm in Fallout 3, whereas with Borderlands it starts you off with an objective and you really aren't at a loss in regards to what you need to do for the rest of the game (so far, at least).

 

How's the RPG aspect? Is there a decent story? Are the quests unique or are they randomly generated?

 

It's not as heavily focused on RPG aspects as Fallout 3. For instance, there's no conversation system where you can choose your response, your weapons and armor don't deteriorate over time, and there's nothing too in-depth that would take away from the fast-paced FPS action and bog down the pace. It is, first and foremost, a first-person shooter with some RPG elements. Every time you shoot or melee an enemy, a number will appear to indicate how much damage you've inflicted, and if you land a headshot on a human enemy you will score a critical hit that inflicts more damage than usual. As a side note, one small thing I really like is whenever you land a critical hit, your character will let you know with some humorous dialogue (e.g. the Soldier will shout out "Critical, *****!"). It's another small touch that serves to distance Borderlands from its peers.

Also, the myriad guns that you'll find littered throughout the game each have unique individual stats. The basic three that every gun has are Damage, Accuracy, and Fire Rate. Some guns will have some pretty sweet bonuses, such as an Incendiary pistol having a high chance to light your enemy on fire, or a Shock combat rifle with rounds that will electrocute your foes. There are literally millions of different guns in this game, so the opportunities to find some pretty awesome weapons are nearly limitless.

From the start of the game, you have four characters to choose from, each with unique abilities and skill trees for you to assign Skill Points that you earn throughout the game to (so you can upgrade how fast your shield regenerates, how much health you have, increase shotgun damage, etc.). There's Brick, a melee-focused Berserker whose special ability makes him invulnerable for a short time so he can lay down some heavy-hitting punches against his foes. There's the Hunter, Mordecai, a long-range focused character who specializes in sniper rifles and pistols. His special ability lies in his large pet bird, which he can send to kill enemies as he snipes from afar. The third character is the Soldier, Roland, who can throw out a turret with shields on either side to use for cover and assistance in battle. Then there's Lilith, a Siren who can become invisible and sneak around enemies with massively increased speed. When she reveals herself, she sends out a shockwave that damages all enemies within its radius.

So as you can see, each of the four characters suits a different play style so you can basically play the game exactly how you want to. Predictably, each of their special abilities recharge over time once you use them. So there are RPG aspects here. They're not as in-depth as you'll find in Fallout 3, but there are just enough to keep you in tune with the experience and shape your character how you wish without slowing down the game's excellent pacing.

Which brings me to the missions. As I stated in a previous post, each mission you're tasked with has a certain Level that is used to gauge the difficulty of the mission with your character's current Level. So if your character's at Level 12, a Level 14 mission will be considered Hard and a Level 12 mission will be considered Normal. And this game does get tough when you face enemies that are at a higher level than you are, so it's definitely recommended that you take on lower level missions first to gain experience so you're more prepared for the tougher ones. When you first encounter story missions, they're usually at a higher level than you, so there are side missions that you'll find from other characters or Bounty Boards that are more attuned to your skills and will help you gain experience to level up and be able to advance the story. These have nothing to do with the main quest, and range from surviving in arena battles with skags (hostile dog-like creatures with metal plating over their heads and backs) to finding scattered pieces of a sniper rifle that needs assembling. I'll also add that the navigating/map system is much better in Borderlands than it is in Fallout 3. The map is much more clear in its bo

 

Wow, thanks for all the info Reynar! Sounds to me though like it's the exact opposite of Fallout. An FPS with RPG elements rather than an RPG with FPS elements. I think I'm gonna pass on it for now. I'll wait till the price drops and maybe pick it up then.

 

Yeah awesome write-up. I picked up my copy today (decided to get the 360 version in the end), so can't wait to crack it open when I get home.

Anyone up for some co-op just let me know!

 

I'm up to level 12, and so far so good. The guns and all the different damage types are awesome, especially the shock ones that make heads explode.

I went with the Siren for my first playthrough, her phase walk ability is pretty handy at times.

I'm a bit confused about the sniper guns though. Sometimes I'll shoot right in the middle of someone's chest and it'll miss completely. Is the chance to hit directly calculated from the accuracy rating of the weapon?

 

In a video I watched the reviewer said you can really feel the difference between rifles with a higher accuracy stat and those that dont, so you might be right on that one.

Anyway, so of people I know who've played this game, only two of them I know personally.

First one said 'Meh. WoW with guns. Atleast my copy came with a t-shirt' (I found this strange, as this guy loves WoW and FPS' but complained about it?)
Second one took a little longer to get back to me on his thoughts. Because he played it for 8 hours straight. Couldn't tell me enough how much he loved this game.

