Like many I’ve been wild with anticipation over the release of Borderlands 3; I sold most of my hard copy games just to afford the $100 edition. So far, I’ve put roughly 10 hours into the game with Moze and about 3 hours with Zane.
In terms of raw gameplay, 3 is the biggest leap since Borderlands 2 from the original Borderlands and the strongest feature of the game. There’s a lot of small changes that welcome like the ability to power slide, being able to climb ledges, being able to customize vehicles more and the addition of alternate fires on some weapons. Speaking of customization, there is a huge amount of customization when it comes to your characters skill trees. For Zane as an an example, you can chose between 3 different skills to choose from, that you can switch up at anytime; each tree is dedicated to a skill and there are augments available to pump them up. It’s a bit to get used to but well worth it. Combat is much more intense because the enemies are smarter and you take damage much quicker. Guns also handle much better and feel crisp. It’s undoubtedly the best shooter I’ve played in a while.
So what’s the drawback? Sadly the story. After the awesome opening, the game hits a stagnant patch for much of your stay on Pandora. It tries to be funny but comes out flat a lot of the time. The Calypso Twins aren’t terrible as main antagonists but they get annoying when you figure out they are pretty much evil Twitch streamers. A change I didn’t like was getting rid of the Badass rank and replacing it with Guardian rank that you can’t access until you beat the story. Also, if you take too long to figure something out, the game will pester you until you figure it out at certain times.
Overall, it’s a awesome game so far and the review will be out soon. May the gaming gods bring you glory.
Savior Gaming 