I view this game as a 130 mission, giant $60 DLC pack for Borderlands 2 packed with novel features that change up combat. The combat mechanics are radically different. Being able to jump and remain airborne ends the constant search for cover and hit-and-run-for-cover tactics you often require in BL1 and BL2.
I think this will make the " silly, stupid-fun " of the previous Borderlands games both sillier and more stupid. If you only liked using Roland and/or Axton in the previous games and played those characters in the tactical shooter role then Borderlands The Pre-Sequel may not be the game for you. If you are looking for a tactical combat experience this game is not for you. For every one else not in this camp the Pre-Sequel should be good fun.
Graphics Basically The Same
THe Minimum and Recommended PC Specs remain identical from BL2. The game has been publicly displayed at shows like PAX Prime and PAX East and dozens of game play videos are on youtube.com. Expect the game to offer the level of graphics improvements that an annualized EA Sports sequel gets. Maybe even less improvement than that.
Lots Of New Game Mechanics
New stuff includes: Laser weapons, Low gravity, New Vehicle Mechanics, Double Jumping, Using a grinder to "craft" your own guns. Freeze enemies so you can 1-shot kill them or punch them to kill them.
Oxygen is a precious resource allowing you to (1) perform ground slam attacks, (2) remain airborne during jumps (3) continuing to breathe ( ClapTrap does not need to use oxygen to breathe)
The tension between these 3 activities that require oxygen seems pretty cool.
Not A Big Budget Blockbuster Title For the Franchise
This game was not in development for 2.5+ years the way BL1 and BL2 were. This was put together using existing BL2 technology in less than 2 years and maybe even in as little as 1 year. There is no $150 Loot Chest Collector's Edition. No $100 Deluxe Edition. There is a $30 DLC Season's Pass. It is not available on PS4, or XBOX1.
2K Australia's First Game
Gearbox in Texas made the first two Borderlands games. The writers and creative guys at Gearbox directed the over all direction of the story in THe Pre-Sequel while 2K Australia did everything else. Basically, this is a 2K Australia game with writing and story by Gearbox. 2K Australia worked under 2K Marin and Irrational games on all 3 Bioshock games. This is the first time they are the lead studio primarily in charge of a game's development. The fact that 2K Games keeps giving 2K Australia greater levels of responsibility over the past 10 years means they've earned this shot.
BattleBorn, Gearbox, 2K Australia, and Borderlands 3
My guess is this. Once Battleborn and the technology behind the building of that game are 100% solid. And, Battleborn is released. And, 2K Australia proves they can make a really good Borderlands game. Then, look for 2K Australia AND Gearbox to work together to build a giant mofo of a game that is a quantum leap forward compared to Borderlands 2. This will be Borderlands 3.
Although I think you may have forgotten a few things Pal. New enemies! More loot! Different terrain/scenery and some much needed (see speculations to ad nauseam on youtube) BACK STORY!!
You may be right that this is a GIANT DLC pack, to test out 2K Australia, and I really hope it works out because I'm already saving my money for Borderlands 3!
I think it is the back story speculation that sparked the idea for this MEGA DLC game. Gearbox has done such a great job writing the lore for these games (unlike the sadness that is Destiny) and put in so many easter eggs for their fans to hunt down, ponder, and expand on that Borderlands' truely is a huge game that players of all types can get their fill!
Is Krieg Tiny Tina's Dad? Does Moxxi and Axton have/had a fling? Granted, these speculations won't be answered in the Pre-Sequel, and more than likely we'll have even bigger, more nagging questions to ponder and post videos of! But isn't that part of the greatness that is Borderlands?
I think this is going to be a fun change up for the Borderlands' fans who have been craving more! New characters, new skill trees, new badass poems and smart ass comments that make this world worth exploring!
Personally, I for one cannot WAIT to see ClapTrap's unpredictable skill set and .. yes..I may even get him killed on purpose......more than once!! the lil guy is more annoying than Raynor in the NHL Threads!!
And we get to play Jack?! Even if it is his hotness' dopple ganger. I can't wait!!
Preordered since I've been a huge fan of all the previous installments and I can't see them really messing up that formula. Tiding myself over with Smash 4 and Shadow of Mordor until it comes out .
