Posted 11/09/09 at 10:28:06 PM by Nathan Grayson

Borderlands' first DLC expansion, “The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned,” is a couple weeks away from pulling your level 50 Borderlands veterans out of retirement… on consoles. For now, unfortunately, mum’s the word on the first-person shoot ‘n’ loot’s PC DLC.

“We will have information on the PC version at a later time,” a 2K Games spokesperson told Blue's News.

Shame, that. Our guess? The DLC’s hit a snag in the certification process. After all, that’s what caused the main game to trail the console versions’ dates by a week. We’ve gone ahead and asked Gearbox for clarification, though, so hopefully we’ll hear more soon.

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Posted 10/07/09 at 12:30:00 PM by Will Smith

From the first time we saw Borderlands, we were intrigued. By mixing a fast-paced first-person shooter with the procedurally generated weapon system of a loot-hoarding RPG like Diablo, and letting you play the game cooperatively with three of your pals, the kids at Gearbox have made a game we simply can’t wait to play. We went down to Plano, Texas to play the first three hours of the game and to chat with Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford about what the future holds for PC gaming, why Steam is not an ideal method of distribution, and why Randy loves Wal-Mart.

Read our interview with Randy after the jump!

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Posted 09/24/09 at 12:00:00 PM by Nathan Grayson

It’s been nearly four years since the Xbox 360 helped consoles get their graphical groove back, which – of course – kicked off the current console generation. Time flies, doesn’t it? The Xbox 360, then -- if we’re going by Tech Standard Time (TST) -- should now be on its last legs. A dinosaur on its death bed, facing extinction by the meteoric approach of a new “next-gen” Microsoft console. But it’s not. In fact, if Microsoft and Sony have things their way, the current console generation will keep on chugging along for another five years.

Not long ago, for us PC gamers and our beefy, ever-evolving rigs, this would have been a moot point – or even a nice bit of superiority to hold over console gamers’ heads. “Our graphics are prettier than yours! Neener-neener-neener!” But times have changed. PC exclusives are few and far-between, and many are only one mediocre first week of sales away from being ported to consoles (*cough*Crysis*cough*). The large majority of games are unable to take full advantage of PC hardware, because consoles and their aging innards are holding everyone else back. Sorry state of affairs, ain’t it? 

And I couldn’t be happier.

Read on to find out why!

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Posted 06/11/09 at 04:45:48 PM by Nathan Grayson

I can’t even imagine how boring presenting a game at E3 must get. You’ve got a cramped room, countless herds of tired, sweaty journalists, and the same canned “Lookit! A low level enemy!” presentation day in and day out. For three grueling days. Yet somehow, Gearbox Studios’ Randy Pitchford gave off so much unbridled enthusiasm that you would’ve thought his game was some juicy piece of gossip he’d been keeping under wraps for years.
 
Honestly, though, Pitchford’s boisterous excitement wasn’t without warrant. After all, Borderlands recently underwent a cosmetic surgery not unlike that of Team Fortress 2, resulting in an attractive comic book-style wrapping for the shooter-RPG. In other words, Borderlands looks like an entirely different game now, and a far more appealing one at that. Fortunately, its gameplay – which has always struck me as the expected result of Diablo, Halo, and Fallout 3 walking into a bar – remains just as alluring as always, even in the face of shiny new graphics.
 
During the presentation, Pitchford and two other Gearbox devs showed off Borderlands’ co-op mode, which allows up to four players to kick up dust in the game’s colossal desert world together. First, we saw two players take on impish, Gollum-like enemies called Scags by – what else – shooting them. As with enemies in obvious role model Diablo, Borderlands’ baddies drop all kinds of algorithmically generated loot, making for a whopping total of over half a million weapons in the game. If you can find a use for that many weapons that doesn’t involve building a Death Star, you’re a better man (and/or woman) than I.

Apparently, variations on that algorithm will power the enemy spawning system as well, though obviously in much smaller quantities. As we were made aware of this, another type of Scag whose most defining characteristic was that he was on fire howled and leapt at our guides. The merits of the evolutionary trait of being aflame notwithstanding, the spicy fiesta style Scag was quickly blasted, and the show went on.

Read more to see our verdict on Borderlands' E3 showing.

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