The action sequence remains quite captivating and continues to frustrate you at higher levels, but Borderlands Pre-Sequel has very little new factors to offer after Borderlands 2.
Borderlands 2 was a super hit and to follow it up with a prequel or rather the Pre-Sequel can be a quite a dicey move. You remember Handsome Jack, the space terrorist and the main antagonist of Borderlands 2? Well, this is all about him and how he turns from a good guy to a bloodthirsty villain. It feels a bit strange that you tend to be sympathetic to Jack because in this game he shows no traces of the lunatic anti-hero we know him to be. Love it or hate it, he still has his quirky sense of humour, which is actually quite entertaining.
There are four playable players or as the game refers to them – vault hunters, and again it takes a bit of time getting used to the fact that you are working with Jack and not against him. So let’s start with Athena, the gladiator armed with a versatile Kinetic Aspis shield, and then there is the enforcer, Wilhelm, who can upgrade his own physical form with robotic parts; Nisha, the gunslinger, is a gun-trotting sharpshooter with a murderous streak. The last and my favourite is Claptrap. It is a robot that calculates the current situation – are you playing alone, what is your health level in the game, how many enemies are you facing – and gives you an action package to match. He is the perfect player as he analyzes the battlefield and deploys what according to him is most appropriate for the situation at hand. But keep in mind all the four characters have their own skills for a purpose; therefore get to know the capability of all the players.
Coming to the most important part of the game, shooting. It remains spot on in this aspect like its previous titles and the movement is swift. Keeping it realistic, each gun feels different and this could help make or break your game. The array of weapons has always been the USP of the Borderland series and the Pre-Sequel lives up to the game play.
This game also comes with new gear and goodies like freezing or setting the enemies on fire with a new range of laser weapons. Now you get an additional oxygen tank called Oz kits. This lets you breathe where the atmosphere is thin. Another good thing is that the loot drops frequency rate is very high, so you are never short of supplies. Rather you end up sorting what you need or could be helpful later. The game also gives you a lot of opportunities to customise your character.
A word of advice for the players, opt for co-op mode when you start out because if you die you don’t have to wait for someone to revive you. Also like its previous titles, you can cross the initial stages in a single player mode, but as you progress the more powerful bosses will squash you, so you need all the help you can get to take them down. The co-op option lets you join another player’s game right from the title screen, where it will attempt to match you up with other players at the same level as you. This process is completely lag free.
The Pre-Sequel is for hardcore Borderlands fans. The game has very few new tweaks to offer to actually call itself a new game. If you were looking for a massively enhanced experience, I would recommend you wait for Borderlands 3.
