Some of my friends are gamers, but since I'm the only one keeping up with the industry professionally, I've become a de facto source of information for the people in my life who aren't inclined to scroll gaming websites or read “The Game” to watch awards as they happen. So one Saturday night I ended up rattling off to my friends a near-complete list of all the announcements from this year's awards show.
There's a new Naughty Dog game, I told them. And there was a theatrical trailer for The Witcher 4 that showed Ciri as the protagonist – that was pretty cool, I said.
“What about Borderlands 4?” one of my friends asked hopefully, taking a sip from her beer can. I had forgotten that she was the only person I knew who still loves Borderlands and plays it regularly. “Oh yeah! There was a trailer.” I said. “And?” she said expectantly. I thought for a second. “Well, it looked like Borderlands,” I said. Then I added, “Now there is one Confrontation.” You gasped. Another of our friends frowned at her. She said defensively, “You don’t understand. I was so happy when they added something like vaulting. Just vaulting.”
Borderlands 4 is more of the same
I'm sure the Borderlands 4 trailer surprised absolutely no one – especially since Randy Pitchford prematurely revealed its existence. Looking at it again now, it looks a bit more technologically futuristic than I expected, with lots of big robot enemies and a horde of androids, but otherwise it's more or less what I expected.
The art style has modernized – less comic book and more realistic, but it still looks undeniably like a Borderlands game. The traversal is the same, only with grappling. There are still tons of weapons, so many that in one scene it rains from the sky. There's a lot of shooting. There are psychos. It's definitely… Borderlands.
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Borderlands hasn't changed much over the years
That's not necessarily a bad thing. As my friend who defends Borderlands said, “If it ain't broke…” Borderlands hasn't made any significant deviations from its formula since the first game released in 2009. 2012's Borderlands 2 repeated the first by improving the overall narrative and revamping gameplay systems in many ways, but most notably by giving players more build flexibility. Borderlands 3 added beautiful, diverse planets, a ping system, and more co-op modes. The pre-sequel doubled down on the futuristic aesthetic we see in the trailer for 4.
But everyone plays largely the same. They are cooperative first-person looter shooters with some RPG elements where you play Vault Hunters with different skills and abilities. The series is iterative but never revolutionary. You shouldn't expect to see any major changes in gameplay or mechanics, or any changes at all for that matter.
It's tempting to speculate about what this refusal to change means for the future of Borderlands. The Triple-A space is incredibly competitive and games are becoming increasingly expensive to develop. If Borderlands continues to refuse to innovate with its games and simply gives players more of the same, will it be able to compete?
On the other hand, it has worked so far. Borderlands is one of the best-selling video game series of all time, selling more copies than Halo, The Witcher and God of War. The strategy of giving players exactly what they expect isn't particularly interesting and can make the series feel dated and trapped in the 2010s, but Gearbox isn't suffering from it, at least not yet. A slight iteration won't work forever, but in 2025 it could still be enough.