On October 04 2014 09:46 KelianQatar wrote: I think it is the back story speculation that sparked the idea for this MEGA DLC game. Gearbox has done such a great job writing the lore for these games (unlike the sadness that is Destiny) and put in so many easter eggs for their fans to hunt down, ponder, and expand on that Borderlands' truely is a huge game that players of all types can get their fill!
Borderlands lore is pulp fiction straight out of a pulp magazine. The guys at Gearbox have a clear sense of self-identity. Unlike some other company whose name rhymes with Dungie and Rungie.
"We like to tell big stories and we want people to put the Destiny universe on the same shelf they put Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter or Star Wars", some Bungie Executive Talking-Head Guy.
Gearbox created the quintessential dystopian universe.. equal parts Mad Max, 1850 California ,and futuristic corporate corruption.
Patiently waiting for the Pre-Sequel to come out, playing Borderlands 2 with my Pals and decided to play around with Photoshop a bit... what do you guys think?
street value of the game is $45 due to the Steam Key being a give-away packaged with a video card. Steam Keys are littered all over Ebay; CJ CD Keys has it for $45 USD.
when its street value hits $25 i'm buying.
its basically a giant DLC with a few bells and whistles. it should be a lot of fun. i think its street value will plummet fast as XMas software titles come at us hard and fast.
all this "street value" and real price talk is relative to teh PC version. i know nothing about the XBOX360 and PS3 marketplace.
on ebay. there are also vendors such as happy9817 with 2000 transactions and an extensive online track record you can buy from as well.
if you're a hardcore collector of Borderlands stuff then paying $60+tax for the boxed copy makes sense. Other than that, i'd go with ebay or CJ's CD Keys.
Is Krieg Tiny Tina's Dad? Does Moxxi and Axton have/had a fling? Granted, these speculations won't be answered in the Pre-Sequel, and more than likely we'll have even bigger, more nagging questions to ponder and post videos of! But isn't that part of the greatness that is Borderlands?
In borderlands 2 there was a quest where you found out who Tiny Tina's dad was. The psycho that she asked you to bring to dinner and she electrocuted was her father. There is a late game quest where you get 4 echo's in the hyperion animal reservation that reveals this.
Is Krieg Tiny Tina's Dad? Does Moxxi and Axton have/had a fling? Granted, these speculations won't be answered in the Pre-Sequel, and more than likely we'll have even bigger, more nagging questions to ponder and post videos of! But isn't that part of the greatness that is Borderlands?
In borderlands 2 there was a quest where you found out who Tiny Tina's dad was. The psycho that she asked you to bring to dinner and she electrocuted was her father. There is a late game quest where you get 4 echo's in the hyperion animal reservation that reveals this.
Fleshstick? There were echo recordings about him selling out Tina's parents (supplying them to Dr. Samuels, who performed Slag experiments on human subjects for Handsome Jack), I don't recall anything saying he was one of her parents.
Playing Athena atm. Going to see if I can get some sort of a melee build going. Playing as melee Krieg in BL2 was really really fun.
tbh I am not liking this as much as when I started BL2. The low gravity environment is more pain than fun: you get loot scattered everywhere (i also dislike how 99% of loot in BL is useless). The 1st real boss on the moon leaps left and right and is almost impossible to chase down as he shoots his laser gun at you. Ended up cheesing the encounter by staying on ground level and headshotting him with a scoped pistol when he tries to do a shootout against me: there is even a convenient "room" in the wall to hide inside for shield recharge too.
As others have mentioned, the bulletsponge thing I disliked a lot. There is also the concern of non-scaling skills (a lot of special procs only scale by level and not gun damage, minions/summons also tend to have not enough HP to be able to survive any UVHM fight.
Is Krieg Tiny Tina's Dad? Does Moxxi and Axton have/had a fling? Granted, these speculations won't be answered in the Pre-Sequel, and more than likely we'll have even bigger, more nagging questions to ponder and post videos of! But isn't that part of the greatness that is Borderlands?
In borderlands 2 there was a quest where you found out who Tiny Tina's dad was. The psycho that she asked you to bring to dinner and she electrocuted was her father. There is a late game quest where you get 4 echo's in the hyperion animal reservation that reveals this.
