Borderlands 2

So I've been playing this game called Borderlands 2...and IT’S AWESOME’, is what I'm inclined to say and I'm going to try and reign myself in here. This way I can try and articulate a piece of writing, that doesn't show me to be some rabid fan-boy.

The fact of the matter is this; I’m not a fan-boy. I didn’t highly anticipate the game until very close to its release. I’d always been intrigued by the first Borderlands but something about it scared me off. I think that stems from the fact that in theory to describe the borderlands franchise is simple; ‘Shoot and Loot’. Describing the Borderlands experience to someone who has never played it is always tricky because essentially it’s going to boil down to: you go here, pick up quest, shoot and loot, hand in quest, rinse and repeat. Honestly that kind of description is a disservice because although essentially even though those are the fundamentals throughout the game, the way in which it is executed is done perfectly. Where the original game was concerned, aforementioned reasons stopped me from ever purchasing it despite glowing reviews.

Anyway fast-forward to now, I’ve taken the plunge and fallen deeply. It took a while before this ‘fan-boy’ like attitude towards the game hit though. I say this because the first few hours of the game are slow, I mean really slow. Nothing of great impact really happens either, nothing stands out. There was the odd joke to be sniggered at, the odd reference to popular culture but not a lot else. The quests were just the usual mundane fare of fetch quests and kill X amount of this etc. The game gets going once you reach Sanctuary, the quest HUB of Pandora. All of a sudden the game-play becomes more archaic and frantic, with scraps of Hyperion bots flying all over the shop.

Ok reading that last paragraph back, I can see myself going into reviewer mode. That’s not really what I want to do as I’m sure most people have already read a million reviews, which all pretty much say the same thing. So I guess I could just talk about my experiences with two different characters I’m using? Yeah ok, I’ll do that.

So I’ve got two characters on the go. I’ve got my Siren which I’m using for solo play and then in my other save I’m using the Mechromancer, which I’m going through with two other friends.

Just so that certain story elements of the game weren’t ruined throughout co-operative play, I decided that it would be a good idea to make a character for solo play. I opted for the Siren as her ability was the one that got me the most excited pre-release. Phase-lock BITCHES! The game is obviously geared for co-operative play, there are bosses in this game that are sometimes just too much to take on solo... especially when your ability doesn’t work on some of them *sigh* that said I’m still having a great time with it. Being able to take the time over loot and do things in a leisurely fashion is a definite bonus over co-operative play.

Ok so the best and worst of my experiences with Borderlands 2 have come with the co-op. This is mainly due to the tension and stressfulness of some sessions. So tonight we’re questing in the dust and I open a crate. Out pops an orange SMG, I mention it and ensues a stressful debate about who should carry it. I end up winning on a coin toss, thrown by another third party. The next ten minutes of play are tense. I will say we are close friends and there was never a danger of any breakdown of that relationship but this just proves the allure and desire for rare loot. Overall though I’m having a blast, playing with friends is how this game is supposed to be and it’s where it’s at its strongest.

(Oh right, I was going to talk about the Mechromancer. Geeze I’m rambling tonight)

So the Mechromancer is an interesting build. Supposedly the ‘n00b’ build, understandably as it has an arguably overpowered Deathtrap taking care of business however, it offers a skill tree that completely switches the game on its head. This comes in the form of the ‘ordered chaos’ tree. The idea of this tree is that you empty clips onto enemies in order to gain a stack of ‘anarchy’, each stack of anarchy adds 1.75% of gun damage to your stats and takes 1.75% gun accuracy away from your stats. You can have up to something like 400 stacks, maybe? If you manually reload however you will start to lose your stacks. There is a skill later on though that gives you an accuracy bonus and health bonus as a swap for your stacks. This changes the priorities of the game immediately. All of a sudden you’re looking for guns with high damage but smaller clip and a faster reload speed. Accuracy becomes a non-issue because as you gain stacks you’ll lose it anyway, forcing you to be more aggressive and up-front. There are a load of different strategies to implement with this skill tree that are so different to any other character play style in the game and if you can’t tell I’m having a blast playing as her.

I have a feeling that despite my best efforts this came off as quite a fan-boy post but whatever it doesn’t matter. I’m about level 20 with the Siren and level 23 with the Mechromancer. Have plenty of core game content yet to still plough through as well as purchasing the Captain Scarlet DLC today – yet to try it. I’m loving every second.