Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel

sesselpupser

sesselpupser

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neema_t
So Gearbox/2K have announced a 'new' Borderlands game:

2kau_borderlands_fob.jpg


- Developed by 2K Australia, not Gearbox, but apparently written by Anthony Burch et al. (I think?)
- Chronologically between Borderlands and Borderlands 2.
- PC, PS3 and X360, no current gen releases; i.e. it's an expansion to Borderlands 2 rather than an entirely new game.
- Set on Pandora's moon and the Hyperion base visible throughout Borderlands 2.
- Includes two new weapon types, Laser and Cryo.
- Features four entirely new classes based on old characters: A Claptrap called Fragtrap (I never did play the Claptrap DLC from the first game, I don't know if he's from that), pre-Loaderfied Wilhelm, the Sheriff of Lynchwood and Athena, an assassin from Borderlands' General Knoxx DLC.
- Introduces - shudder - an oxygen mechanic. You have an O2 gauge that depletes constantly and killing enemies yields O2 pickups. Your helmet - and that of enemies - can be destroyed (it's a shield bubble, so it probably just goes away until it regenerates again), causing some problems.
- Also you have a jetpack which uses your O2.
- And enemies have Australian accents.

I'm interested but pessimistic, Borderlands players will probably understand given the poor track record of outsourced Borderlands content, and as far as I can tell 2K Australia have only really worked on the three Bioshocks - none of which I liked - and XCOM: Declassified (or whatever) which apparently bombed. Still, as a huge fan of Borderlands I will be keeping an eye on it.

Sources:
Rock Paper Shotgun
Eurogamer
2K Australia
 
- Introduces - shudder - an oxygen mechanic. You have an O2 gauge that depletes constantly and killing enemies yields O2 pickups. Your helmet - and that of enemies - can be destroyed (it's a shield bubble, so it probably just goes away until it regenerates again), causing some problems.
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This just sounds very, very annoying. I'm hoping they can get this right as I love the Borderlands games, but so far apart from the new weapon types it doesn't really grab my attention too much.
 
I might "play" this but don't know if I will go all wild like back on BL1 with the armory.
 
I don't think the farming-out to other devs went too badly with BL2 and I like the look of the gameplay for BL:TPS. I do hope the humour stays good though.
 
Here's a piece with one or two small details: http://ow.ly/x75Cl (apologies for the shortened link, I copied it from twitter on my phone, it's an Edge article)

- The oxygen thing is apparently not going to be about suffocation, rather it's used as fuel for the jetpack and other abilities only.

- Wilhelm's action skill is about summoning drones (I wonder if that'll be like Mordecai and Bloodwing in Borderlands?), Athena's is a 'catch and return' shield power and the ability to double jump, which doesn't sound all that thrilling... But then again, neither did Salvador's dual wielding and that turned out to be pretty mad in the end.

That's all I can remember. Sounds interesting, I suppose we'll know more after E3 or whatever.
 
Now there's this:



If you can't be bothered to watch:

- Cryo is a new elemental type applied to existing weapon types while lasers are a new weapon type which carry on the manufacturer traits. In the video there's a Maliwan laser which fires a constant beam and a Dahl laser that fires bursts of laser pulses. The player also shows off the cryo effect which can apparently freeze enemies in any position and then shatter them in a random way, so you don't see the same freeze animations all the time.

- The Oz system means there's a new item category, the Oz Kit. It seems to have similar stat modifiers as some shields; apart from the amount of Oz it can store, one Oz Kit also alters the character's resistance to some elemental damage, another grants improved stats while the player is 'air'borne (i.e. off the ground).

- Oz is depleted by breathing and it seems like it'll give you a damage over time effect when you run out, popping an enemy's shield bubble helmet will start a suffocating animation and damage them while their helmet is down.

- Oz is also used to do a ground pound attack, thrusting forwards (and presumably in other directions) and upwards, like a dash and double-jump move.

- Oz seems to be replenished only by Oz sources in the environment; it leaks out of the ground, but there are also Oz stations you can activate that create a bubble of Oz (similar to the ION Loader's shield).

- Fire weapons don't work when you're not in an Oz-filled environment, presumably because there's no oxygen to burn. That'll be another thing to consider in combat, I suppose.

- Pandora's Moon is basically Australia, hence natives will have Australian accents. Makes sense, I suppose, given the developer's nationality.

