Review
Played on: Xbox Series XReleased: 2015 (UHD Texture Pack 2019)
Original release: 2012 (360/PS3/PC)
The first Borderlands was indeed an entertaining looter shooter with rock solid gameplay and a unique art direction. The beginning of a franchise that would become immensely popular, check out my thoughts on it here. However, it's presentation, story, character personalities and environments left me wanting something more polished and expanded upon.
Although it differentiated itself from similar post-apocalyptic titles like Rage and Fallout, opting for a more humorous and crazy take on the desert setting. Borderlands 1 somehow also felt undercooked, lacking that something to really stick out many years after release when I played it earlier this year.
With an UHD texture pack installed, I boarded the sequel! Ready for more crazy apocalyptic shooting mayhem once again, let's take a look at what's been improved!
With an UHD texture pack installed, I boarded the sequel! Ready for more crazy apocalyptic shooting mayhem once again, let's take a look at what's been improved!
Even from the get-go, it is clear that everything that felt like undercooked in the first Borderlands has been improved upon in Borderlands 2, times ten.
Most obvious is the higher quality cinematics and presentation of the story. Characters are visually better designed with fleshed out personalities and diverse apperances. It's all be cranked up to a more memorable and enjoyable experience to watch.
Most of the main cast have their own personal tasks they want you to complete, adding missions and some depth to their stories in the lore. Compared to many of the cinematic apporaches to big budget titles in recent years, the refreshing speedy approach and straight to the point style to dialogue and cutscenes is welcome one. Combined with an overall high quality humour focus throughout the campaign.
There's so much crazy going on at times and over the top outbursts from the cast, you'll be laughing a lot. The developers have perfectly combined the cell shaded cartoon style with humour, they suit each other and the end result is great.
While the visuals in Borderlands 2 sport far more variety in colour, environmental themes and visual flair, they also lean deeper into the cell shading art direction. The first game looked like a standard grey and brown post-apocalyptic affai, with black outlines added to make the cell shading work. This sequel has the cellshading integrally designed into every single texture and drawn line from the drawing board. Characters and environments look perfectly cartoonish, stand anywhere to look around, even at the ground, and it all looks perfectly cell shaded.
Fantastic then, that they've future proofed this re-release with an ultra HD texture pack alongside 60fps and a massive bump in resolution for console owners. It really looks sharp and impressive looking considering it's age. It did, after all, begin its day on the Xbox 360 and PS3 for console players, chugging away in a rough looking 720p@30fps.
Gameplay has the same great shooter feel as the original, with even better precision. Invisible walls blocking shots, which seemed to happen every now and then in the first game, are as far as I experienced mostly gone. There's more gun variety and it just all seems smoother and more refined to play.
Just like the first entry, you can perfectly fine play this sequel on your own. This sequel does a better job at gradually easing you in on all its features and harder missions. However, I can’t stress enough how incredible fun these titles are to play in coop! There's just something about blasting away and helping each other while chipping away at the level grind and missions together. All progress is saved for both players, and enemy levels are balanced to both players individually. Jumping in and out of coop and singleplayer is seamless.
While the visuals in Borderlands 2 sport far more variety in colour, environmental themes and visual flair, they also lean deeper into the cell shading art direction. The first game looked like a standard grey and brown post-apocalyptic affai, with black outlines added to make the cell shading work. This sequel has the cellshading integrally designed into every single texture and drawn line from the drawing board. Characters and environments look perfectly cartoonish, stand anywhere to look around, even at the ground, and it all looks perfectly cell shaded.
Fantastic then, that they've future proofed this re-release with an ultra HD texture pack alongside 60fps and a massive bump in resolution for console owners. It really looks sharp and impressive looking considering it's age. It did, after all, begin its day on the Xbox 360 and PS3 for console players, chugging away in a rough looking 720p@30fps.
Gameplay has the same great shooter feel as the original, with even better precision. Invisible walls blocking shots, which seemed to happen every now and then in the first game, are as far as I experienced mostly gone. There's more gun variety and it just all seems smoother and more refined to play.
Just like the first entry, you can perfectly fine play this sequel on your own. This sequel does a better job at gradually easing you in on all its features and harder missions. However, I can’t stress enough how incredible fun these titles are to play in coop! There's just something about blasting away and helping each other while chipping away at the level grind and missions together. All progress is saved for both players, and enemy levels are balanced to both players individually. Jumping in and out of coop and singleplayer is seamless.
There are tons of missions to complete, spread across the various areas of the environments and crazy personalities you meet. From simple wanted missions, where you need to take out a gang leader, to missions involving gathering resources. Just like the first game, the open world is cleverly divided into bite sized sections, with a loading portal between them. Making it easier to find objectives within each area to complete missions.
There's also two cars, versus one in the first game, to wreck havoc with and speed across larger terrains. The vehicles are extra fun with a friend on board, where on drives and the other shoots! Some of the desert areas, fighting vechiles feels like it echoes Mad Max car combat!
With the charming and living city, aptly named Sanctuary, working as you main hub you can travel about to far off destinations. The entire map of the game is divided into clear loading divided sections, although they feel larger and more content filled this time around compared to the first game. There's also a large number of returning characters, with highlights like Lilith, Claptrap, Scooter, Tiny Tina and Moxxi. Memorable, crazy and fun to listen to in dialogues.
It's hard to point out weaker sides to Borderlands 2, it just expands and matures a lot of the ideas the first game introduced in a brilliant way. The presentation is dialled up, story is fleshed out, more humour, more diversity in locations and tons of missions to enjoy. It takes the fundamentals of the identity it established in the first game and matures it into its own thing.
It's hard to point out weaker sides to Borderlands 2, it just expands and matures a lot of the ideas the first game introduced in a brilliant way. The presentation is dialled up, story is fleshed out, more humour, more diversity in locations and tons of missions to enjoy. It takes the fundamentals of the identity it established in the first game and matures it into its own thing.
Focused in on only shooting and looting, and while the story is fun to follow, it's neither a cinematically deep experience, nor a varied gameplay experience. It's all about hectic first person shooting and those seeking something else in gameplay won't find it here. Just like a movie, sometimes we just need something that's focuses on action and doesn't take itself too serious.
Upgraded in every way, with a clear sense of diverse art direction and detail. Jam-packed with content, lots of player levels to grind, tons of guns to find and side-missions galore. All with an even clearer identity than the first game. You won't run out of things to blast away at any time soon, all the massive DLC packs are included here too, and it gets even better if you dive into some coop along the way!
Upgraded in every way, with a clear sense of diverse art direction and detail. Jam-packed with content, lots of player levels to grind, tons of guns to find and side-missions galore. All with an even clearer identity than the first game. You won't run out of things to blast away at any time soon, all the massive DLC packs are included here too, and it gets even better if you dive into some coop along the way!
