Borderlands 2 Announced 79
Today, after Eurogamer spilled the beans earlier than Randy Pitchford would have liked, Gearbox and 2K Games officially announced Borderlands 2, the sequel to 2009's well-received shooter/RPG. It's planned for sometime between April 2012 and April 2013, and will be available on the PS3, Xbox 360, and Windows. Gearbox plans to demonstrate the game in its current state during Gamescom and PAX Prime later this month.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Where's Duke Nukem Forever?
That hoax release from earlier this year was a good laugh, but, seriously, when's the real one coming out?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
if that was the name i would pre-order today with nothing else to go on.
Re: (Score:2)
Left 4 Dead 5: The Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.
FTFY
One, two, five.
Three sir!
Three!
Spoiler, don't read this (Score:3, Funny)
spilled the beans
I have some secret corporate knowledge about this game... Here comes my NDA violation.... wait for it... "you run around and shoot things and people."
My god I can't believe I gave away the secret. Sorry if I ruined it for anyone; can't blame me, I used a "spoiler" tag in the subject. Everyone act surprised when it turns out I was correct, mkay?
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
All that being said, Game Informer is still great bathroom reading. Hell, they seem to basically acknowledge their nature these days. The review section is tiny and way in the back.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
I want to know why Borderlands was ever referred to as a "shooter/RPG". In what way can Borderlands possibly be considered an RPG?
I can tell a lot of work went into Borderlands, but I can't think of a game that was so well-made that I got tired of so quickly. Same thing over and over and over. No incentive at all to do the things you're supposed to do.
I see that there are a lot of these games out now. Games where you get dropped into a world of a lot of chara
Re: (Score:2)
I can tell a lot of work went into Borderlands, but I can't think of a game that was so well-made that I got tired of so quickly. Same thing over and over and over. No incentive at all to do the things you're supposed to do.
You're right, the hundreds of people who think it was an awesome mix of FPS and RPG are wrong, and your single, solitary idea is right. Even after YEARS of existence!
Re: (Score:2)
I dunno. I enjoyed it. The shooting was actually fun, and the weapon variety was cool. Got repetitive at times, yeah, especially near the beginning. But I was always enjoying myself enough to keep playing - more than I can say for a ton of other games.
Re:Spoiler, don't read this (Score:5, Interesting)
They called it a role playing shooter. It's basically an FPS with light RPG elements. You level up your character, your proficiency in various weapon types (just by using them), and there's a simple ability tree that grant various powers. Lots of loot in the form of weapons, shields, grenade mods and class mods which give you extras like boosted shields or ammo regeneration.
It was just a tightly coded bundle of fun with a breezy little story and a good sense of humor. Seemed generally inoffensive to me, but I guess some people thrive on being offended.
I loved the game, and I'm someone who also loves deep RPGs where the stats screens look like spreadsheets. I get bored of a genre if I play it too much, though, so I play all sorts of game types. I like RPG. I like FPS. I like platformers. Puzzle games. Whatever. Why limit yourself?
I don't care for games where there is abundant running around and shooting and screaming and killing
Well, some people do, especially in co-op with friends. Gosh, I hope that's OK, good sir.
I guess we should all be playing À La Recherche Du Temps Perdu: The Video Game.
Maybe the amygdala, except the amygdala figures out in about .5 seconds that none of it is real so it goes back to sleep.
Yeah, my brain figures out pretty much every game isn't real. It's good at that.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't get me wrong, I really wanted to love Borderlands. The mechanics, the interface, the art direction were all very nice.
I just never got the answer to the question, "and why am I running around doing all this shooting?"
Re: (Score:2)
You were running around shooting shit because shit was shooting at you from the very beginning! You wanna live or die?
Re: (Score:1)
There's no real reason, the storyline is borderline nonexistent, it's pathetic to try and pass this game off as decent. Horribly mundane, I would understand if it were a multiplayer-experience only but it's not, it's marketed also towards single-playing gamers and I'm one of those.
To me it's a shame this crap gets made and we still haven't seen Bionic Commando's sequel.
Re: (Score:2)
You forgot:
Shallow and pedantic.
Insists upon itself.
Re: (Score:2)
I want to know why Borderlands was ever referred to as a "shooter/RPG". In what way can Borderlands possibly be considered an RPG?
The same way that Diablo is sometimes referred to as an RPG. Now we both may not entirely agree with that categorization either, but it is seen as an Action RPG, and Borderlands shares much more with Diablo than it does with a typical FPS.
Both games include classes, leveling mechanics, hit points, talent trees, equipment, character stats, large amounts of random loot, and a simplistic storyline that provides the motivation to kill some monsters / bad guys and loot the bodies.
It may be hack 'n slash, but it
Re: (Score:3)
I guess I take the "role" in "role playing game" too literally.
To me, "role" indicates some dramatic arc, some story, some goal. There is a lot that is good and interesting about Borderlands, but nobody can say there is a dramatic arc.
Re: (Score:2)
The world is DEAD! The DRAMA!
