Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel

 PC
User Score
6.5

Mixed or average reviews- based on 1028 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 470 out of 1028
  2. Mixed: 332 out of 1028
  3. Negative: 226 out of 1028
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  1. Dukenukemx
    Oct 24, 2014
    4
    The game makes a lot of mistakes that Borderlands 1 did. The environment is mostly the same with enemies that are mostly the same. No Goliath's like in Borderlands 2, so the enemies are only running at you and trying to kill you. No real interesting enemies. Lots of running around and even though there's vehicles, you tend to find yourself without one most of the time. Resulting inThe game makes a lot of mistakes that Borderlands 1 did. The environment is mostly the same with enemies that are mostly the same. No Goliath's like in Borderlands 2, so the enemies are only running at you and trying to kill you. No real interesting enemies. Lots of running around and even though there's vehicles, you tend to find yourself without one most of the time. Resulting in you having to traverse the same area over and over on foot, which results in you fighting the same enemies over and over. The new classes aren't interesting either.

    The game also seems to have new mechanics for the hell of it. You have to worry about oxygen, which is available within arm reaching distance. So it's not hard to get oxygen but it's annoying to remember that you need to refill. You also have badass points that you can throw at increasing things like gun damage, shields, and etc. But it's just another annoying thing to remember to deal with.

    Then there's the in your face about sexuality. For example Janey Springs is a lesbian, and that information was told to us more than once. Sir Hammerlock is also referenced to be gay. The new female character classes look clearly like the developers were trying to avoid trying to sexualized them. Even Mad Moxxi turns out to be a mechanical genius, which happens to be the one over sexualized character. We get that GBX is very pro same sex and you don't want to treat woman as sexual objects. We also get that the developers are Australian. But this doesn't add anything comedic to the game, like what is usually done in Borderlands 2. The game just doesn't seem to be as funny as Borderlands 2, and is nearly downright serious. I really miss hearing the random idiocy from npc's like the Goliath.

    Overall the game isn't worth $60. You want a good Borderlands game then get Borderlands 2. The game has a lot of travel time between key areas and you get sick and tired of killing Aussie's.    … Expand
  2. schmitty23
    Oct 20, 2014
    3
    *Warning possible spoilers *

    Let me start by saying BL1 was one of my favorite games. Of. All. Time. I eagerly bought BL2 and it's season pass, and definitely enjoyed playing more in Pandora. I finished all of the games, much of the BL1 DLC and I think all of the BL2 DLC. The graphic style, action, individual character's traits & special abilities, and weaponry were all super    *Warning possible spoilers *

    Let me start by saying BL1 was one of my favorite games. Of. All. Time.

    I eagerly bought BL2 and it's season pass, and definitely enjoyed playing more in Pandora. I finished all of the games, much of the BL1 DLC and I think all of the BL2 DLC. The graphic style, action, individual character's traits & special abilities, and weaponry were all super enjoyable, but even more so was the overall story line, voice acting, humor and just the overall way the games presented themselves to me as a player. But I have to say, the game was getting long in the tooth for me.

    I'd been watching some news about the pre-sequel for a few months, but didn't read too much of it because I wanted it to still have some surprises for me when it came out, but I had pretty much committed to buying the next thing Gearbox put out in the series. I was honestly expecting a very different game from the past couple, and am incredibly disappointed to find out that this is not the case.

    Without being overly dramatic, as many other have said, this looks like the BL12 assets were dumped over to another developer who has, imho, done a pretty poor job of creating a new game out of them. I was really surprised to see that right off the bat, the story seemed poorly told, the voice acting and dialogue is not very good (actually the dialogue is terrible in parts to be honest). Most everything in the game is either pulled directly from the first games (like the gratuitous and stupid appearances of Roland and Lilith in a bar) or is a reskinned asset from the game. The awesome personalities of the past characters are smothered in bad writing now, and the new playable characters seem dull as well.

    Even early on the game there are visual glitches, tons of pathcollision problems (both I and NPCsMobs getting stuck, etc). The framerates seem to hiccup at times, etc. Not what I would expect from a title in a several year old franchise. There are years-old issues (example: why are there a million little green light boxes that have $1 or $2 in them - why does the game make you waste so much time opening stuff only to receive more junk?) and even more fundamental issues in new game - why do you spend hours playing and getting access to the health vending machines, only to be shown a tutorial tip long after that saying you can buy health kits from them?) It's like no one actually paid attention to this stuff to see if it was done properly, to the standards of any other 'new' game.

    But honestly, the worst part - no told me this was going to be "Aussies in Space". Seriously. I love stuff Aussie in general, but if someone told me the developer was going to use so mush Aussie voice acting *with* accent and moreover, tons of Aussie slang, I would never have even considered purchasing this. This whole aspect is off-putting and the jokesreferences are just plain terrible.

