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. joerevs300
    Oct 14, 2014
    6
    If you loved Borderlands or Borderlands 2, there's nothing I'll tell you which will say that Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel isn't a game you'll enjoy as well.

    - You shoot things - They die - They drop loot - You keep killing more things, getting better loot and rinse/repeat. However, if you're new to the Borderlands series, I cannot recommend the game at this time. - The pacing is    If you loved Borderlands or Borderlands 2, there's nothing I'll tell you which will say that Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel isn't a game you'll enjoy as well.

    - You shoot things
    - They die
    - They drop loot
    - You keep killing more things, getting better loot and rinse/repeat.

    However, if you're new to the Borderlands series, I cannot recommend the game at this time.
    - The pacing is horrible. Not Final Fantasy XIII horrible, but the first 4-6 hours of the game it'll be holding your hand
    - The environments are, well, as boring as in Borderlands 1. You'll be looking at grey moon for nearly the entire game.
    - There are game breaking bugs, to include a main story mission in which you take a lift to the 2nd floor of a building. If you get knocked off said 2nd floor, there is currently no way to get back up. Since it's a main story mission, you can't proceed (unless it's patched later). So your only option is to restart with a new character. This is completely unacceptable in 2014, not to mention Borderlands 1 and 2 had the same issues with missions that would become broken.
    - The gameplay gets way, way too chaotic, and with many of the action skills this time around, so much is flashing on the screen (especially with ClapTrap) you don't always know what in the **** is hitting you, and then you're in FFYL and dead.
    - The story. Nothing even close to Borderlands 2. But it is better than Borderlands 1, I'll give it that. They had quite the potential to show Jack's rise to power, but it just falls flat.

    So, in closing:
    - You're a huge Borderlands honk who can't get enough. Raise this to 9/10.
    - You're someone who has never played Borderlands. 5/10, take $20 and wait for the GOTY edition to go on sale for Borderlands 2. You'll get 50-70 hours of content and a much, MUCH better game for you.    … Expand
  6. 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
  7. 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
  8. 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
  9. 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.
  10. 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
  11. Captiosus
    Oct 14, 2014
    5
    I LOVED Borderlands 1 and really enjoyed Borderlands 2 so I took advantage of the pre-order loyalty discount. I am wishing I had saved my money. So far, The Pre-Sequel leaves a lot to be desired. Loot drops are few and far between, the characters are just reskinned, revoiced versions of the BL2 stereotypes, and the distinctions between the four character classes are "meh" at best. The O2I LOVED Borderlands 1 and really enjoyed Borderlands 2 so I took advantage of the pre-order loyalty discount. I am wishing I had saved my money. So far, The Pre-Sequel leaves a lot to be desired. Loot drops are few and far between, the characters are just reskinned, revoiced versions of the BL2 stereotypes, and the distinctions between the four character classes are "meh" at best. The O2 (Oz Kits) thing seemed novel at first but then it becomes just another meter and piece of gear to worry about along with your shields, health, and class kits. Weapons still suffer the same boring homogenization from Borderlands 2, except slag is basically replaced by lasers.

    This doesn't even get into the terrible and buggy textures or the ridiculous amounts of bugs in the game. In the first 30 minutes of playing, I was hit by both a "Fight for Your Life" bug on Helios Station that caused me to die when it shouldn't have and I fell through a texture on Elpis that forced a complete game restart. Meanwhile, the flat, terrible textures on static items (like power conduits) are a slap to the face, as if they just couldn't take the time to be bothered. I've seen better texture work back on the Dreamcast.

    This feels like it should have been just a larger DLC for Borderlands 2 but, instead, Gearbox decided to milk it into a full release that exists solely to push out another 6 to 8 months of further DLC. Save your money and just wait for a complete edition that will inevitably come out around next summer.

    Edit: Beware, the downranking and "new user, first time review" shills are coming. Read the critic reviews, don't just pay attention to number. Most of them, even the positive ones, make the exact same complaints I do. This is NOT a game worth full retail price.    … Expand
  12. 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
  13. 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.
  14. 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
  15. 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.
  16. SNKPanda
    Oct 27, 2014
    6
    Fun game like borderlands 2, but it feels more like a large DLC, everything still looks the same and there aren't many new features and mechanics. This is a bit sad since I expected more from a borderlands game
  17. mizo_ghost
    Oct 14, 2014
    10
    finally Borderlands The Pre-Sequel coming out :D

    i dont know whats the wrong with reviews

    but

    This game is a game of the year for me +Middle Earth Shadow of Mordor
  18. Tridus
    Nov 4, 2014
    5
    Surprisingly unpolished compared to Borderlands 2. There are weird bugs and glitches all over the place. Driving on some of the terrain is really annoying. Making terrain jumps in vehicles is harder than it used to be because vehicle boost works differently and they don't tell you that.

