STACK #179 Sept 2019

GAMES FEATURE

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One last bash with Borderlands 3 before release proves you really shouldn’t commit to your fave guns with so many attractive alternatives waiting to be looted. Words Nathan Lawrence LOOT ’EM UP

Y ou can’t spell ‘cooperative’ without ‘operative’. And when it comes to the Borderlands series, cooperative is the operative word as far as we’re concerned. Such was the case at a recent preview event that showcased a few more hours of solo content and, more important to this particular Vault Hunter, co-op play. That’s because, confession time, we’ve never seen Borderlands as a solo series. Sure, you can loot and shoot on your lonesome, but

playing with friends. It works great both ways. We spent a lot of time on that.” Even during those solo hours of the preview session, there was a constant rain of distractions to keep us entertained. The larger-than-life weirdness returns with a cast of old and new faces who do a great job of eliciting IRL LOLs while you lose

yourself in the loot-frag-repeat gameplay loop. Start a main mission. Get distracted by shiny side quests.

we really wanted to keep the Borderlands tradition of having a really good story

like a hot dish best enjoyed with company. That said, Borderlands 3 works hard to still have appeal for the lonesome wasteland tamers. “On the mission design side and

Eviscerate everything on the way. Score a militia-

fragging waves of fools and bagging mountains of tools has always felt

load of new weapons. Find a fave fragger or two, then fall out of love with them any time you find a new shiny shooter. What will likely keep you

narrative side we really wanted to keep the Borderlands tradition of having a really good story that you

focused on the main path is the presence of two love-to-hate-’em main villains: the Calypso twins. “With the villains, we didn’t want to just copy what Jack did in

can experience, either co-op or single player,” says level designer Matt Higgins. “So we didn’t want players to miss events while

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SEPTEMBER 2019

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