    I seriously feel like this was a rehashed game put out to pull in revenue leading up to the holiday season. This is a purchase I really regret and would return the game if I could. Randy, if you read this - this kind of thing is what turns a loyal customer into a "never going to buy from this company again", because I won't take a $60 chance again if this is what you going to let be published.    … Expand
  3. uchxo
    Oct 16, 2014
    0
    Gearbox's transparent attempt at exploiting the consumer by charging full price for a lazy DLC reflects poorly on the gaming industry. The gameplay is rehashed and the humor is infantile. Avoid supporting this trash.
  4. Foar
    Oct 22, 2014
    4
    Subjectively...
    ...I think this is, if anything, a larger DLC. I found the environments horribly monotonous, or rather, bi-tonous: Tech or generic Moon with small cosmetic adjustments.
    Whacky Borderlands scenarios and personalities were much more scarce this time, much of them replaced by extremely annoying, some INTENTIONALLY annoying voices. The unending barrage of trivial vocalized    Subjectively...
    ...I think this is, if anything, a larger DLC. I found the environments horribly monotonous, or rather, bi-tonous: Tech or generic Moon with small cosmetic adjustments.

    Whacky Borderlands scenarios and personalities were much more scarce this time, much of them replaced by extremely annoying, some INTENTIONALLY annoying voices. The unending barrage of trivial vocalized nerve-gas some of the NPCs keep attacking you with caused some of my group to just turn voices down a lot. I don't remember a similar situation once in whole BL1 and BL2. In fact, the only NPC that never grated on our nerves was Springs.

    The game progress, story turns and story "connections" between the two games felt rushed, sometimes half-assed, and my group thought the best ones were actually the small, hidden ones in ECHOs and similar. The focus on our pro/antagonist... well a rushed chain of total over-reactions from both sides hardly surmounts to an interesting character development, and sometimes ridiculed those the game tried to display as dramatic. This is only the second time BL had a good opportunity to give contrasting serious and dramatic situations opposed to the fun and nonsense, but failed, none of them turned out believable in my eyes.

    As for the gameplay mechanics, I like the increased variations through lazers and cryo weapons, but the O2 is im my opinion more obstacle than feature, same with airborne bonuses and atmosphere split bonuses.

    Objectively...
    ...the raw amount of landscape variations is less than in the previous games, and using the moon as an excuse for this does not apply in a logic-defying universe as BL's.

    Now voices are of course completely subjective, but the fact can be noted that 4 out of 4 in my group were annoyed by them, though our personalities are quite varying.

    The amount of quests AND environments was limited compared to the previous games, just open a finished quest log in BL2 -and- look through every zone's map once, two looks are enough to show that it is unnecessary to count them to verify this being objective.

    Summary: Thanks for the lazers but I'm gonna go back to Borderlands 2    … Expand
  5. Allexio
    Oct 17, 2014
    4
    *** This review/rant is made at the near end of my first playthrough which lasted approx 11 hours ***

    This DLC is great. I mean seriously. ten hours of content for a price of... 30 pounds... I'll admit I feel cheated. And you know, I knew this would happen but I decided to pre-order this game anyway. This game feels and plays out like a DLC. this does NOT feel like a complete 30 quid    *** This review/rant is made at the near end of my first playthrough which lasted approx 11 hours ***

    This DLC is great. I mean seriously. ten hours of content for a price of... 30 pounds... I'll admit I feel cheated. And you know, I knew this would happen but I decided to pre-order this game anyway. This game feels and plays out like a DLC. this does NOT feel like a complete 30 quid game at ALL.

    There are some modifications made from borderlands 2 however, weirdly enough, I think they uswd an older version of Borderlands 2 as a template because some good things from borderlanda 2 were removed like for example the possibility to mark inventory items as trash has unfortunately vanished. As well as the zoom level on sniper rifles and weapons with scopes. Are there any positive modificatoins made from the original game (and by this I mean BL2) ?

    Yes, namely one, the zero gravity system. Ill admit it feels like a breath of fresh air to have the gravity system as a functionning system. it is also particularly well implemented in the search for treasure and the like. the terrain is much more explorable than in Borderlands 2 and you'll have to inspect every roof of every building to make sure you haven't missed a chest somewhere.
    Its uses in combat are fairly limited. You can the so called butt slam but it seems a bit useless to do that when you can get some purple level equipment pretty easily and shred your enemies to pieces. Also, if it is like melee damage in borderlands 2 (which I think is a good way to assimilate), it will probably become completely insignificant in new game + and ng ++.
    But yeah, the jumping feels good and responsive (especially that double jumping part, nice going), even if there are those hard times when you are a milimeter under the ledge you want to grab and you just cant get over it (this tends to happen a lot).

    So why do I thumbs down this game? why so much hate?
    BECAUSE THIS IS NOT WORTH GODDAMN 30 QUID !!
    This is worth 15£ not a cent more. and to see that they charged full price (I say full but generally itd be 40£ but since they really wanted people like me to pre-order it, they decided to "make it at a reduced price of 30 pounds" and I mean seriously? this is **** They KNEW very well that the game wasnt worth 40£ at ALL and they just wanted to make the game look more alluring because of a pseudo "limited time" offer.

    But you know, when they see that borderlands 3 doesnt have as good a start as they expected, now theyll know why: Because they are lying cheating bastards whom I (and other people I'm sure) trusted in making a game and failed to deliver.

    To add to that, the four player co-up is COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY BROKEN. Not only is there not a single match with less than 30 ping but there are huge connection problems in general, massive lag spikes, CONSTANT freezes when using the chat and sometimes youll have to wait 5 minutes to get the list of available servers to play from. So yeah, I am NOT satisfied.

