login sign up feeds about

We've known about Borderlands for some time now, but details on Gearbox's co-op focussed shooter have been scant, despite the obvious promise shown by previous FPS creations from the Texan developer.

• images (5)

  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 
  • all 5 images

• game info

  • Borderlands

  • Publisher:

    2K Games

    Developer:

    Unknown

    Release Date:

    Christmas 2008

  • more

• related stories

  • Borderlands delayed, GTA IV episodes...
  • Gallery: Borderlands
  • 2K detail Borderlands
  • Borderlands coming from Gearbox
  • more

• xbox 360

  • Braid
  • Saints Row 2
  • 2011 debut hinted for PS4 and new Xbox
  • Heroes over Europe
  • Tomb Raider: Underworld
  • more

• e3 2008

  • 
  • id CEO admits E3 disappointment
  • Peter Moore attacks "soulless" E3
  • New PSN updates now online
  • Bungie "disappointed" rather than angry at Halo E3 cut
  • E3 for the whole family
  • more

Big boss man Randy Pitchford is at E3 in LA to take us around the new game, and what we're presented with a slice of pre-alpha gameplay, Gearbox leading us through the action-packed world of Borderlands; a sci-fi Wild West-styled title, with a few RPG elements thrown in for good measure. Co-op will be a focus of the game, which looks every bit as frenetic as other co-op favourites such as Halo 3.

Further complexity will be added to the experience via the aforementioned RPG elements: character classes, leveling-up, sides quests and more. Going back to Bungie's seminal FPS, the vehicle-based combat is looking like a solid and quite important aspect of the game. One player drives, while the other shoots, players taking on bandits across vast California-eque vistas. You can even switch roles on the fly, mid-combat.

As well as the ever-present threat of bandits, all intent on disrupting your mission-progress, a variety of beastly-looking skrags will also be salivating over the prospect of, well, eating you. These monsters offer more aggressive, less intelligent foes, and are just one of a variety of tongue-in-cheek, bloody-action focussed diversions available. Roadkill is also loitering for squashing as you race across the plains, en route to your mission objective.

In a bid to spice up the FPS genre, Gearbox have included a few unique elements with Borderlands. Beyond drop-in, drop-out co-op play, there are also randomly generated weapons, which you'll find littered around the game world. Thousands of combination of components, stylisations and colours means that no two guns will be identical, adding further intrigue.

After showing off the driving element of Borderlands, Randy enters a vast off-world mine, taking in some impressive texture-work, sizable caverns, and a noticeable change in the game's atmosphere. The quarry is over-run with bandits, and to reach a showdown with some local thug we're first going to have to battle past his determined minions.

The Wild West theme becomes more apparent during this underground demonstration, and there's plenty of gore, explosions and more; Gearbox pushing to deliver action focussed on fast-paced fun, rather than gritty or serious realism. Enemy AI is looking pretty fluid, Pitchford is proud to point out, your foes demonstrating solid path-finding despite the complex, multi-layered environments.

Missions are based around the collection of artifacts to some extent, and this fits into the wider story-arc, although Gearbox aren't giving too much away on this, or the multiplayer side of things yet.

Call of Duty 4, Borderlands is not, but Gearbox certainly look to be exploiting their potentially unique setting and premise well, while the combat looks to be a highly polished, well-balanced affair, even in this pre-alpha demonstration. With the focus on co-op fun and over the top ultra-violence, the developer might just have stumbled across an action-game favourite.

All should be revealed in time for Christmas on PS3, Xbox 360 and PC. Yee-haw.

1. This sounds fantastic, esp. since it'll be on PC. We need more great co-op games desperately.

   Psycros Friday, 18 July 2008, 04:56:34

2. i agree psycros on pc it will rock

   dave c Tuesday, 22 July 2008, 17:14:4

3. when is it realeased this yr or next

   Renji Tuesday, 22 July 2008, 19:02:49