Ugh the psycho you electricuted at the tea party was the person who sold out her family. I believe his name was Fleshsticks. They never really clarify or specify who Tiny Tina Dad was. Some people speculate that the Psycho playable class character is her father driven mad by experiment from handsome jack but he probably the closest thing you can probably speculate on who is Tiny Tina Dad.
Is Krieg Tiny Tina's Dad? Does Moxxi and Axton have/had a fling? Granted, these speculations won't be answered in the Pre-Sequel, and more than likely we'll have even bigger, more nagging questions to ponder and post videos of! But isn't that part of the greatness that is Borderlands?
In borderlands 2 there was a quest where you found out who Tiny Tina's dad was. The psycho that she asked you to bring to dinner and she electrocuted was her father. There is a late game quest where you get 4 echo's in the hyperion animal reservation that reveals this.
Ugh the psycho you electricuted at the tea party was the person who sold out her family. I believe his name was Fleshsticks. They never really clarify or specify who Tiny Tina Dad was. Some people speculate that the Psycho playable class character is her father driven mad by experiment from handsome jack but he probably the closest thing you can probably speculate on who is Tiny Tina Dad.
I went and looked it up, yep I was wrong. I misread the sentence where that was mentioned in the Echo. Sorry bout that =D
The game is pretty fun, It's very much like Borderlands 2 the low Gravity is a real pain in the ass I don't really care about all the loot I find 2-3 guns that I like and just use them the whole game or till I find something similar, I have put a good 10 hours in and have had quite a bit of fun. Just expect to die to stupid low gravity stuff.
the game just flies along at 60 FPS on my crappy computer with the settings cranked. the only thing i disabled was "DynamicShadows"... and that nVidia physics stuff.
Overall i'm impressed with how much better optimized this game is on both my desktop PC and my laptop. i didn't expect that.
i wonder if other people with crap hardware are experiencing the same improvements i am.
Went with claptrap as well (probably not a surprise) and the only thing I don't like is that I think we're going to be pidgeonholed into the middle team-buff tree for any serious late game dps. The right fragmented fragtrap tree seems way too awful if you get a subroutine you don't have a good weapon for and the left boomtrap tree only has a few skills that I'd cherry pick and average over all. I'm sure someone will come up with something once more people get to late game but that's just my two cents.
Got my last talent point in athena's xiphos tree. She went from good to Zero on steroids: her melee override is a dash that does not invoke a cooldown if you hit something for the 1st time or if you kill the target. This allows me to just zoom left and right of the battlefield using singularity slam + dash forward with bloodrush...
Game balance in TVHM feels really out of whack. There seem to be... an absence of missions between the very start of the game and when you reached concordia.
This can be explained since in normal mode, it was around the lv1-6 range, so obviously you level up really quickly. However, in TVHM, I ended up as a lv31 character with only lv35 missions in my logs.
My melee athena also seem to have reached some sort of a bottleneck (partially due to being underleveled and undergeared): it takes a good minute to kill a super badass enemy with melee attacks: I guess I am missing a good Roid shield: I have seen pictures of legendary roid shields with unbelievable amount of Roid damage. The lack of % melee modifiers in BL2 might have to do with the significant boost in Roid shield effectiveness. Oh, and Rend... it used to be able to bleed out an enemy, now its damage is just... so insignificant.
The Torgue-o! Torgue-o! quest is game breaking. The mission-only gun is a moxxi gun with 60% life steal ("Punctilious Probe"). Using that gun (even without +50% melee dmg blade) keeps my health topped off at all times. In fact, out of frustration, I made a new Nisha, and is now lv14 using that gun+using slam as my primary attack, swapping to a shotgun vs airborne targets.
They have added a bit of "replay value" by having slightly different dialogue in TVHM. In normal mode, it was Lilith interrogating Athena, in TVHM, Tiny Tina came in and had Athena retell the story. That was an interesting touch.
Since you can now shatter an enemy, I am debating if I should switch my Shock O2 mask into a Frost mask for the chance to freeze on slam. Shooting them with an explosive gun shatters them (shotgun?). Shock O2 masks are nice for removing shields and mostly unmitigated damage....
i deleted my pirated copy of the game and bought 2 keys for $90 USD from CJ's CD Keys.
i'd like to take a scene from Pulp Fiction that is a good analogy for comparing Borderlands2 to Borderlands:TPS.