    This game couldve been good but I think its pretty obvious that 2K only intended to use the franchise as a way to milk money out of honest fans. And I have learnt my lesson. I will only buy 2K games when they are at half price and never buy them full price again.

    Do I have any other general comments on the "game" as a whole?
    I like the story. the SHORT story. I also like the vehicles but found it particularly tedious to drive the buggies without falling in lava.
    I think that the game fits well in the BL universe, for what it's worth.

    Is this DLC good? hell yeah, its a top quality DLC worth 15£ for sure. Is it worth buying now? NO. DEFINITELY NOT. And if I were you, I'd just not buy it at all just to show 2K that we arent **** stupid at the point of buying a DLC at 30£.    … Expand
  6. Jetpil0t
    Oct 16, 2014
    4
    The game is more akin to Borderlands 2 DLC than a full release, while there is quite a bit more content here than a typical Borderlands 2 DLC, it is largely repetitious and with very little in the way of compelling new features, visuals or content this makes it difficult to recommend at $60.

    Borderlands 2 was fantastic and the DLC that went along side that game was quite good, however    The game is more akin to Borderlands 2 DLC than a full release, while there is quite a bit more content here than a typical Borderlands 2 DLC, it is largely repetitious and with very little in the way of compelling new features, visuals or content this makes it difficult to recommend at $60.

    Borderlands 2 was fantastic and the DLC that went along side that game was quite good, however it has been some time since this original release and in 2014 I just dont think the game holds up all that well. The visuals are dated, the impact and quality of the writing has tapered off, the shooting feels mechanical and flat and features added here that attempt to mix up the formula feel very minor, unoriginal and probably should have made an appearance earlier in Borderlands 2 DLC.

    If you really loved Borderlands 2, you will probably enjoy what is on offer here however really only if you are looking for more of the same with a few twists.

    People hate to see padded out re-hashes of old games shipped at full retail prices and unfortunately this feels exactly what we have here. If this game was cheaper, shorter, less broken and released a little earlier in the year everyone would likely be more than satisfied, or simply un-interested. I am the latter.    … Expand
  7. mAdZeRG
    Oct 17, 2014
    4
    Let's say it: Borderlands TPS is just a mid-level, mid-enjoyable, mid-everything game !

    The most horrible part lies in the gameplay: they tried to add a third dimension to the series by injecting gravity and loooong and booooring jumps that fail to be enjoyable. The player spends too much time trying to master this skill and, guess what ?, the enemies are shooting at you when you are    Let's say it: Borderlands TPS is just a mid-level, mid-enjoyable, mid-everything game !

    The most horrible part lies in the gameplay: they tried to add a third dimension to the series by injecting gravity and loooong and booooring jumps that fail to be enjoyable. The player spends too much time trying to master this skill and, guess what ?, the enemies are shooting at you when you are mid-air :) In a FPS game, jumping in low-gravity is the dumbest move you can do as a player because you're an just an easy target waiting to get shot ... So, the overhyped feature (low-grav) is nothing but a bad one.

    Laser guns are not fun at all. They just don't work on animals and are way too effective on humans... Speaking of these, there are way too many to be enjoyable past the first couple hours of gameplay.

    Because of low-grav, the combat system tends to be very cumbersome. That's a show killer for me !

    The level design in the 'open world' maps renders the vehicles useless. In fact, the game forces you to use the jump/low-grav combo too many times in these areas and the player spends a lot of time just ... running and shooting animals. So, in my opinion the game lifespan is overrated. In general, I fell the level design is not well done.

    The only really good part comes from the character design: playing as claptrap is funny as hell ! It's dialogues are amusing and sometimes really funny ! It's skills, and their combination, are puzzling and offer a great deal of variety. On the contrary, the other characters are just new names put on the old ones from the first two games of the franchise. Their skills are way too common.

    As another commenter said it, Gearbox has been taking too much money from me already (duke nukem, alien colonial marines, borderlands tps). At the point I even consider not buying Homeworld Remastered when it will get out ! Please Gearbox, don't mess up with this one or you will lose a sale ! You already lost a pre-sale ...    … Expand
  8. wesStyle
    Oct 15, 2014
    4
    Cashgrab Of The Year. Boring new heroes, silly storyline, repetitive quests. Looks more like DLC. And don't forget to buy Season Pass to buy DLC for DLC!
    4 only for Claptrap jokes.
  9. Grufton
    Oct 16, 2014
    4
    This game made me so sad. I really loved the first Borderlands. Was honestly one of my favorite games. The second was a step backwards, mainly because it was mostly just a DLC of the first game. I had high hopes for this games.

    Graphics: The graphics were basically the same as the other games, which when the first game came out were good, when the second game came out there were okay...    This game made me so sad. I really loved the first Borderlands. Was honestly one of my favorite games. The second was a step backwards, mainly because it was mostly just a DLC of the first game. I had high hopes for this games.

