Borderlands.

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Borderlands.

PostPosted: Thu Oct 22, 2009 4:44 am

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Fenavian
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4 Player co-op. Too much fun. Too many weapons. Not enough vehicle or character variety. BUT it is a must buy in my book.
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Re: Borderlands.

PostPosted: Thu Oct 22, 2009 10:27 am

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Anubis
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How much of an RPG is it? I have held off mainly because it just looks like a skill driven FPS, rather than any real kind of deep RPG.

Would be interested to hear any thoughts on it :)
"Perhaps this is what I have always wished for since that day. The loss and destruction of all. That's right, one must destroy before creating. In that case, if my conscience becomes a hindrance to me, then I will simply erase it. I have no other choice but to move forward....therefore!" - Lelouch vi Britannia/Zero, Code Geass: Hangyaku no Lelouch

Forever an eXile and proud of it!

Re: Borderlands.

PostPosted: Thu Oct 22, 2009 1:33 pm

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M.Steiner
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I was surprised this didn't appear on your "upcoming games of 2009" tbh Anny. :)
Right now it doesn't feel like an FPS but with some RPG elements, or just another shooter. But then I didn't think it looked like it from everything i'd watched either. I'd say it's the other way around personally (more RPG). The game must be huge with literally hundreds of side quests. Played about 7hrs or so driving around, doing sidequests & a few main ones and i'm still in Arid Badlands which is the first section of the game's huge open world. (Not an RPG I know, but I 100% completed Br11tal Legend in 15 - All the main story, sidequests and collectables.) Should get a LOT of play out of this I think.

Can't comment much on the main story cos i've not played enough of it yet, but sidequest wise they have been quite varied so far. Yes there are go kill this & that with story to it but what RPG doesn't? You can get those from certain NPC's you meet, and bulletin boards which new quests appear on all the time. Those pop up similar to quests in MMO's so a description/story for the sidequests, a difficulty level - trivial, normal, hard, tough etc and shows you what rewards you'll get for completing it. When you've marked the quest as active it will add a pointer to your map too. Which helps as the first area alone is bloody damn big.
There's no overall difficulty level, a quest that is marked as tough for instance will obviously become easier the better equipment you have and depending on your level. And from what i've seen, the tough ones are actually a challenge and quite tough sometimes even if the boss or whatever is just a level higher.

Up to 4 player Co-op so you can invite people into your game and do missions together like you can with games like Fable2 & SR2. Enemies become harder when you do that and have the chance of dropping better loot.

Loot wise, there's tons of it, really. (Cash, Guns, shields, enhancements, artifacts etc. Though you don't wear armour pieces). Sadly, there doesn't appear to be any type of storage like the apartment you'd get in Fallout3 or similar. Which did make me wonder when the game has a bazillion guns as they say (and from the ones i've picked up from drops & stuff so far they don't all look or shoot the same just with different stats). But, you can increase the storage limit of your backpack several times by doing certain quests which will be a big help.

When you level up you'll get a skill point to spend in your skill tree, think of WoW talent tree's with this Anny, and you can reset them later if you make a mistake or fancy a change too. So the hunter has skills that improve certain parts of your sniper/pistol, and your bloodwing (a pet bird which you can summon to attack an enemy, on cooldown). So you can spend points & increase the damage your bloodwing does, how many enemies it will attack when you summon him, decrease the cooldown etc. Like the bloodwing skill, each class gets their own unique skill which you'll use lots.
Besides the skill points, there's weapon proficiency which increases the more you use each specific weapon types (pistol, revolver, combat rifle, shotgun etc etc). You can also use any weapon you like too. So my hunter may be specialised with snipers & such and my skills go to improving those things, but if I pick up a nice combat rifle I can use that too and the more I use that rifle the higher my proficiency will become for that type of weapon.

If you're critically damaged, you'll go into last stand mode (or a similar name I forget). If you manage to kill one of the enemies you were fighting during those few seconds you'll be revived with full health & shield. If you die however you'll respawn to a New-U station, similar to Bioshock but this costs a bit of money. So best not to go running in guns blazing and try to use cover.