Re: (Score:2)
Technically, you take on the "role" of a mercenary on a mission to find a great vault of treasure and fame (goal.) It's all explained in the intro (back story.) ;)
In order to find that vault, you are forced to work with the people living on the planet in order to get whatever information you can, all the while hearing their stories and helping them with their plight. (story)
Re: (Score:2)
If it's trivial enough for the developers to allow you to skip by using the ESC key, it can hardly be called a "backstory".
[actually, I don't know if the developers of Borderlands allow the player to skip the intro, but it was such a good thought, I figured I'd go ahead and use it]
MGS4 (Score:2)
It has about as much time invested in story building as gameplay, weaving a very large and intricate story with an extensive history and character development.
You can skip those scenes too.
Re: (Score:2)
Now you're trying to hide the foot in your mouth. Come on, man. There is a story that builds and has drama. But what about having a 'role' and 'playing' it necessitates a 'dramatic arc' anyway? You're just trying too hard to say its not an RPG despite your blatant ignorance to having played it. (If you've played it, please get an IQ test and report back immediately.)
Re: (Score:3)
I guess I couldn't disagree with you more. For me, Borderlands had more replay value than any other game I've played, save for maybe Fallout 3.
I played through with each character (very different play styles), and then did playthrough 2 with each character (actually, still have to complete one character). Not to mention the four DLCs (three of the four being outstanding).
I played through all of Playthrough 2 and three of the four DLCs with one character in co-op mode with a good friend. Had a BLAST. La
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Agreed. My wife and I have played through every character. I'm not going to say it is the best game ever made, but it has been one of the funnest games to play for us.
Don't forget the artwork (Score:2)
These days I'm sensitive to crappy graphics, trying to look real but not doing well. There are a lot of games around like this, and usually after I see a game video or demo, I instantly dismiss them.
Borderlands got around this with the cool cel shaded look. I like it a LOT better than going anime.
I also appreciated the humor in the game, from Dr. Zed to Marcus to Claptrap. It wasn't contrived and forced like in Duke Nuke'm Forever.
Re: (Score:2)
Given the massive amount of awesome Gearbox pulled off with Borderlands, I was really disappointed with DNF. Then again, when you're given shit to polish, you're still polishing shit. I'm still really hopeful that, given their own IP to work with, Borderlands 2 will be just as enjoyable as the first.
Re: (Score:2)
I agree, it was a very simple and repetive game that should have gotten boring quickly, but for some reason I absolutely loved it. I spent more hours playing it and all of the DLC's co-op than any other game I have every owned.
The rotoscoped grahics were cool, the characters were fun, the intensity of big shootouts was exciting, and I think the main part - the elusive hunt for better gear was addictive. Properly addictive - stimulating the reward centers of your brain, just like a poker machine.
Re: (Score:2)
That wasn't a very flattering comparison.
I'm not sure I want that kind of stimulation.
But OK, as I said for the first few hours it was a kick. I just couldn't see the missions going anywhere I wanted to go. The artwork was terrific, though. Very fun.
Re: (Score:2)
You clearly didn't play it. That's why it doesn't make sense to you.
Go play it.
Re: (Score:1)
Stats and leveling up. Thats all thats required to be considered part of the RPG grouping., Aside from that i love borderlands. Nice light fun, and Scooter cracks me up. No heavy story just hop in, grab a few missions, and blow stuff up.
Re: (Score:3)
"In what way can Borderlands possibly be considered an RPG?"
Levels, stats, quests. You know, the key elements of an RPG.
I don't disagree that it was a bit boring though, I still found myself playing it a lot, but I think that was more because it was fun to prat around whilst talking to 3 friends, rather than because the game was inherently fun or had an enjoyable storyline. I think if I played it solo I'd have been bored after about 1 minute.
Re: (Score:2)
In the world of video games, any game with stats is lumped in with RPGs. Counter Strike does not have stats (or classes or levels) and so is just a shooter. Personally, i wouldn't call it an RPG, you don't make your character or any real choices.
i'm going to let you in on a secret. People who aren't you are different than you. They like different things. Which of course makes them evil and stupid. Now you can both understand why things you don't like are sometimes liked by others AND enjoy that warm
Hope they improve it (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Randomness? I'm not quite sure what you mean there. Random unique weapon drops with tons of different
Re: (Score:2)
Mad Moxxi lets me store my extra guns so I can collect more... it's not a complete waste ;) Well... maybe in terms of it should have been in the base game, but...
Re: (Score:2)
An MMORPG without the MMO? Around here, we call that an RPG.
Re: (Score:2)
He means a traditional RPG is story driven, and you progress your character through the story. In Borderlands, the story was ancillary, and served to tie one boss battle to the next. In that respect, it was more like a dungeon grinder (Diablo) or an MMORPG, where the goal is to become more powerful, explore, and collect cool loot, rather than to actually win the game.
It's a valid point, and if you enjoy that style of play, then Borderlands was an amusing game. It's just a terrible way to state it.
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly. Borderlands is First Person Diablo With Guns. It is also Tremendous Fun when played with friends.
