Why Borderlands kicks FPS arse!

I can bang on about how the FPS genre is dead, boring and beyond monotonous till I’m blue in the face but it won’t get me anywhere and the publishing giants out there won’t change their ways. The future is dead and the golden goose has been killed before anyone could even have a fair crack at the whip producing a unique future-based FPS.

Why then am I going to talk about the Borderlands series then? Well it is quite simple; it breaks the mould and gives gamers something that they actually want. For starters it does not appeal to the bromance-hungry, beefed-up led junkies and it does what it bloody well wants to.

Does it rely on constant, boring and predictable set-pieces that you could spot from a while away even if you walked with a stick and wore solid black sunglasses? No. Does it swear at you with every other word? No. Does it let you shoot mutant midgets on fire? You bet your arse it does.

The originality found in the game is not seen anywhere else and that’s a fact. Granted, there are many similarities drawn between Fallout 3 and the first title (I even slated it because of this in the early days). Then I grew up and got some frigging perspective. I woke up and realised that no longer was a yearly ritual of Call of Duty enough to quench my gaming thirsts.

Owning the Game of The Year edition of the game makes it clear how much thought and effort was put into the game not just in the terms of missions and variety but also the visuals. The game looks bloody brilliant and it beats any sort of cell-shading seen in a game before.

How many hours, single player alone, will you get out of your average stale shooter? Fewer than ten I’d reckon. Look at the total number of hours you will get from a single playthrough of Borderlands alone. You know the point I’m making here. The price tag of £40 is blown into the stratosphere in terms of value because of this game; I will never look at a shooter again priced at £40 and think it provides good value.

All this and Borderlands 2 has not even been mentioned. The second promises to re-ignite the genre and take the industry by storm yet again with its refreshing appearance, new setting and exciting gunplay. I cannot wait to sink my teeth into it when it lands and keep it in my collection for quite some time and love every last minute and mission it has to offer.

I sincerely hope that this year will bring about the end of these shameless shooters and we can finally return to the creative nature of the industry that has come and long gone in the past couple of years.

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