- Seems like the ever-familiar bandits are being re-used, but they have a new unit type which is a bit 'Big Daddy in Space'. Attack patterns and animations look the same as in Borderlands 2, but that's hardly surprising given the rife
recycling of assets in Borderlands games so far.

- Subjective opinion from the video: Low gravity looks like it'll be pretty damn annoying. Loot containers spew their contents and take a few seconds to hit the ground again - It'll probably look cool to begin with, then it'll just be an annoyance, I think. I got annoyed enough with the container opening animations in BL2...

- Athena's power looks interesting; when you press the action skill button she draws a shield held in her left hand while still wielding her gun in her right. Damage the shield takes charges it up, signified by a spinning animation, and then you press the action skill button again - before the timer runs out - to throw the shield at an enemy, Captain America style. Naturally the damage dealt depends on how much damage you took. One of her 'one point wonder' skills will enable the shield to bounce between several enemies before returning.

- Wilhelm, the other character in the video, isn't shown too much and we don't see his skill in action but the narrator details his physical 'evolution' from human to android (as he is in Borderlands 2) as you spend skill points, I think that's a nice touch. Fragtrap is also shown briefly at the end, again, not much to say about him.


That's all I can remember now, I got sidetracked while typing this. You might as well go and watch the video, it makes the game look pretty slow but I wonder if that's just how they were playing it.
 
neema_t
- Subjective opinion from the video: Low gravity looks like it'll be pretty damn annoying. Loot containers spew their contents and take a few seconds to hit the ground again - It'll probably look cool to begin with, then it'll just be an annoyance, I think. I got annoyed enough with the container opening animations in BL2...
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Even worse, orange weapon, someone steals it by jumping up.
 
TJ13
Even worse, orange weapon, someone steals it by jumping up.
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There's often a scramble for good gear, I don't think it'll make much of a difference to that 'first come, first serve' thing... But imagine if there's a particularly violent lootsplosion and a legendary gets shot into orbit, that would really suck. Borderlands 2 already had dodgy collision physics in that regard.
 
A trailer:



A pair of release dates: October 14th in the US, October 17th for everyone else (I think).

A pre-order DLC: The Shock Drop Slaughter Pit.

That is all.
 
Add this to the list of things that are extant:


So far, so Borderlands 2. I wonder if we can bring our Badass rank with us?
 
I think she has a thing for Claptrap...

I certainly won't be doing my first playthrough as him, though I do look forward to it when I finally get to play him.
 
MeanElf
I think she has a thing for Claptrap...

I certainly won't be doing my first playthrough as him, though I do look forward to it when I finally get to play him.
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You mean because of the way she's all, er, O_O most of the way through? I won't be doing my first playthrough with Claptrap either, from what I've seen I think I might use Athena first... If I buy the game. I've just seen that they're doing another season pass which answers the question I had about long-term expansion (i.e. it's not going to just be a glorified DLC), but I'd be interested to know who's developing this DLC. I also want to know whether or not 2K Australia can match or surpass Gearbox when it comes to making a Borderlands game and how long the vanilla game will be before I'll be 100% comfortable paying for it.

I'm not done with Borderlands 2 yet either so I may not preorder this one, but given that I passed the 285 hour mark yesterday (it amazes me that after all this time I can still play it in 5-hour sittings) it is getting tempting. Here are the overviews of the other three characters (there were a few options so I went with Rev3 as @Ddrizle already started them off):

Edit: Language warning!




 
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neema_t
You mean because of the way she's all, er, O_O most of the way through?
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Yeah :lol: pretty much...and her verbal outburst too.

I'm guessing from previous posts of yours that you are playing on the PC version. If not, how do you tell the amount of hours you have played? So all I know is that I've played 2 and then the original for the lion's share of my time since BL2 popped up for free on PS+.

Regarding the characters though, as I think I've already said before, it's going to be interesting to see how they manage to get you to identify in the same way while playing as someone who is intrinsically a bad guy by the second game. Either way, I think it should be interesting.
 
MeanElf
I'm guessing from previous posts of yours that you are playing on the PC version. If not, how do you tell the amount of hours you have played? So all I know is that I've played 2 and then the original for the lion's share of my time since BL2 popped up for free on PS+.
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I am on PC but there's an in-game timer as well that keeps track of how long you've played with each character individually, I don't know if it's in the PS3 version (though I don't know why it wouldn't be) but you should be able to see it by going to the character select screen on the main menu, there you should see 'Time' between 'Save' and the current playthrough they're on.