    Graphics: The graphics were basically the same as the other games, which when the first game came out were good, when the second game came out there were okay... At this point I really expect more. There was no upgrade of graphics and while they are stylized that is no excuse for some kind of upgrade. 5/10

    Gameplay: Really the biggest issue I have is the same. There hasn't been any upgrade in gameplay in the series at all. it is more of the same. From my experience there is even less variety in weapon drops than in the first game. 5/10

    Story: This is the biggest dissappointment to me. I thought the story to the first game was really good. And again, the second game, at least for me, took a step forward. But this game is basically one long injoke after another. Not only that but if you are in on the joke, you may as well just ignore the story. If the gameplay had advanced or the graphics were an upgrade I might be able to forgive this but it is hard when the one saving grace should have been the trite, meme inspired, rehashed BS story. 3/10

    Overall score a 4.3 so rounded down... 4/10    … Expand
  10. epeternally
    Jan 8, 2015
    2
    When I first started playing this, I thought it was a pretty decent reskin of Borderlands 2 and a few hours in I gave it a seven. The more I've gotten into it, though, the worse it seems. In addition to feeling like DLC rather than a full new game, almost everything that it does is done poorly. The story, most notably, is horrid, especially when contrasted against the great writing ofWhen I first started playing this, I thought it was a pretty decent reskin of Borderlands 2 and a few hours in I gave it a seven. The more I've gotten into it, though, the worse it seems. In addition to feeling like DLC rather than a full new game, almost everything that it does is done poorly. The story, most notably, is horrid, especially when contrasted against the great writing of Borderlands 2. Instead of cleverness, wit, and endearing characters, we get blandness, incoherence, and a neverending stream of Australian stereotypes. The only good thing here is Moxxi's role in the story, and that gets overshadowed by just how bad the rest of the story is.

    The oxygen mechanics get old quickly and ultimately act to the game's detriment, gameplay feels less satisfying, fast travel stations are painfully infrequent, the level design is bland, the story makes no sense, the pacing is all wrong, so many cheap pit deaths, needlessly large amounts of empty space between everything, a confusing to navigate hub area, moonstone (eridium) chests are annoying since if you don't have forty moonstones you miss out on a large portion of that area's loot, enemy designs are uninteresting, the whole world looks very same-y, the vehicles aren't fun to drive. Outside of the same reasonably solid gunplay, if Borderlands 2 did it well, Borderlands The Pre-Sequel does it poorly. It's not the worst game I've ever played, but it's a sequel that does everything wrong. Unless you're a series die hard or it's $5 with DLC, this is one to avoid. Even for cheap, it's not even really worth your time if you aren't a Borderlands devotee.    … Expand
  11. bazongas
    Oct 14, 2014
    0
    A glorified expansion pack. Randy Pitchford has stolen enough of my money between Duke Nukem Forever, Aliens Colonial Marines, and this crap. Save your money for a title from a studio that cares about their customers.
  12. FMZ
    Oct 14, 2014
    0
    Borderlands: The pre-sequel could be one of the laziest sequels (or pre-sequels, omgwearesofunnyandrandomXD) released this year. The game-play feels almost exactly the same and the "humor" (because nowadays making pop-culture reference is considered good humor) feels too derivative and unoriginal. It's almost ironic that this game is called "pre-sequel", because it feels like it's not aBorderlands: The pre-sequel could be one of the laziest sequels (or pre-sequels, omgwearesofunnyandrandomXD) released this year. The game-play feels almost exactly the same and the "humor" (because nowadays making pop-culture reference is considered good humor) feels too derivative and unoriginal. It's almost ironic that this game is called "pre-sequel", because it feels like it's not a step-forward but just a boring cash grab instead. This franchise was already repetitive in it's previous installments, but here nothing is done in order to fix that problem. Avoid this game like a plague.… Expand
  13. morrae
    Oct 15, 2014
    0
    Awful "meme" writing, SJW propaganda, bugs, crappy story and level design. Just a lazy cash grab. Move along people, don't give Gearbox more of your money.
  14. TheStallion
    Jan 31, 2015
    4
    Being a veteran BL fan (I put nearly 500 hours into BL2 alone), I can say that I was wholly disappointed with this title.

    First, the humor. It was dry, bland, and it felt like it was written by Australians, for Australians. Doesn't 2K Australia understand that people from all around the world are buying this game and might not get Aussie humor? The accents grated on my nerves a    Being a veteran BL fan (I put nearly 500 hours into BL2 alone), I can say that I was wholly disappointed with this title.

    First, the humor. It was dry, bland, and it felt like it was written by Australians, for Australians. Doesn't 2K Australia understand that people from all around the world are buying this game and might not get Aussie humor? The accents grated on my nerves a little bit, but it got better as you went along.

    The character depth just wasn't there, plus characters from BL 1 and 2 were reused with about 25% of their personalities we all know and love intact. The seemingly arbitrary homosexual references really pissed me off. Not that I have anything against LGBT people, but I find it very insulting that the writers had to shoehorn another gay character in there and wave it in my face. I mean, Springs, which I think was one of the few more charming characters, had several dialogue sequences in which the main subject being that she was a lesbian. Great, you're a woman that likes other women. So what? I couldn't care less. If a character's defining trait is their sexual orientation, then you're a horrible writer.

    The lack of extra content was astounding. I bought the season pass, thinking that the game would redeem itself with a DLC gem. I was mistaken. The first DLC that queued in my Steam download tab was another arena map. There was already an arena map in the main game and then you make a DLC that is just another one? Boring, absolutely boring.