"you know what the best part of Borderlands:TPS is? its the little differences... i mean.... BorderlandsTPS has got the same shit BL2 has... only thing is.. its just a little bit different..."
I loved this game! I'm only like level 10 or so right now playing as a Clapper, but the story, gameplay and feel of the game are all very different from any other Borderlands. I am very impressed. Great to know it was Australia putting out great work like this Ill keep an eye on them in the future.
On October 14 2014 19:36 Meavis wrote: eh, not sure about buying in to the hype this time, disliked BL2's extreme scaling and the atmosphere was quite different from what I liked in BL1
Right? I played through BL1 with one buddy a good 4 different times. The guns felt awesome to shoot, you never run into guns with crazyawesome stats but unforgivable natural properties, critical spots and headshots felt challenging, but still rewarding, and cars were much much less mandatory, so you actually experienced most maps on foot. BL 1 is definitely my preference of the two, but I'll hold out until pre-sequel is 20 bucks and give it a go... though I suspect it's just more bl2 with different classes.
the pre-quel is BL2 with different classes, different maps, different stories, different weapons, different items, different bosses and different enemies. its just an expansion or as many call it a very bulked up DLC. in terms of value, its much better than HOTS was for WOL, but not as good as SC2 compared to SC:BW.
Because back in the old days, only new releases cost 60 money, and expansions more like 40. These days are gone a long time ago and they can pretty much release anything and charge whatever they like.
Earlier in the thread some guy said it's indeed overpriced and street value is much lower so at least there are ways.
After having finished the game twice, I just feel that the game is lacking. This is especially true early on where I ran out of quests to do in TVHM. Zones (other than the space station part) just feel so empty... they lack a theme/a story/lore. This makes me feel as if large chunks of the game has been removed as DLC content.
Much of the game just feel like, go to the waypoint and do something, kill stuff on the way (or just sprint+air boost through).
There is no quest reset or UVHM.
Some items are just horribly imbalanced. This is *especially* true for legendary Roid shields which have 10x-15x the Roid damage compared to a standard roid shield. After getting the shooting star on Athena, everything in TVHM just went back to getting 1 shotted... with the punctilious probe in hand (~50% life leech), the game just feel... completely broken.
A gun like the double penetrating unkempt harold is really bad for the game: an undisputed "best in slot". O2 kits are what I considered a really good item: there is no clear best in slot (yet). We have got a legendary one that boosts everyone's ammo and gun damage in party play, but we also have ones that grant resistances, ones that are designed to deal with annoying airborne enemies, etc. One might even choose to just go with the very first unique O2 kit you got which causes oxygen canisters to heal.
While the introduction of O2 kits instead of relics is fun, so is slamming into your enemies from midair. This game falls short of being a standalone game in the Borderlands series. It felt rushed and untested. The world is plain. I get bored of seeing the same moonscape tileset after an hour. Missions feel rather plain at times, and the lack of content + replayability makes the game feel incomplete.
I think I should at least give some praise to their class design, which is in improvement over the older games. They have done some... terribly crazy things with claptrap. The 4+1 point tier 1 being made more common (ie: tier 1 tree defining talents that you MUST get if you want to proceed down the tree) and the "mid tier one point talent" is a nice touch/semi solution to lack of class identity early game.
The game is definitely fun, but the world kinda lacks character and feels empty. The classes are awesome tho. At this point BL2 is a behemoth of a game in terms of content. I'm guessing once they add all the dlcs and new characters BTPS will feel similar. Even then, the moon is definitely barren compared to pandora.
Here is a short compilation of useful tweaks you can make
to the WillowEngine.ini file located in
c:\Users\Admin\My Documents\My Games\Borderlands The Pre-Sequel\WillowGame\Config
none of these are my original ideas. i'm too lazy to cite where i got them. if someone wants to make a federal case out of it i'll figure out their sources
every machine is slightly different and so its basically trial and error to fine tune the WillowEngine.ini settings to give your game the best possible results.
DynamicShadows Setting
the DynamicsShadows setting is in 2 places in the file. switch them both to false for a noticeable performance improvement.
