What Borderlands nailed, and why you don't like it... maybe. (Destiny)

by Korny , Dalton, Ga. US. Earth, Sol System, Friday, January 05, 2018, 11:55 (2364 days ago) @ CruelLEGACEY
edited by Korny, Friday, January 05, 2018, 12:27

Here's to hoping Borderlands 3 is good, I guess.

It's impossible for it not to be.

I feel like I’m missing the gene that most people have that makes them enjoy Borderlands, and it makes me sad. Every time I hear people talking about it, they sound like they’re having the time of their lives with it. But I try it and it does nothing for me. I feel like I’m missing out, lol.

Probably because the gameplay was meh, and Destiny came along and completely wrecked our standards, and the pacing in the first couple of hours is super sluggish, and the snowy environment is such a chore to traverse while having nothing interesting to look at (Borderlands 1 also had a similar issue).

What Borderlands does great is that-

Storywise:
The story goes somewhere, characters are continuously developed, and the devs/writers actually have things to say, often mixing/balancing serious elements with over-the-top humor. Sure, the humor is pretty hit-or-miss, but when you actually start caring about characters, you grow to accept it, since much of the writing is still good, and occasionally clever. Also, lots of puns in the UI.

Gameplaywise:
There are lots of guns, but more importantly, every exotic does genuinely neat things that makes each one stand out. From a shotgun that you throw at enemies, which continues to fire as it homes in on them, to a grenade that spawns homing MIRVs... which track down the person who threw the grenade. Everything is neat, and there are tons, and tons, and tons of exotics. One of my favorites is a rocket launcher called "The Bunny", which merrily skips along the ground, pooping grenades randomly.

Also, unlike Destiny, where a Suros is marginally different from a Veist or Vanguard weapon, every manufacturer in Borderlands has very distinct weaponry:
Jakobs will always hit hard and have a western aesthetic.
Tediore all have a neat carbon-fiber look, and you reload them by throwing them at enemies (they explode) and digistructing (basically 3D-printing) a new one into your hands.
Anything that comes out of a Torgue weapon will explode. That Torgue shotgun that fires a Sword? The sword explodes... into smaller swords... Which then also explode. Explosions.

And then there are variants of every foundry, such as Bandit or E-tech versions, which throw significant twists into the weapon's traits, while retaining the original manufacturer's Identity.

Co-op:
Every character has a single ability, similar to Destiny, but their skill trees are diverse enough that you can have four people playing the same exact character, but with completely different playstyles.

The Siren, for example, could be a Healer, a fleet-footed CC Stun-locker, pure walking death, or a combination of all three, just to name one of the six playable characters, which all have actual personalities.

Content:
Borderlands 2 has tons of quests, sidequests, challenges, upgrades, loot... It's just packed with actual stuff to do. And that's just in the main game. Each DLC includes an entire mini-campaign (even the smallest is bigger than CoO by a long shot) that develops the characters and tells a complete story. And then there are comet-esque mini-mini campaigns which focus more on raid bosses and usually-holiday-themed events. It's completely loaded to the point where you're likely to get completely drained long before you explore it all... Then again, Sammy and I have put more time replaying the Torgue campaign than we've put into some entire games...

So yeh, if you only know the initial slow hours, you'll never reach the point where you remember your first gun and go "heh".