    I didn't have a big problem with the maps, because what do you really expect? It was on a moon, you can't really get too creative with that.

    The length of the story is hard to gauge because I'm the type that completes all available side quests before moving on with the main story. I think it took me maybe 20 hours to complete the entire game and 90%+ of the side quests.

    Buy it on sale if you absolutely have to try it. I uninstalled it and haven't looked back.    … Expand
  15. DanielQuesnelJr
    Jan 6, 2015
    0
    Last time I ever play a game created by Australians. So many glitches, so many reasons to make me delete my character and to uninstall the game. Complete bullcrap of a game. I'm not even going to bother beating this game, wasted my money on the season pass expecting much more than what I payed for.
  16. Illijixz
    Nov 30, 2014
    4
    Im a die hard borderlands fun and gonna cut it short .

    The good: Low gravity and oxygen system improve game play in a new fashion. Good story explaining between borderlands 1 and 2. Lots of guns and ability to craft your own weapons with a new rng system. The bad: Too few enemies to kill. You spend most of your time running and backtracking. Combat is not satisfying enough you will    Im a die hard borderlands fun and gonna cut it short .

    The good: Low gravity and oxygen system improve game play in a new fashion. Good story explaining between borderlands 1 and 2. Lots of guns and ability to craft your own weapons with a new rng system.

    The bad: Too few enemies to kill. You spend most of your time running and backtracking. Combat is not satisfying enough you will miss the critical strike points of enemies in BL2, arms dropping, crippling etc. all maps look like each other and more backtracking. incredibly repetitive. No end game content.

    I tried hard to love this game a lot but got bored as soon as tvhm started.
    I would suggest waiting for huge discount and some DLC content to be available otherwise you will have 20-25 hours of game play before you realize you are forcing yourself to play it.    … Expand
  17. cookfamily
    Oct 27, 2014
    2
    Positives:
    * Low gravity is fun
    * Excellent skin and level design * Nice bits of humor Negatives: * Needs to be longer for $60. Between that and the inventory and ammo cap, seems like a money grab * Too many Australian accents and references * The misandry and repetitive homosexual references break immersion and insult the customer. I just want to play a fun game. Score would be 7    Positives:
    * Low gravity is fun
    * Excellent skin and level design
    * Nice bits of humor

    Negatives:
    * Needs to be longer for $60. Between that and the inventory and ammo cap, seems like a money grab
    * Too many Australian accents and references
    * The misandry and repetitive homosexual references break immersion and insult the customer. I just want to play a fun game. Score would be 7 without this.    … Expand
  18. Folken88
    Oct 20, 2014
    3
    Another rushed release, or something, caused this to end up at a much lower level of quality than BL2 and 1. It's just annoying most of the time. You'll die a lot more, mostly due to falling into space or lava or glitches in the level. It's beautiful, it sounds great, and the PCs and NPCs are all brilliantly drawn and written, but it's otherwise a shadow of BL2 in fun, length,Another rushed release, or something, caused this to end up at a much lower level of quality than BL2 and 1. It's just annoying most of the time. You'll die a lot more, mostly due to falling into space or lava or glitches in the level. It's beautiful, it sounds great, and the PCs and NPCs are all brilliantly drawn and written, but it's otherwise a shadow of BL2 in fun, length, playability and therefore replayability. Don't buy at 60$. It sucks enough that it's gonna be on sale for 20$ soon. Sad.… Expand
  19. comacoma
    Dec 19, 2014
    3
    Bad taste. First game balanced between dark and insane, while being subtle spaghetti western. First game was experiment with experimental DLC (except outsourced last one). Second game decided to ditch everything that was deeper than modern put pop culture and in order to be a safe cash cow to make more money from top to bottom, from dumb revolution romance and plain evil guys to endlessBad taste. First game balanced between dark and insane, while being subtle spaghetti western. First game was experiment with experimental DLC (except outsourced last one). Second game decided to ditch everything that was deeper than modern put pop culture and in order to be a safe cash cow to make more money from top to bottom, from dumb revolution romance and plain evil guys to endless grind and business model. And this 'Pre-Sequel' game is cash cow made from a cash cow. Square of a cash cow, if you wish, exponentially multiplying the issues. this time the result isn't just tasteless burger for wide audience, it's meat is starting to rot. Too safe and too dumb.… Expand
  20. LastChance21
    Oct 27, 2014
    1
    tl;dr, this game gets a lower rating because the first two instalments were so good, new features/aspects relatively poor, still bugs, humour not as good as before, voice actors are annoying. Do not play if you care about the franchise. Do play if you enjoyed game-play and would like a more child-friendly version of BL.

    I wanted to love this game, I really did. I knew very little    tl;dr, this game gets a lower rating because the first two instalments were so good, new features/aspects relatively poor, still bugs, humour not as good as before, voice actors are annoying. Do not play if you care about the franchise. Do play if you enjoyed game-play and would like a more child-friendly version of BL.

    I wanted to love this game, I really did.

    I knew very little about the Pre-Sequel itself before playing it but had high expectations and faith in the franchise that had delivered in the past, and gotten me enthralled in the lore and backstory of Boarderlands. After playing it for the last six hours, I feel a mix of denial and a sense of being cheated. Admittedly I have not played it all the way through, however things are not looking good. The game had potential, exploring more backstory, presenting Jack from another side, origin stories of other characters, revamping the gameplay, menus, weaponry, and just seemed to fail to impress on all fronts.

