PAX East Preview – Borderlands 2

One of the biggest attractions at last week’s PAX East 2012 was 2K Games’ large-as-life Borderlands 2 booth with lines snaking all the way around the booth and wait times of nearly 2 hours to play for 20 minutes.  Craig and I both had the opportunity to engage in a 2-player co-op game and, having already been fans of the original game, we were instantly familiar with the controls.  This is Borderlands, pure and simple.  Everything we loved about the original title makes a glorious return but in a much bigger way.

The first thing I noticed was the exuberant use of colour in the sequel over the original.  Gone are the over-abundance of muted greys and browns of the original, replaced with much brighter colours and exaggerated edge lines making the game more like engaging in a feature anime.  Remember what it was like to actually control a cartoon in Dragon’s Lair? Yeah, get ready to feel like that again with Borderlands 2.

In the short time we had with the game, we were immediately sold on it and are very excited to play the game when it releases.  I would have liked more time with the game to explore the new technology trees for my character and experiment with different weapons.  Borderlands 2 brings new playable characters to the scene but each possessing the same character classes as before, with the original heroes making cameo appearances during the campaign.  This time around, the Siren (my class of choice) has the ability to lift enemies into the air, making them vulnerable for a short period as you pummel them full of bullets.

Simply put, Borderlands 2 is the same Borderlands we all love, only prettier with more weapons, more enemies, more abilities, more, more, more. When September 18th rolls around, a great many people will disappear back into Pandora.  I plan to be one of them.