Dan: For reasons that I'll go into a second, I'm not very fond of Borderlands. But the weird thing is, I keep wanting to play more. I feel as though I've ingested some terribly addictive narcotic - and the only high it offers is a gambler's high. As World of Warcraft players will know, the thrill of finding a rare item is unique and powerful. It's also Borderlands' chief draw, and the key contributing factor to its considerable appeal.

At least, that's how I see it. Would you agree, Bennett?

Bennett: I think we're going to have rather different viewpoints on this game Dan, and yet come to the same conclusion. Personally, I'm really digging the entire game as a whole, and the much-vaunted loot aspect is but one piece of this intriguing post-apocalyptic puzzle. I'm enjoying it for the same reasons I liked Fallout 3; it offers an RPG-lite experience combined with a shooter, allowing my bullet-blazing character to develop and grow how I see fit. Oh, and you also get to blow irradiated mutant creatures into little wobbling chunks of meat. High impact violence here we come!

You're not a big fan of the game's RPG elements though, are you Dan?

The biggest fleas we ever did see

Dan: Well, I'm not sure to what extent there are RPG elements, really. True, there are stats and skill trees, but no role-playing - no real sense of ownership of your character.

Cosmetically, you can change the colour of their hair and clothes, give 'em a new name, and that's it. Why Gearbox didn't include a character creator a la Fallout 3, Mass Effect, etc. is beyond me. The existing
characters are all obnoxious cliches. (This is especially evident in Lilith: the sultry vixen with gender-specific skills like "Mind Games" and "Hard to Get". Ugh.)

So far as the underlying mechanics go, I have two main criticisms. The first is something I mentioned to you while were playing: the fact that pretty much every upgrade in all character classes is some form of stat increase. Along with the thrill of finding rare loot discussed above, a big part of what makes games like Diablo and WoW so satisfyingly addictive is the wide selection of powers available for each class. When you hit level 20 as a Necromancer in Diablo II, you get to summon a fire golem. When you hit level 20 in Borderlands, you get to make one of your guns fire a bit faster. Gee. Awesome.

This leads to my second criticism: most of the skills are just flat out dull. Again, take Lilith as an example: there is so much Gearbox could've done with her Phasewalking ability - teleportation, enemy possession etc. - but as it is, it's just utterly unexciting. And broken too! Let's not forget that.


Bennett: True, the skill trees and levelling system aren’t exactly deep, but compare this to Call of Duty or Doom, and I think it’s still a fair call to say this is a (Lite-)Role Playing Shooter. Even though the skill tree isn’t ripe with awesome skills hanging from its lower branches, I still get a real kick out of levelling up. And making up for the lack of skills is the massive range of guns in the game, each of which is tied intricately into the skill and level system. It’s almost like these guns are a replacement for skills, as they’ve all got very different abilities. For example, I can’t unlock a skill to shoot fire from my fingertips, but I can pump enough points into my elemental ability that I unlock a shotgun that shoots incendiary bullets instead.

Vehicles are fun, if somewhat twitchy

It’s definitely a shooter first and foremost though, with the Role Playing element playing second fiddle. And as a shooter, it’s pretty darn cool. It ticks all the necessary shooter boxes to deliver an enjoyable experience for itchy trigger fingers. In fact, I’d say that the gunplay in this game is superior to Fallout 3’s. It’s not really a surprise though; Gearbox has been making shooters for the last decade, so they better bloody know what they’re doing.

It’s a solid, polished shooter when played solo, but it becomes something else when played with pals, don’t you think?

Dan: Co-op is more fun than single-player, definitely. The constant stream of respawning enemies can be frustrating when playing alone, but in co-op it creates an atmosphere of constant tension and excitement. My only criticism is that – again – Gearbox could’ve done more with it. Though many of the skills are designed to complement one another, there isn’t enough interaction between players, which seems to me to be a missed opportunity. For example, what if they’d made it so when one player shoots an enemy with an ice gun, the other player can shoot it with a fire gun for increased damage? In combination with each other, simple little interactions like that are what give rise to deeper and more satisfying combat.