    I lot of this review will be subjective, however the game seems to have failed to improve in many areas, and taken a step back in others. The gameplay is practically identical to BL2, there seems to be less variety with the weaponry (discounting the lasers), the AI seems to be worse than previous instalments, the vehicle mechanics are worse and buggies often are unable to drive over a small ridge.

    The gaming features meant to be exciting and new just come off as gimmicks. The oxygen thing changes from being inconsequential to frustrating, but never really steps out from being boring. I can see they were trying to create some more pressure to travel and combat but it just doesnt make it any more fun. The landscape so far is boring, not remarkable apart from the novelty of seeing the Hyperion H in the sky again and from a different angle. And the zero-gravity gimmick seems to detract from the overall gameplay, rather than adding to it. This in itself had a lot of potential in exploring the world, however it is just frustrating in combat and ends up reducing a lot of tactics to 'jump and shoot'.

    Finally, what really killed it for me was the characters and the humour. Personally, I could overlook all the rest if BL:TPS was equal in regard to either, bugs get fixed and patches are released. While I was expecting a darker turn for the BL universe, considering we know the conclusion of the character arcs, it seems to have moved in the other direction. The twisted, quirky, dry, sharp humour of the first two games seems to be dulled, polite and very careful not to offend, with one or two notable and kind of puzzling exclusions. The inappropriateness of the first two, as well as the feeling that the game had been made for the gaming community by the gaming community, and stacked full of easter eggs or references, seems to be replaced by poor imitations. If anything this seems to be trying to be child-friendly.

    Final point, why on earth is every second character Australian, and a poor Australian accent at that. As an Australian, those accents, coupled with the poor dialogue and line delivery, made the game seem like a B-grade movie, and distracted greatly from enjoying the backstory and relevant information being dispersed. Please note we for the most part don't sound like that.    … Expand
  21. obexpe
    Oct 21, 2014
    3
    This is not a proper addition to the Borderlands series--incredibly, even with all it's unfortunate new additions, it fails to address any of the problems I had with Borderlands 2. The tutorial still sucks, the drop system is still flimsy with common loot and overspecialized with boss loot, there are still bullet sponge enemies everywhere, the lighting is still hard on the eyes, (though aThis is not a proper addition to the Borderlands series--incredibly, even with all it's unfortunate new additions, it fails to address any of the problems I had with Borderlands 2. The tutorial still sucks, the drop system is still flimsy with common loot and overspecialized with boss loot, there are still bullet sponge enemies everywhere, the lighting is still hard on the eyes, (though a little better because of the lack of variety), the frame rate is inconsistent no matter what system you run it on, the inventory UI is still an unwieldy abomination, enemy level progression is all over the place, and the writing still sucks. What we have here is a Majora's Mask sequel's worst case scenario--a one-off game that with a gimmick that completely changes the way you play, but but is completely and totally inferior to the home series' "mainstay" games. This is a game with slow and unsatisfying gunplay, horrendous pacing, a plot that seems to have been put together with glue and chicken feathers, and a cast that is, at best, conventionally unlikable, at worst, obdurate to the point of inhumanity.… Expand
  22. Pecheckler
    Nov 15, 2014
    4
    Absolutely love borderlands 2 but have a lot of trouble stomaching this game. My number one complaint is the poor humor and most of the voice actors have thick Australian accents. The new oxygen resource and low gravity mechanics are lame, and only detract from the great gun play of borderlands 2.

    I bought this game even after reading bad reviews because I had just finished playing    Absolutely love borderlands 2 but have a lot of trouble stomaching this game. My number one complaint is the poor humor and most of the voice actors have thick Australian accents. The new oxygen resource and low gravity mechanics are lame, and only detract from the great gun play of borderlands 2.

    I bought this game even after reading bad reviews because I had just finished playing through the masterpiece that is Tiny Tina's assault on dragon keep as well as the extremely funny Mad Moxxi and the Wedding Day Massacre. Was a mistake.    … Expand
  23. titofdidi
    Jan 12, 2015
    0
    At the start a very good game, new heroes, new weapons, Jack(!!), a new playground but few hours later, the game started to be awful, the game become very ulgy, unplayable, just not fun, not Borderlands...

    For me Borderlands (1) is better than this one... This Pre-Sequel is just for me useless for the gameplay and for the story too... The game bad coded, weapons go through the    At the start a very good game, new heroes, new weapons, Jack(!!), a new playground but few hours later, the game started to be awful, the game become very ulgy, unplayable, just not fun, not Borderlands...

    For me Borderlands (1) is better than this one... This Pre-Sequel is just for me useless for the gameplay and for the story too...

    The game bad coded, weapons go through the ground, invisible walls, instakill trough the walls, ...

    I just want to forget this Borderlands and wait the Borderlands 3.