MeanElf
Regarding the characters though, as I think I've already said before, it's going to be interesting to see how they manage to get you to identify in the same way while playing as someone who is intrinsically a bad guy by the second game. Either way, I think it should be interesting.
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Well, in a way you weren't exactly acting morally in Borderlands 2; apart from Hyperion, you fight:
- Bandits who were originally people working for the corporations who buggered off and left them there so they went insane,
- Creatures who are just doing what animals do, i.e. defending themselves. As I'm sitting here I actually can't think who else you fight that doesn't fit into those categories.

Anyway, You take jobs from just about everyone to kill people who don't really deserve it or steal things from them and really the only person who isn't corrupt in some way is Roland, I suppose Claptrap isn't too bad either. So there's not all that much separating you from Handsome Jack, except for his ultimate plan, the Wildlife Preserve, the construction of Opportunity (and what it entailed for the people who built it), how Overlook is treated... Ok, so there's a few things, but while I now mostly ignore the story of Borderlands 2, I do appreciate that it is aware that what it asks you to do is generally pretty dark and morally questionable.
 
neema_t
...by going to the character select screen on the main menu, there you should see 'Time' between 'Save' and the current playthrough they're on...
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Thanks, I'll give that a go 👍

Yeah, it's all pretty dark I suppose. I was only curious really about the mechanic and story approach that they'll be using. Sucker Puch did a good job with the evil playthrough on Infamous: Second Son - that's more in line with what I meant. I suppose for me it's a bit like the interest some people seem to have when studying a serial killer - a kind of fascination.
 
I forgot to mention, you can get the PC version for £22.50 here:
savygamer.co.uk/2014/09/12/borderlands-the-pre-sequel-pc-22-50/
 
This seems to have slipped us by...

Mr Torgue and Sir Hammerlock essentially telling us what we already know...but it's Mr Torgue!
 
CAMAROBOY69
Such a strange decision.
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Not really, they get to re-use the entire engine of Borderlands 2, make new assets (even though it looks like it re-uses quite a bit) and sell it as an entire game. On the one hand, it's a last resort cash-in, but on the other hand it looks like if you liked Borderlands 2 you'll like this as well.

They've said they wanted to make more content for Borderlands 2 but it was really pushing the consoles' RAM limits, so I guess this is the next best thing - I'm not sure I understand the logic and I don't fully believe that line, I think what they really mean is they can make way more money if they made a glorified DLC, make it into an actual game and then add DLC to that... But hey, if the content is good I don't really mind. It certainly looks good so far, if a little recycled in some places.
 
neema_t
Not really, they get to re-use the entire engine of Borderlands 2, make new assets (even though it looks like it re-uses quite a bit) and sell it as an entire game. On the one hand, it's a last resort cash-in, but on the other hand it looks like if you liked Borderlands 2 you'll like this as well.

They've said they wanted to make more content for Borderlands 2 but it was really pushing the consoles' RAM limits, so I guess this is the next best thing - I'm not sure I understand the logic and I don't fully believe that line, I think what they really mean is they can make way more money if they made a glorified DLC, make it into an actual game and then add DLC to that... But hey, if the content is good I don't really mind. It certainly looks good so far, if a little recycled in some places.
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That line right there is why I expected a next gen version of this game.
 
CAMAROBOY69
That line right there is why I expected a next gen version of this game.
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If you take the "I think what they really mean is they can make way more money if they made a glorified DLC, make it into an actual game and then add DLC to that..." line into consideration it makes sense, though, as it's far, far cheaper this way so their profits will be that much bigger. If they were making a proper sequel it would've been current gen, Gearbox has said as much, but it's sort of an expandalone (ugh, I hate that phrase).
 
Like camaroboy I would have liked it to be on the next gen consoles. I'm not even saying it should have been developed for the next gen consoles. Just a straight port would have done. Considering how much the next gen consoles are supposed to be "similar" to PCs I imagine it wouldn't have been that difficult. I guess its the same story as Grid Autosport and F1 2014. The majority of sales wouldbe on the last gen consoles and PC so they opted out of it.
 

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