Hands On: Borderlands

A couple weeks ago, I ventured out into the wilds of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where I entered a dark, foreboding warehouse and entered the Borderlands. 2K Games laid out quite the feast, with beers from around the world and delicious roast pig that I noshed on while I watched others play Borderlands before actually getting my own greasy mitts on it. I wanted to see what I was getting myself into!

Visually, Borderlands is kind of like Mad Max meets Fallout 3, but done in a cell-shaded style that makes the game look like a European comic book come to life. It's nice, because it makes the graphics stand out from all the rest of the post-apocalyptic shooters, while still keeping it realistic and not distractingly cartoony. It's primarily a shooter, but look a little closer, and the RPG elements are clearly visible (numbers appear over hit enemies to tally up the damage you've done, with experience points appearing after a kill). We were given characters that had already been leveled-up, and assigned them various skills purchased with experience points.

Without a single player tutorial level, I basically was thrown into the deep end with some four-player co-op and little-to-no idea of what I was doing. Controls were smooth, but with no tutorial, there were a lot of nuances I was clearly missing. There are four characters, each with their own special abilities, and none of which I seemed able to execute with anything resembling finesse. I was excited to learn that the first character I was playing as, Lilith, was the stealthy one, but when I would activate her invisibility, I would suddenly leap forward towards the enemies, getting confused and disoriented, with no clue what I was doing. I did better the second time with Brick, who is the tank. I actually worked my way through the level with no backup (I had no co-op players for most of it that time). Although during my third playthrough, the guy playing as Brick was using his special ability to literally punch creatures to death. No gun needed! (I prefer a gun in my mitts...)

After two earlier attempts to beat the boss failed because the developers kept resetting the game, they finally let us crush the giant spider creatures. (Shoot 'em in the butt — it's their weak spot!) I felt terribly proud until I was informed that the spiders weren't the end of the level, and in fact, a giant with a gatling gun was waiting to tear you to shreds. Yeah, probably not ready for that... no wonder they kept restarting it for us! I did have a lot of fun playing Borderlands, although to be honest with you, the much-touted thousands and thousands of weapons were kind of lost on me. In the heat of multiplayer co-op battle, there's really no time to explore the nuances of them, so one gun felt pretty much like the other to me. Well, aside from my BFF, the sniper rifle, of course. Also, my videogame OCD doesn't lend itself well to co-op because I find myself compelled to check every single box, body, and pile of debris to get the items within. I'm no help at all!

As the lovely Pixel Poet informed you last week, Borderlands will be hitting the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC (we got our hands on the 360 version, FYI) on October 20. But for now, you can enjoy some shots I took at the event as well as some brand-spanking new screenshots!