    I don't know who did this game but i hate you 2K Australia, just let the American create good games    … Expand
  24. JohnGaltJunior
    Oct 16, 2014
    2
    I really wanted to like, even love, this game. Borderlands 1 remains my daughter's favorite game of October 2009. After the disappointing Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood, it was Gearbox's improbable diamond in the rough, a game that not only managed to take the best features of MMOs and integrate them with COD-like gunplay, but to make us laugh at the same time. Unfortunately, it seemsI really wanted to like, even love, this game. Borderlands 1 remains my daughter's favorite game of October 2009. After the disappointing Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood, it was Gearbox's improbable diamond in the rough, a game that not only managed to take the best features of MMOs and integrate them with COD-like gunplay, but to make us laugh at the same time. Unfortunately, it seems like ever since Anthony Burch took the helm the quality has steadily degraded, starting with Borderlands 2 and hopefully ending with this sorry excuse for a "Pre-Sequel". We can only hope that this is the final nail in the cheap, plywood coffin of Gearbox Software, and that with a little luck the IP will finally fall into the hands of a competent designer.… Expand
  25. LehmannAD
    Oct 18, 2014
    2
    Honestly a pure cash grab, runs on same engine as BL2, acting is poor, characters are poor, everything about this game is poor. I'm a HUGE borderlands fan i have BL2 on my PC, PS3, and even my VITA for on the go play, and i find it hard to even play this game for more then 30 minutes without wanting to play another game or just not play a game all together. if you're going to buy this gameHonestly a pure cash grab, runs on same engine as BL2, acting is poor, characters are poor, everything about this game is poor. I'm a HUGE borderlands fan i have BL2 on my PC, PS3, and even my VITA for on the go play, and i find it hard to even play this game for more then 30 minutes without wanting to play another game or just not play a game all together. if you're going to buy this game then at least wait for the steam winter half off sale but i bet even by then the price will drop dramatically. don't waste your money this game is not worth your time at all.… Expand
  26. ruinerr
    Oct 18, 2014
    3
    Overpriced BL2 DLC : The best thing that 2K Australia did was their variation of the 2K logo.

    After watching the opening cinematic, I had a gut wrenching feeling that I had just wasted $60+ on a knock off. Unfortunately, the next few hours into the game only made me realize my instinct was dead on. FYI, introducing a poorly voiced character with a hard to understand accent who basically    Overpriced BL2 DLC : The best thing that 2K Australia did was their variation of the 2K logo.

    After watching the opening cinematic, I had a gut wrenching feeling that I had just wasted $60+ on a knock off. Unfortunately, the next few hours into the game only made me realize my instinct was dead on. FYI, introducing a poorly voiced character with a hard to understand accent who basically says Americans are stupid, is a poor way to lead into your game. For the player to then realize that most of the characters all have the same accent just destroys any immersion we had.

    This should be a lesson to other studios out there. When your flagship IP is handled by an amazing studio and then gets passed off to a mediocre one to milk it, we can all tell. Follow Pixar's example and when you see something is just bad, REWRITE IT. Didn't Colonial Marines teach anything?

    I'm a huge Borderlands fan and was looking forward to this release. I didn't want to see any major changes or overhauls, just wanted more of the same awesome thing. Problem is, the writing in this is flat at best. The pacing of the humor is entirely off. Lines said too quickly without any impact, or just of poor taste to begin with.

    We get it, Australians believe Americans are stupid and they think that's fine to put in the game. However they censored a lot of other things they thought would be offensive, yet insulting their largest target market was deemed ok. I can understand why the impression of us is negative, but if we're going to generalize a nation of people then your penal colony production facility isn't any better, just cheaper to use and less successful at everything.

    On top of it, you're just not funny. Really. You took a stellar IP and basically turned it into a B movie-direct-to-video production. Congratulations.

    Low gravity is a gimmick and becomes just an annoyance. Oz kits are basically just relics with a different name to remind you where this garbage was produced.

    Characters are flat, none of the new playable toons really have any desirable qualities that feel new outside of Claptrop who ironically copies other toon's abilities. Mordecai became Gauge and now becomes Wilhelm. Salvador is a chick now. Not even bothering Miss Captain America and no siren this time around. Speaking of sirens.... Where's Angel? Major plot hole.    … Expand
  27. MadclownJack
    Dec 22, 2014
    4
    Completely Phoned In. I really don't see a reason to sell this obvious DLC as a complete game. The humor is nice SOMETIMES, but not much else is worth mentioning. They made Borderlands, boring. And that takes skill. The first two games i played over many times, each time more fun than the last one, especially with all of the dlc. This is just...Bad. Like, seriously repetitive even on firstCompletely Phoned In. I really don't see a reason to sell this obvious DLC as a complete game. The humor is nice SOMETIMES, but not much else is worth mentioning. They made Borderlands, boring. And that takes skill. The first two games i played over many times, each time more fun than the last one, especially with all of the dlc. This is just...Bad. Like, seriously repetitive even on first try. I didn't want to finish it, because it was that boring. Everything is boring. Thank god it's quite short.

    What's "new":
    -"Maps" - Read 5-6 areas with the same old grey/moon filter.
    -Laser Weapons (It needs to be mentioned that these were also present in BL2, albeit in a more rudimentary form)
    -A constant cycle between Atmosphere and Zero G areas,which is kind of pointless.
    -O2 bar, to be used for breathing in space and double jump, which is
    -A new "story". Jesus Christ, what the hell were these people thinking...