    It's shorter than Borderlands 2, significantly. The map is smaller, and the area reuse is really    Surprisingly unpolished compared to Borderlands 2. There are weird bugs and glitches all over the place. Driving on some of the terrain is really annoying. Making terrain jumps in vehicles is harder than it used to be because vehicle boost works differently and they don't tell you that.

    It's shorter than Borderlands 2, significantly. The map is smaller, and the area reuse is really noticeable. The side quests are incredibly tedious, especially due to the area reuse. You'll get side quests in areas that you outlevel so much that actually stopping to shoot anything is a waste of time.

    The gameplay is still good, but this is more like an expansion than a full game, and isn't worth full game prices. Series fans should wait for a sale. People new to the series should get Borderlands 2 instead.    … Expand
  19. Ghoster
    Oct 21, 2014
    5
    I'm writing this review as huge fan of Borderlands and Borderlands 2. Those 2 games was almost perfect with only few bad things. Unfortunately, Pre-Sequel creators decided to take bad things out of B1 and B2 and base whole game only on this leaving everything phenomenal out. So, here we have bunch of boring time trail missions. Level design is poor and missions design even worse. In 50% ofI'm writing this review as huge fan of Borderlands and Borderlands 2. Those 2 games was almost perfect with only few bad things. Unfortunately, Pre-Sequel creators decided to take bad things out of B1 and B2 and base whole game only on this leaving everything phenomenal out. So, here we have bunch of boring time trail missions. Level design is poor and missions design even worse. In 50% of missions you don't exactly know what you need to do. Most of the missions you can't start before listening 5 minutes of boring self conversation! In B1 and B2 you could start the mission and then listen to talks. But here they figured how to make this part boring. In 80% of missions you must stand and listed because at end of all talking you get some stupid thing you need for mission. Starting mission before would result with need to return to starting point. Unfortunately, don't see way how updates could repair this game. It have same sweet cartoon graphics as previous games, but gameplay and mission design is totally bad!… Expand
  20. clukskin
    Oct 19, 2014
    5
    I feel distraught after beating this game.
    There is a large amount of reused borderlands 2 assets in here, and it's difficult to see how this is worth a full 60 dollars.
    The combat rapidly becomes tedius in low gravity especially when trying to collect ammo or gather loot. Lots of bugs at the moment everything from quest items to inventory management. The story is good enough to hold    I feel distraught after beating this game.
    There is a large amount of reused borderlands 2 assets in here, and it's difficult to see how this is worth a full 60 dollars.
    The combat rapidly becomes tedius in low gravity especially when trying to collect ammo or gather loot.
    Lots of bugs at the moment everything from quest items to inventory management.
    The story is good enough to hold up as far as consistency, but oh my god the humor in this game is awful. The jokes feel very forced and for the vast majority of it i was not laughing.
    I am glad i beat this game so i understand the events that transpired, but it felt more like a chore then something i should be enjoying in my free time and towards the end i was skipping entire packs of mobs to run to the teleporter out of sheer disinterest.

    At the end i'm left with the questions, "what was missing in this game? what went wrong?" because after it all i did not receive the same delight i've come to expect from it's predecessors.    … Expand
  21. LightOfTheMoon
    Oct 19, 2014
    5
    Mechanics are great, the use of jumping and slamming ads a whole new level to the game, I LOVE the grinder and the characters talking to each other was a nice change. But that's about it. The story lacks any depth , the developers really over hyped the amount of guns you'll find and actually use, there is very little difference in the levels, and it feels EXTREMELY short. In short its aMechanics are great, the use of jumping and slamming ads a whole new level to the game, I LOVE the grinder and the characters talking to each other was a nice change. But that's about it. The story lacks any depth , the developers really over hyped the amount of guns you'll find and actually use, there is very little difference in the levels, and it feels EXTREMELY short. In short its a good game, the things that are actually new work well, it just doesn't have the good quality and quantity that Borderlands 2 had.… Expand
  22. pesho_one
    Oct 26, 2014
    5
    I am a huge BL1 and BL2 fan and played through them multiple times with all the DLCs. The Pre-Sequel's production value is quite low in comparison with the previous games. This is not immediately obvious. I started to play it, while very exited, and it was at least 4-5 hours in the game until I realized that something is missing and is kind-of off with the game as a whole. It is stillI am a huge BL1 and BL2 fan and played through them multiple times with all the DLCs. The Pre-Sequel's production value is quite low in comparison with the previous games. This is not immediately obvious. I started to play it, while very exited, and it was at least 4-5 hours in the game until I realized that something is missing and is kind-of off with the game as a whole. It is still Borderlands installment but I felt it was worse than most of the DLCs for the previous games. The map design is poor, story and dialog are neither inspired nor fun anymore (which were big points for BL1 and BL2). The new game-play mechanics are alright though. Biggest minus for me: the overall atmosphere is not there. I can even say that this game didn't feel like true Borderlands in some ways. After finishing it, I played BL2 for a bit and I was almost stunned how much better everything was arranged within a given map. The enemy variety and the beautiful places of BL2 are just in another league. I wonder, did the "The Pre-Sequel" was just an exercise for another sub-team of developers or they just lost the inspiration?… Expand
  23. metascifi
    Apr 9, 2015
    5
    endless wandering. the maps are just so horrible. when it's fun it is SO FUN but these moments are separated by hours of being lost and doing stupid, boring side-quests to gain experience. improve the maps, reduce the distances, improve the side quests and you have among the best games ever made
  24. Matiya024
    Jun 16, 2015
    5
    Highly Flawed. They decreased the drop rate of loot in general, meaning you'll often be stuck with loot multiple levels below the enemies you need to kill with it, the player gains XP far to slowly meaning you will be forced to grind levels off enemies. Either that, or do the boring side quests. The enemy power and health has been increased, making second winds nigh impossible, and theHighly Flawed. They decreased the drop rate of loot in general, meaning you'll often be stuck with loot multiple levels below the enemies you need to kill with it, the player gains XP far to slowly meaning you will be forced to grind levels off enemies. Either that, or do the boring side quests. The enemy power and health has been increased, making second winds nigh impossible, and the characters are just boring, I found myself thinking which of these would be the least boring to play, I have yet to play the DLC characters, the gladiator, or the enforcer, but if you do buy it, do not play Nisha or Claptrap.

