I thought of your hand-grenades, of your bayonet, of your rifle... BORDERLANDS 2 REVIEW

(Written September 2012)
This is my Hyperion brand auto correcting “lady finger” pistol. There are many like it, but this one is MINE. In the Borderlands you never know what’s over the next hill or at the bottom of the next crate. You will burn through hundreds upon hundreds of rifles, shotguns, revolvers, or sub machine guns and not a single one will be exactly alike. Not. One.

Thus is the siren song of the sequel to one of my personal favorite games in all of ever. Borderlands 2 retains the narcotic-esque draw of bigger and better loot whilst handsomely outshining every other aspect in which the first stumbled.

There’s a word I want to avoid using to describe this game, but I don’t want to sound... you know, overzealous. Let’s just say it rhymes with “laster-neice”... it's masterpiece.

Where the first game was pretty, this game is gorgeous. Where the first was kinda funny, the sequel is achingly so. Where the first practically forgot to tell a story, this chapter spins a damn decent yarn.

When Borderlands 2 boils over into an act break it brings the plot developing goods and it brings them hard. Of course if you never played the first, most of the pathos will fly right over your head so . . . tough cookies.

The respect paid to the intricacy of BL2’s continuity is unheard of in the gaming world. Where most sequels start stories from scratch or hire new and indifferent writers; Gearbox software found a few that saw the potential in the world and its loveable menagerie of characters then raised them up miles beyond my rose colored expectations.

Everybody’s back and I mean everybody. If you haven’t found your favorite character yet then you aren’t looking hard enough. Even better, the playable characters from the original, who I totally can’t name from memor- Lilith, Roland, Brick, Mordicai, Have speaking roles and are each fleshed out into the most interesting characters in the series thus far! But enough about the old guard, we need to get to know Jack.

Seriously. He is just the worst.

For my money? “Handsome” Jack is one the best villains gaming has to offer. From the first entitled/painfully delusional line of dialogue I was hooked. I couldn’t wait for him to taunt me, or threaten me, or regale me with another hilariously sociopathic anecdote. Jack is a full tilt delight. That is, until he isn’t. You can’t have a great story if your villain never comes off as either threatening or dangerous. So for the sake of surprise I won’t say much more on the subject, but from the second act break on, I wanted to rip his throat out with my fingernails. Slowly.

But wait, you ask, why are you droning on about the story? This a friggn’ video game! You’re right and it is, my apologies. There is much more to discuss. Great guns don’t mean jack-monkey-squat if there ain’t nothing decent to shoot at. BL2 does not have this issue. If anything the enemies are too varied and interesting. You never stay with the same kind long enough to learn the tactics to take them all down. This is what they call a “good” problem.

You’ll need all the kinds of guns you can get your hands on for all the armored loaders, acidic varkids and flaming midgets you’ll be in the crosshairs of every other minute. But guns alone aren’t the most important decision you’ll make about combat, first, you’ll need a character. Of which presently, there are four.

There’s the runaway elemental Maya who’ll deal all the fire, corrosive, electric, and explosive damage you could possibly want. And you’ll want a lot of it. Then there’s a special opps commando/bitter divorcé Axton with a detachable turret on his back. The local Pandora resident ‘roid monkey: Salvador; who makes up for his stunted growth with being able to dual wield any two guns at once. Last and least we have Zer0. A faceless assassin who speaks only in monosyllables and Haiku. . . also he has a giant blue katana and is invisible so, whatever. (He's my favorite.)

They each have three skill trees and each take a full playthrough of the game to max out. There are hundreds of ways to approach each character and one playthrough takes at least twenty hours. Suffice to say: I’ve been busy. I have only scratched the surface of my Zer0, and I plan to stick with him for a whole ‘nuther go around. That’s how much fun he is.

I can’t tell you what kind of experience you’re going to have in Borderlands 2. But I can tell you to bring friends. You’re gonna want them; because I suppose I forgot to mention the entire game was built around four player coop. The more folks playing, the better the loot, and the closer you get to your friends... unless they also want that shiny purple revolver... then you can set up a trade menu and duel them for it! Gearbox really thought of everything.

From top to bottom BL2 was everything I wanted it to be, from the laugh out loud script, to the surprisingly somber story. From the addicting loot and gunplay, to Jesper Kyd’s Twangy/ techno Sci-Fi western score. This game is, in a word, a laster-niece.

And I'd like to thank Scooter personally for coining the moniker: "Peppernip." It is delightful.