Changing the subject a bit, I’m curious to hear what you think of the tone and general aesthetic of the game. Personally, I’m a big fan of the … what are the graphics again? Cel shaded? Well, anyway, the whole game more or less looks like a comic book – colourful and full of personality. Speaking of personality, Borderlands could definitely do with less of it. I appreciate that Gearbox has tried to make their game funny, but the truth of the matter is that they’ve tried much too hard. Case in point: that annoying robot thing that won’t shut. the hell. up.

Bennett:While it uses the Unreal 3 engine, it looks like no U3 game I’ve ever seen. Apparently it’s technically not even cel shading, but the end result is that it looks just like it. I’m not sure why Gearbox thought they were the first company to do these style of graphics – they’re certainly not, as we’ve seen them in XIII and Red Steel 2 to name a few. But it’s been done few enough times that it’s still refreshingly different. At times the game is very reminiscent of Team Fortress 2 as well, with its heavily stylised, exaggerated comic-book characters and Warner Bros landscapes. So in all, a very sexy way of depicting the depressing inevitability we all face of a life in the desert, where mutants and death reign supreme.

While I’m not too fussed about the attempt at humour, (though I agree that Claptrap should be hung, drawn and quartered), what does irritate me is the fact that the PC interface is even more annoying than the whiny little robot trashcan. Now, when I recently interviewed Randy Pitchford, the CEO of Gearbox, he looked me in the eye and swore that the PC version would be the definitive version of the game. Randy, dear sir – you are a rotten liar.

Randy, you lied. So please, go right ahead

You have lumped PC users with an excruciatingly painful interface that works masterfully with Xbox 360 controllers, yet is a painful Rubiks cube of barbed wire and broken glass when negotiated with a mouse. I’d be even angrier if the PC’s smoother framerates didn’t make it the visually superior version of the game. Note that these frames come at a cost – my 4870x2, i5@ 3.7GHz PC struggled at times, without antialiasing (which doesn’t work anyway).

Considering you’ll spend so much time in the GUI, looking at quests and managing the six gazillion guns you’ve picked up, this lack of attention to the GUI is a real slap in the face to PC gamers. Are you as upset as me Dan?

Dan: The interface is definitely sloppy, there’s no doubt about that. Instead of streamlining it for mouse and keyboard, they’ve clearly just taken the 360 version and replaced buttons with keys. As a result, even simple tasks like buying ammo and accepting quests are much more cumbersome than they need to be. If you want to buy in bulk, for instance, you have to do it one item at a time, which is just silly. Keyboards have number keys for a reason.

Another thing that sucks about the PC version is that you’re forced to edit config files to toggle basic options, like V-Sync and mouse smoothing. To me, that’s clear evidence that Gearbox was more focused on the console versions. I can’t blame them for that, though. Financially, I imagine it makes more sense for them to prioritise the 360 version over the others. That doesn’t excuse their sloppiness, of course, but it does make it understandable.

In any case, despite my reservations, I do like Borderlands. Though a bit bare bones for my taste, the RPG and shooter mechanics are rock solid and mesh fairly well. And now that they’ve got the engine and basis structure down, I suspect Gearbox will really go to town in the sequel, much like Blizzard did with Diablo 2. What do you think?

Want to beat the game? Go Sniper

Bennett:It says something great about the core gameplay that we both had such a great time in spite of the consolitis that Borderlands suffers from. When played co-op, it captures the awesome feeling of questing in WoW with a group of pals, only this time you’ve got a Level 15 Explosive Sniper Rifle instead of a Staff of Righteous Glory, which in my opinion makes it even more fun. There’s a flipside to this though – play it solo and it all gets a little bit grindy, a little bit monotonous. If you’re gonna buy Borderlands, make sure you bring your mates along for the ride.

As somebody who has spent equal time with both the 360 and PC versions, I’ll be finishing the game on the 360. Yes, the PC version looks marginally better (albeit with rather high system requirements) and the controls are far easier to kill people with, but it’s obvious that this was designed for consoles. The ongoing inventory wrangling just annoyed me too much. Sorry PC users, once again the console kids get the more polished experience. Don't worry too much, you’re still likely to have a blast with Borderlands, you’ll just have to put up with a few rough edges while you do it.

Dan’s Score: 3/5
Bennett’s Score: 3.5/5 (4/5 for the 360 version)