    This game is not good for single player, it's a terrible single player experience, and should only be played with friends. That seems to have been the intent of the game seeing as it has a drastic increase in difficulty when compared to BL2. Who knows it may actually be good if you have friends(who have the game) to play it with. Otherwise do not buy this game. It's not worth 40$, and its sure as HELL not worth 60$. If you enjoyed Borderlands 2, this game will be a disappointment, if you didn't like Borderlands 2, then you'll enjoy this thing even less.    … Expand
  25. Lenzie
    Oct 6, 2015
    6
    A ‘good’ (but not great) return to the borderlands universe with solid borderlands-style FPS game-play that we are used to coupled with some interesting story elements that provide background to some of the events and characters seen in BL1 & 2.

    That said this iteration in the series lacked the sparkle, interesting character narrative and 'laugh out loud' moments that made Borderlands 2    A ‘good’ (but not great) return to the borderlands universe with solid borderlands-style FPS game-play that we are used to coupled with some interesting story elements that provide background to some of the events and characters seen in BL1 & 2.

    That said this iteration in the series lacked the sparkle, interesting character narrative and 'laugh out loud' moments that made Borderlands 2 a complete pleasure to play. I was left wanting with this game and towards the end I got bored with it and simply felt obligated to grind though the game to get all the quests and side quests complete to get the game ‘done’.

    If you've not played any of the Borderlands games, go try Borderlands 2 (and its superb DLC expansions) over this game, you won’t regret it!    … Expand
  26. 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
  27. 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.
  28. 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
  29. JeremyB
    Oct 17, 2014
    5
    Unfortunately 2K Australia failed to deliver the same humor and love that went into previous Borderlandst.
    I recently played through Borderlands 2 and really couldn't put it down from start to finish. Unfortunately for this game I'm having to force myself to play it just so I feel like I wasn't totally jipped out of my money.
    The world gets ugly and repetitive to look at very quickly.    Unfortunately 2K Australia failed to deliver the same humor and love that went into previous Borderlandst.
    I recently played through Borderlands 2 and really couldn't put it down from start to finish. Unfortunately for this game I'm having to force myself to play it just so I feel like I wasn't totally jipped out of my money.

    The world gets ugly and repetitive to look at very quickly. World design in Borderlands is always something I've felt the game series did pretty bad, but the Presequel does it REALLY bad. It is the most unmemorable game world I've ever played, I would literally rather explore a dog turd.

    The low gravity doesn't add any real value to the gameplay other then throwing your loot off the map on a regular basis, and the o2 mechanic is one of the most pointless tacked on features I've seen in a video game. There's no real threat in running out of oxygen because you're always surrounded by areas to restore it. Even if you do run out it takes eternity for it to kill you.

    They CONSTANTLY throw weapon crates at you. I mean you don't even need to explore for them, you'll often run into multiple just along your path during a mission. It honestly takes away the joy of exploring and finding them like in BL2. Many of them will cost moonstone to open (presequels version of eridium). You'll probably find yourself accidentally wasting all your moonstone by opening them without realizing it.

    The story about Jacks rise to power should be fairly interesting, but somehow it manages to be pretty much total crap. It's a mixture of boring characters, poor writing, and a serious lack of humo, though it does attempt and fail over and over to bring humor.

    The side quests are simply not even worth doing. They are nothing but fetch quests, always taking you back to areas you've already been at a lower level, meaning you'll be having to kill lower level mobs while you do it.

    Anyone with half a brain will see this game was rushed and extremely lazily done. Calling this Borderlands 2.5 would imply this would be as good as BL2 with some new stuff. It isn't. It's the worst of the series and it's an absolute rip off they are charging $60 for this.    … Expand
  30. 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
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Awards & Rankings

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

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
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.
    Read full review
  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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