Re: (Score:2)
I think the more generic term is "action RPG". That is, story is secondary to beefing up the character via repeated combat and loot collecting.
Re: (Score:2)
I *loved* the way you died. It was clever and made for a really fun game.
If you die during a firefight, a progress bar starts emptying and you can "save" yourself from dying by killing an enemy before it finishes.
Also, if you're not going to make it, your friends can come over and revive you.
And if you do end up dying, you lose like 10% of your cash, that's all.
All this makes you wade in hip deep into the mayhem.
The randomness didn't really matter. It keeps the game replayable, because we all know, a ra
Finally! (Score:1)
Not surprised (Score:1)
PC gamers want real options (Score:2)
Maybe this time... (Score:1)
They won't use a crappy game network like Gamespy so, you know, I'll actually be able to play it online. I literally never got multiplayer working behind a firewall and I was FAR from the only person with this issue. As well, this was the only game I have ever had a problem playing online...
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
By snooping on the traffic, I figured out that the problem appears to be that during the online initiation phase, if there is packet loss, the arbitrator opens up a new connection, which bumps up the port number. This causes it to not work through restricted cone NAT routers, but only through open cone ones. So if you have an ultra-cheap and unsafe router that doesn't maintain port tables for each remote host, it works, but if you have a real NAT router / firewall that only accepts return traffic from the
Re: (Score:2)
Games Journalism (Score:2)
Meh, mediocre games get announced all the time. I'm not sure why this merited any attention other than the perturbance regarding the story being broken early and Pitchfork's childish retort. It's sometimes interesting I guess to see what executives really think (Twitter) without their PR departments filtering everything.
The Ars article was right on the spot, but it's not a huge suprise that publishers and games "journalists" have a parasitic/symbiotic weird thing going on with their business models.
Re: (Score:2)
Granted, if you can only handle getting annoyed at one failure of journalism, it's more important to focus o
Re: (Score:3)
I seriously doubt it was "accidental". Borderlands 2's main competition, Rage is getting shown to the public tomorrow at their big Quakecon media/fan event. Tomorrow. Announcing your product the day before your competition shows off a live demo of theirs? Well I never!
I'm excited... (Score:2)
Need coffee... (Score:1)
Hardcore mode please (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
At pretty much every point in the game, death is meaningless. Death just slows you down. Look at ALL FPS games and point me to one that did anything more than port you back to a spawn point or your last save location. Taking away some of your cash is actually the harshest punishment I've ever seen in an FPS game.
Re: (Score:2)
I always had this idea (but never the time or the skills) for a survival-horror game that behaved like nethack. Once you die, that's it. I feel like that'd make the game pretty intense.
My Response (Score:1)
Brown (Score:2)
I have one question: Will the sequel also be monotonously brown?
Between Fallout 3, New Vegas, the caves in Oblivion, and Borderlands, I've had just about all the grey and brown I can stand.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The FA states that the new game will have "more varied environments" - and that it's still on Pandora.
Hopefully that doesn't just mean "brown and grey, in exciting new shapes."
Could anyone explain the appeal to me? (Score:2)
Or the hype?
Seriously, I bought it. And it was maybe one of the most disappointing purchases of my gaming career. What seemed to start out like a Diablo-in-3D turned into a boring, repetitive experience. And I'm not even mentioning the half-assed console port look-and-feel, the crippled and pretty much nonfunctional networking (unless you were willing to forgo any and all network security you might have) and the loading times from the age of the dataset.
Was it better and actually playable on consoles? Or, d
Re: (Score:2)
I played it on PC, mainly co-op with my best friend, with perhaps 50% more solo time too. Two playthroughs of the main campaign, to get to the loot-pinata mode.
Frankly, I liked it a lot. We could play the campaign as a duo, and that was worth every cent of admission (to me). Sharing weapon drops ("Oh, you like rifles? I found some good ones ...") wasn't bad. The main fun was in cooperatively tackling things. My partner was much more .... Rambo-esque than I am, and often would run headlong into things that
Re: (Score:2)
It was awesome on the PS3. I'm still playing it with my financee. It's one of the few games that we both enjoy. It has entry level simplicity with some cool character refinements that go beyond any previous FPS. Yes it might be a little repetitive, but what FPS isn't?
Care to name for me an FPS that doesn't just throw you up against the same 5 mobs over and over?
The really good thing about borderlands (for me) was the splitscreen campaign. The teamwork wasn't forced (you press this button while I pull this l
it's a pretty good concept (Score:2)
It was a great concept - take the basic 'wander around and shoot stuff' ethos of Fallout, add in some lite rpg stuff, use the "randomly generated item of awesomeness" system of WoW (where the quality of the drop is determined by random seed for each drop, displayed for the character by color, and the quality then provides the budget from which the randomly-determined stats for the weapon are generated), rinse, repeat.
The only shortcoming was fairly characteristic of console shooters and that was the default
Maybe this is a bad idea. (Score:2)
I'm still waiting for an ending for the previous game. Once I beat it, I called a friend complaining that my game glitched, and I didn't get an ending. They explained, "NOPE, THAT WAS IT"