While the rest of the gaming community is focused on things with a hastag of “gate” behind it or bitching about what is or isn’t next-gen enough it’s good to know someone (a) hasn’t forgotten about the last generation of consoles and (b) has given over a mega-franchise to one of the few big name local developers left. Gearbox Software handed the keys to its baby and 2K Australia took this muscle car, slapped a beefy V8 engine in it and took it down to Bathurst for a thrash.



Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is more accessible to a lower player count, an exponentially increasing hoot with a full roster, gives you four insanely different skill trees (well worth a playthrough with each character) and a boss-man on a highway to Hell you’d happily turn to the Dark Side for. It also drops a uniquely Australian experience players not born in the Land Down Under won’t ever fully appreciate or truly understand. Sucks to be them, don’t it.

Glossing over the story, taking place between Borderlands and its sequel, you play one of four hunters enlisted by Jack (not quite the Handsomest, yet), currently Hyperion’s errand-boy as opposed to supreme overlord, to get him out of a spot of bother on Elpis, Pandora’s moon. You really don’t need to know more to it than that. Jack’s your client and you go and do whatever he tells you. To this end you’ll be gallivanting about Elpis for fortune and glory knocking out quests by the hundred and killing bandits by the thousand. The toughest decision you’ll be faced with is which hunter to play.

Veterans will be familiar with the roster. They’ve all cropped up in the franchise at one time or another. There’s Athena the Gladiator, a former Lance Assassin armed with her Aspis (damage absorbing shield) she’s one you don’t want to mess with. Pre-cyborg Wilhelm the Enforcer sports two support drones with Wolf bringing the pain and Saint kissing it better. You even get a front row seat as he slowly morphs into the cybernetic bastard from Borderlands 2, piece by piece. Nisha the Lawbringer is a dual-pistol packing mama and isn’t shy about cracking her whip iffin’ you get too close… and then there’s Clap-Trap. Yes, Claptrap the Fragtrap, a robotic minion/force of death and destruction to both itself and those around it.



2K Australia has done a spectacular job of offering such a diverse group with skills completely unlike anything you’ve played before. Even within each skill tree, there are a multitude of options. Spoilt for choice is the only way to describe it. The skill cooldowns are quite fast so you’re constantly using your abilities finding what works best and what a smorgasbord of death there is. Nisha is a powerhouse of guntastic proportions, instantly acquiring targets dealing massive damage in short bursts. Wilhelm is both an offensive and defensive tank and Claptrap buffs the entire group whether you want him to or not! It’s a crap shoot. He runs a vaulthunter.exe mod and its effects hit the entire party. Highlights include Funzerker - not being able to stop firing your weapon, Torgue Fiesta - spamming grenades hindering friend and foe and Load 'n' Splode - a crazy modifier where he actually unleashes explosive hell on anything around him, just by reloading his weapon.

I was extremely partial to Athena. Her Aspis was super fun to use, blocking all incoming damage, storing it up and then sending it ricocheting between bad guys like an explosive pinball machine. It also bolsters health regeneration, shields and can release multiple types of stored incoming elemental damage. If that wasn’t enough, her sword melee has a modifier for a dash strike, can make enemies explode and anyone bearing witness to such awesomeness freaks out at the mere sight of it. I played her like some bloodthirsty combination of Captain America and Wonder Woman leaving a trail of dead bodies in her wake by both her hands and their own weaponry. Using the Aspis is deliciously addictive and wonderfully satisfying, but that’s enough with the roll call. It’s time to get out there and get amongst it.



Moon patrolling brings with it two crucial additions to the franchise, low gravity and a powerful need for oxygen so, you know, you lungs don’t pop and eyeballs don’t explode. Now before you starting thinking stuff like “well chasing air all day is going to suck balls”, it doesn’t. Pop a dude’s cranium and he might just drop a replenishable canister, there are manually operated pockets of atmosphere and, as luck would have it, eleventy billion cracks in the lunar surface positively overflowing with the stuff so it’s rare you’re going to choke yourself out.

The lower gravity on Elpis lets you jump tremendous distances and even boost further using your oxygen (or Oz) reserves. And then there’s the slam. Oh yes, the slam. Lordy how I loves me the slam. Jump straight up, line up your target and bam, come crashing down to the ground. It’s melee on crack. It’s your own Hulk Smash. It’s a beautiful, beautiful thing and you can pick up a multitude of perks to increase mid-air melee damage, elemental discharges when you impact and even lower your consumption rate. These might seem like small modifiers to the Borderlands formula, but it completely changes up the gameplay. It makes managing larger groups of enemies when you don’t have a full four player compliment much much easier, something almost impossible previously. Borderlands has always been one tough sumbitch when you go it alone, but you can escape the immediate vicinity a lot quicker with a super jump and scamper away to regen. Make sure you fully utilise the new features, it’s a totally new way to play.

The real star of the show for me was easily the true blue Aussie stamp 2K Australia put on it. You see, in case you’ve been living in a bubble, almost the entire population of Elpis appear to be some kind of inter-dimensional sons and daughters of The Southern Cross. Australian colloquialisms, slang, names and even folklore filter into everything, and thankfully for once the accents aren’t of the usual Rooty Hill RSL overly-bogan variety either. There’s no denying this game came from an Australian developer and I’ve lost count of the number of times I had to pause because I was doubled over laughing, losing my shit.



I think my favourite mission involved a mate who had lost his pal, last seen camped by a billabong, somewhere under the shade of a coolabah tree. Then there was the massive wreck of a train called the Dundee. You get the point, though I can see how a non-Strayan might miss it. Their loss in my opinion and it gives the game a, dare I say it, almost patriotic flavor that tastes better than any shrimp on a barbie, long cold Vic or toast with our spreadable national treasure on it.

That said, it’s not all sunshine and lollipops. Where does it falter? The main downsides of Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel are pretty much the same things which have plagued the rest of the franchise. There’s a lot of big wide empty spaces. While mega-jumping in low gravity is heaps of fun, legging it endlessly (especially when you don’t have access to vehicles which could also use a tune-up) is nothing more than a time sponge. 2K Australia, and Gearbox Software, should rip a page out of Destiny’s playbook and let you materialise a ride on the fly. It makes the busywork just that much more pleasurable.



Can we also all agree we’ve moved beyond having to go halfway across a map to collect a reward, too? I’m fine with the nature of RPG grinding and the need to offer ‘kill this’ missions or ’grab x amount of that’ collections, but once I’m done, let it be done. There’s no need to traipse back, sometimes across several non-Fast Travel sections, just to meet up with the quest-giver. It’s the future, dammit. Be more futurey. Teleport me my reward or at least Space Australia Post it and cut out the aimless toing and froing so I can get back to doing what I do, and what Borderlands does best, stylishly shooting shit in the face. Also, totally missed the opportunity to rebrand Handsome Jack. Can you imagine working for Whispering Jack? I’ll show myself out.

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is deadset the most Australian game you’re ever going to play. 2K Australia has taken the well-worn series formula, added its own low gravity tweaks, lasers, cryo-freezing buffs and doused it in true flag-waving Aussie flavour. Strewth, there were so many moments that had me pissing my pants, relishing our country’s lingo, history, colourful characters and, for lack of a better word, culture. It’s gratifying to see Gearbox let the team run with it and I really just couldn’t get enough. If you love shooters and don’t pick up this belter of a game, you’re downright un-Strayan.