Photo courtesy IGN.com
Borderlands, the latest in a line of video games to mix role playing elements with traditional first person shooter controls in a sci-fi setting, isn’t groundbreaking, but with a stylized presentation, thousands of items to collect, co-op and multiplayer options, it presents one of the more addicting gaming experiences in recent memory.

The plot of the game, what little is presented, is mostly covered in the intro movie and relayed by a bus driver /arms dealer in a thick Eastern European accent. Your character is one of four bounty hunters who recently arrived on the planet of Pandora in search of the vault – a legendary and mythical place of vast wealth and weapons. Once the story is set up and you pick your player (a hunter, soldier, siren or tank), a mysterious angel appears to act as a guide and you’re unleashed upon Pandora. From there it’s a frag-fest as you shoot your way through Mad-Max style bandits, feral space dogs, alien bugs and more in an effort to find the vault and collect all the loot found along the way.

Aside from cash, which even space dogs seem to carry, there are plenty of guns, ammo and accessories to pick up. This is where Borderlands shines. While the game controls as good as any current shooter (it was designed by Gearbox, the company who worked on several Half-Life titles and created Brothers in Arms) the long-lasting appeal is clearly meant to be looting through the remnants of the shootouts. While many games dating back to Diablo and beyond have featured item drops as a key component of the addictive game play nature, Borderlands offers what Gearbox calls a content generation system. This provides a large number of variations in the guns that enemies drop, allowing players to pick up weapons with different stats and effects (such as exploding, flame or acid rounds). Classic RPG elements of leveling and a certain amount of character specialization are present as well and add to the game’s addictiveness.

All that Borderlands offers in terms of game play and content is fun enough as a single player experience, but this game was meant to be played with friends. Offering local split screen co-op and online four-player multiplayer, Borderlands is likely to result in late-night binges of shooting and looting.

While stylistically reminiscent of award-winning titles such as Fallout 3 and Bioshock, Borderlands doesn’t offer the in-depth story telling of those games. It does, however, take the fun game play elements that contributed to the success of those titles and streamline them. Borderlands is brighter and faster than its predecessors, but is no less brutal and grim in its actions. It’s a mature title for fans of shooting and looting, and it’s unlikely to change the minds of anyone who hasn’t had interest in such games before. But for gamers who constantly chase that next upgrade, level or mission, Borderlands will probably take up a large chunk of time during the busy winter gaming season.

-- Toben Shelby

Shelby co-hosts Spoiler Alert, which airs most Thursday nights from 7 to 9 p.m. KRUA, 88.1 FM.

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Borderlands is available for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC.
borderlandsthegame.com
gearboxsoftware.com