    Fans will be utterly disappointed by this, and if they really must have it, they should get it on sale, same as everyone else. It's a 10$ title at best.    … Expand
  28. Spirit25
    Oct 17, 2014
    2
    I have not completed this game, but my oppinion will probably not change as I read through all reviews.

    Welcome to Elpis (Pandora's Moon). The population is 99% Australian accent and 1%, well you guys and some characters from BL 1 and 2. Not a huge issue until it got squased into your face with poor dialogue and bad jokes. They even went and redone the "bandit voice" for some odd    I have not completed this game, but my oppinion will probably not change as I read through all reviews.

    Welcome to Elpis (Pandora's Moon). The population is 99% Australian accent and 1%, well you guys and some characters from BL 1 and 2. Not a huge issue until it got squased into your face with poor dialogue and bad jokes. They even went and redone the "bandit voice" for some odd reason. I have played a lot in one day and I have yet to actually just smile at a joke, but felt a lot of disgust most of the time - lets just say their jokes are more aimed at earthly issues/matters/cultures and nothing to do with the borderlands universe.

    What made Borderlands humour so awesome is that characters had a trait in their personality and then that trait was taken to the EXTREME. In pre-sequal that concept was just thrown down the drain, the characters are a jack-of-all-trades with normal earthly personalities and jokes - which in turn makes you feel very uncomfortable when all these people want to do is kill each other. Oh and just want to say thank you to the devolopers for ruining Moxxi for me, that goddess has totally been stripped down to the normal earthly grounds.

    Ok enough of me ranting about how badly the dialogue and jokes are.
    For a few good points: If you never bothered with the story of the previous games or cared for the humour then you will be pleased that nothing has change regarding the gameplay/fighting and graphics.
    Another good point is that this game has the best fighting start scene compared to the previous 2 and you can play as Claptrap (eventhough I didn't). Also what was a good surprise is that your character actually talks to people this time around and comunicates back with Jack. Anti-gravity.

    Bad points: Your character talks back with quest givers, if they limited this to Jack alone then it would have worked - but now you totally feel at a distance as your character spews the biggest load of rubbish when speaking to random quest givers. I play Nishe and I am very close to throw her into the dustbin, skill tree sucks and her "personality" sucks even more. Her special skill is auto-aim and her trees have a lot of "needs" that has to be met first. Want more gun damage? Then kill someone 1st and then you get more damage. Want more accuracy? You will only get it when you shoot from the hip - nevermind the fact that the scope outperforms that skill immediatly. Want healing regen? then 1st take damage 10 times and then we give you back 50% from then on - if you are still alive.
    Jumping is super limited and slow for a place with no gravity, you will run around on foot quite a lot as cars can't make every cliff jump. Also a small ledge in the middle of the road, nope still have to run around it as you are just just unable to jump ontop of it. This is also the 1st borderlands game where I am drowned in Ammo but starved for weapons. Now either they hid the weapon crates or there just isn't, maybe the 1st but as jumping gets old super fast and frustrating you can imagine. The battle field are also badly thought out - you want cover? nope you went and aggro another set of enemies. Heck - if your able to aim, stay in the air or just chase down your enemies. This game is so unimaginary they took names from other sources like - drakensburg or a small gang that named themselves the darksiders.

    I really want to throw this game in the bin, really I do - but the only thing that keeps me going is Jack. If it weren't for him, I would have uninstalled this game already. Take it from a player that loved the humour and story from Borderlands 1 and 2. Waste of money    … Expand
  29. Joe_Friday
    Nov 15, 2014
    3
    A short overpriced DLC masquerading as a full game. You're getting literally 1/3 the content of previous Borderlands games and paying a higher price than you did for the real full games. The season pass is also a ripoff, only giving buyers 1 additional campaign when previous season passes gave 4 campaigns each. It's almost as if they're intentionally slapping Borderlands fans in the face.
  30. skarr
    Oct 22, 2014
    2
    If you like Borderlands franchise, this game is good. However, the price tag for something that could have easily been a DLC is a show stopper. Same graphics, same gameplay, new classes and a cheesy story...that's all you get. I will instead continue enjoying BL2 as I haven't tried all classes yet.
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Awards & Rankings

28
#28 Most Discussed PC Game of 2014
13
#13 Most Shared PC Game of 2014

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
75

Generally favorable reviews - based on 55 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 37 out of 55
  2. Mixed: 18 out of 55
  3. Negative: 0 out of 55
  1. CD-Action
    Dec 13, 2014
    75
    Derivative, but also colorful, absurd and fun. If you played one Borderlands game, you played them all. [Dec 2014, p.56]
  2. Digital Trends
    Nov 25, 2014
    50
    There isn’t a AAA game out there that doesn’t exist to make money, but Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel stumps for dollars in a brazenly insipid way. It’s a paint-by-numbers effort, almost from top to bottom.
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  3. Game World Navigator Magazine
    Nov 25, 2014
    76
    2K delivered exactly what it promised: a derivative game which nevertheless deserves to be completed in single-player for the story. And then maybe one more play through with a friend or two, just to shoot stuff and kid around, before setting Pre-Sequel aside until DLCs come. Just as it always is with Borderlands. [Dec 2014, p.64]
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