Of the two, the 2nd one has always seemed to have opinions a lot more closely in tune with my own, so one way or another I'm getting this game

 

So after playing this game for a good while (I'm a Level 30 Rifleman) on single player and co-op with a friend, I'm about to make a very bold statement that will solidify my status as an absolute Borderlands whore (and probably make a few people hate me):

Borderlands is the best game of this console generation.

Disagree all you want (I'm sure 99.9% of people will ). That's what I think. I never thought that Grand Theft Auto IV would relinquish that title, but it has. I am absolutely in love with this game. The only reason I'm not playing it now is because I thought it was necessary to share my views on here. Now that I have...

*drinks Monster and goes back to play*

 

That's cool. For me it's not my favourite game this gen, but I'm having way more fun with it than Fallout (though to be fair, they're not really comparable).

I love how the game can get real tough real fast. Like one minute, you've got full health, full ammo and everything's fine... then a random encounter with bandits and wave after wave of skaggs will leave you limping along almost dead and with no ammo left, and you haven't even got to your mission objective yet. It certainly keeps the game interesting.

 

All opinions aside, it certainly has the technical and artistic chops to be considered.

 

I love that, because once you level up a bit and get some better weapons, you can come back and wipe the floor with enemies who used to absolutely drain you, which gives the game a stellar sense of progression.

For example, me and a friend went into an area where you fight some much more advanced and well-armed enemies than bandits, and there are a lot of them. We both were getting obliterated by the first few enemies we encountered, so we high-tailed it outta there and decided to go on some other, less challenging quests before attempting it again. About an hour or so later, we go back to that same area from before with some extra experience and better weapons in hand, and complete the mission with our lives intact. That's not to say it was easy, as we had to do some reviving and an occasional respawn, along with tons of ammo pick-ups (I went in with 800 combat rifle rounds, and used them all up rather quickly). It still had a good level of challenge to it, but we weren't running for our lives like we had before. It's pretty satisfying.

 

So I've purchased and pre-loaded this bad boy on Steam, but it doesnt unlock for another 3 hours. As much as I want to stay up to play it straight away, its currently 2am and I have stuff to do tomorrow

But tomorrow afternoon...

 

Sorry for double post, but

Steam were displaying the incorrect release time, and pushed it back to the 30th with only ONE hour to go! I dont really wanna point fingers about this whole mess, but for the thousands of European and Australian customers who pre-ordered this game and arranged time off work to play this game today, saying 'Sorry for the confusion' in a post on the Steam forums isn't really good enough.

The very least they could do is acknowledge the mistake, and unlock the game as it had said it would be for the last 3 months...

 

That really sucks. Whose mistake was it, Steam or 2K?

I wouldn't be surprised if they made the "mistake" on purpose, dangling the carrot as close as possible so people wouldn't pirate it.

 

It was Steam's mistake.

Also as I got home I found out Steam made another blunder relating to this game. For the Australian version they accidentally uploaded the files including a low_violence.ncf, which was made for countries such as Germany. That particular file was never intended for the Aussie version, and 2K received a bunch of angry emails about it only to say 'Uhh, Steam gave you the wrong one.'

And now Valve have to come up with a patch for those of us who pre-loaded it to take the .ncf away.







These things come in threes, right?

 

Second time I've double posted in this thread, but oh well.

I've played a solid amount of this game, and I've got to say my opinion of it is pretty close to Reynars. I wouldn't give it my GOTY by any stretch of the imagination, the menu functionality and complete lack of reliable online play serve to take away any chance this game had of receiving such a title. The actual gameplay though, is top notch. The RPG elements, while from afar appear to be rather minimal, actually end up being very integral to everything you do in this game. Loving it. And the story isnt as bad as everyone says it is. It may not be incredibly well fleshed out, and there is a suprising lack of dialogue, but Stalker relied more on text than voice acting too, and that game had an incredible sense of story and atmosphere.

 

The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned releases tomorrow!

 

I need to get back into this game.

Hopefully over the holidays when I'm done with AC2.

 

It's an underwhelming bit of DLC. Not as great as it could have been, unfortunately.

 

So, what character does everyone think is the best. I started with Mordeci, but then decided to go with Roland. Mordeci was good for long range, however, in single player you fight alot in close so his abilities were lowered some imo. So I changed to Roland. He is pretty good at both which is nice and his turret can help out in a sticky situation. I have not tried Brick or the Siren (forgot her name). Are they any good?

 

I've only played as Lilith the Siren. She's been all right, the phase walk can be pretty handy at times.

 

The only character I've played with extensively is Roland (Soldier), and I can't imagine any of the other three being nearly as effective.