DynamicShadows=False
DetailMode Setting
While the in-game Detail Mode adjusts certain other aspects of the game’s visual, the one inside the ini file will get rid of very minor and subtle details in the surroundings that can result in a decent performance improvement on older machines. The default value is 2, but you can set it down to 1 or 0 to get rid of these details.
DetailMode=1 or DetailMode=0
Shadow Resolution This option controls the resolution of shadows in the game. Higher resolution shadows use up more VRAM and have a significant impact on performance, but make the shadows appear much sharper and realistic.
The default value is 2048, but it can be increased to 4096 or decreased to 128. 4096 will result in super-sharp shadows but with huge performance impacts, while 128 will result in nothing but dark blocks, but give a tangible performance boost.
MaxWholeSceneDominantShadowResolution=2048
Improving PhysX
The settings below basically double the resource settings devoted to PhysX, as well as one setting for using Fullscreen mode. Windowed full screen mode costs some frames, so using fullscreen mode should net some extra FPS (I get around 15 FPS more using it alone). The above settings smoothed out my FPS to a steady 60 even in fairly high combat areas. The only area I currently have a problem with is one many others are as well, and that is the final area of the DLC "Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep".
Played a shitload of this fairly recently. Everything all maxed out and basically have been just grinding bosses trying to get the right legendary pistol to drop...
i'm impressed with Gearbox's continued post sales support of the Borderlands franchise. This includes Borderlands (2009), Borderlands2(2012), and Borderlands:The Pre-Sequel (2014).
GameSpy got shutdown and Gearbox modified Borderlands1 so that it can work on Steam's servers. Dozens of incremental improvements to Borderlands2 and Borderlands:The PreSequel got made for the PC versions of the game when Borderlands :The Handsome Collection was released for XBOX1 and PS4.
They continue to re-balance the game modifying drops rate and enemy strength to match better exotic weapon drop rates.
I just got the "Handsome Collection" for 30€ on Xbox One, although I already have BL2 incl. all the DLCs I felt that this was a good deal.
I'll start with the things I like first:
- Characters/Character selection, this was the first time where I was seriously torn between three or four different characters (Jack, Athena, Aurelia and Natasha), in BL 1 and 2 there were at most two characters I was interested in playing. And it came down to the siren. Both games.
- The new weapons, I really really really do like the laser guns and the new cryo effects. Although it feels a little OP it's incredibly fun to freeze your enemies and shatter them into pieces.
- I never really cared for Borderlands' story but in this game I find it interesting, playing for and not against Handsome Jack is quite entertaining.
- The humor is as good as ever.
- The whole World is pretty cool in my opinion, the moon was my fav. planet in Destiny and so far I'm loving it in TPS.
The things I don't like:
- At first I thought that adding O2 and playing on a planet with lower gravity would be a nice addition. After a couple of hours (Level 15 right now) the gameplay is getting kinda "annoying". I think that it would've been better, if there were only some passages where you are actually depending on O2/low-grav. Playing in bullet-time-mode all the time is not exactly fun. Plus burning effects are useless 95% of the time.
- Because of the low-grav-gameplay, the game can become really confusing from time to time. I've been shot and died multiple times without knowing what hit me from where. Plus you're never safe. Some people might like it, I think it's a little too much.
- Leveldesign/Gameplay: I feel like there are tons and tons of explosive/corrosive/flamable/electric boxes placed all over the map. I've already died countless times to some exploding box I wasn't aware of. That combined with partially extremely strong enemies equal some really frustrating moments.
- In case it was not clear up to this point: I'm dying way too much without knowing what hit me. Dead, oh suddenly theres someone behind me. Dead, oh there was another exploding box. Dead, oh there was some enemy with a one-shot-kill attack. Dead....
Microsoft accidentally put "Borderlands : The Handsome Collection" available for free download; you can dl and play it on XBOX1 for free. It is BL2, and BL:The PreSequel and all its DLC in 1 giant package called "The Handsome Collection".
it'll be hilarious if/when MS tries to disable all those freely downloaded games. what a clusterfuck this will be!
EDIT: nice catch by MS labelling it a free weekend even though they made the game freely available on their general MS web site and not just for XBOX Gold Live subscribers...and its not the weekend. i wonder if people's copies they got from the general web site and not within XBOX Live will have their copies disabled.
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