Gear drops are like WoW as well. So you'll randomly get them from enemies and bosses (as well as being able to buy some things). They're all coloured like WoW depending on the rarity so white, green, blue, purple, orange. I've got a nice epic sniper rifle atm! :p

Vehicles. You can pick between one with a machine gun turret or one with a rocket launcher & change the colour of it slightly too but i'm not sure if there are any other vehicles you can use later on, mebbe not. Great for getting from A to B so you don't have to walk everywhere and you can use them to run mobs over or shoot em too whilst still gaining exp (but have to get out to pick loot up). There are places scattered around the map where you can summon said vehicle too, like Neocron vehicle depots.


Hope some of that is useful Anny, that's all I can think of to mention off the top of my head but if I think of anything else i'll post some more. So far i'd agree with Fen that it's a must buy game and considering how big the game looks when you count all the side stuff, having payed only 1129.95 for it from Zavvi i'm bloody pleased with that. Bargain for the amount of playtime this is likely to give.
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

Re: Borderlands.

PostPosted: Fri Oct 23, 2009 2:11 pm

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Anubis
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Very useful MS in giving me a better picture of the game than I had, as was the time spent chatting with you about it last night alongisde the opening 10 minutes video :)

However, I have found many comments indicating that the game actually is what I feared it would be. This one pretty much sums them up generally:
The rpg elements, though well done, are relatively light. there's very little story, though what's there is well written and funny (if not deep, original, or lengthy), there's no character development in a story sense, and you never make a single choice. the RPG elements are limited to health bars, leveling up, and talent trees.
In essence, not really an RPG and just an FPS with skills. The lack of any real main story (and by all accounts a terrible ending, worse than Fallout 3's) and character development pretty much condemns the game to "Maybe when it gets a lot cheaper" status at best, and even then it would be unlikely I'd buy it. For now, I won't be getting it.

I'd still be interested in hearing your specific views on the storyline and characters when you finish the game, as I could well change my mind if you feel said quotes are completely unjustified. But at present, it pretty much sounds like the reasons I was avoiding it were justified :(
"Perhaps this is what I have always wished for since that day. The loss and destruction of all. That's right, one must destroy before creating. In that case, if my conscience becomes a hindrance to me, then I will simply erase it. I have no other choice but to move forward....therefore!" - Lelouch vi Britannia/Zero, Code Geass: Hangyaku no Lelouch

Forever an eXile and proud of it!

Re: Borderlands.

PostPosted: Sun Nov 01, 2009 1:04 am

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Fenavian
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This game has eaten up so much of my time. :(
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Re: Borderlands.

PostPosted: Sun Nov 01, 2009 3:18 pm

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Fenavian
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K. I just beat Borderlands. Pretty weak ending till the last like 3 minutes of the cut scene. :) I vote that we should be able to play a Claptrap in the DLC. ;p Whats real nice is that when you start up again, you can choose to restart in Playthrough 2 where everything is hella harder, or finish questing in Playthrough 1. 4 player co-op is the bomb. :)
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Re: Borderlands.

PostPosted: Sun Nov 01, 2009 4:30 pm

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M.Steiner
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Agree about the ending, and the main story wasn't as deep as some others but nevertheless i'd still say it's a must buy game. Completed all sidequests along side the main story in my first playthrough so I didn't have any left over to finish. I love the new playthrough system too. Not only do you keep your level, skills & gear from the previous playthrough (and continue to level in those in the new game) but all the enemies scale up to to match too (so level 35 enemies at the start of the game) and all the loot/rewards are higher too.
Will have to check the secret basement again on this second playthrough whenever I come back to it, should be a scaled up version of the Gearbox gun heh.
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

Re: Borderlands.

PostPosted: Sun Nov 01, 2009 10:26 pm

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Fenavian
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Secret basement??? where dat be?
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Re: Borderlands.

PostPosted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 1:38 am

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M.Steiner
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Bit of an easter egg & reference to a film really so nothing really spectacular or anything, but it was a fun searching for it. A Dev had commented that there was a secret basement somewhere in New Haven which nobody had actually discovered yet and which supposedly unlocked at a certain point in the game but then became inaccessible again. So across a few forums there were quite a few people searching for this basement heh.
Basically when you have accepted the mission "Another Piece of the Puzzle" and have that in your questlog, a door in New Haven unlocks with an elevator behind it leading down into this secret basement. Inside are a few chests/lockers etc and a rifle called the Rider, the manufacturer's name on that being Gearbox. There's a vid here which shows ya.
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

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