Yesterday, Borderlands 3 was supposed to debut an unusual event, one that changed the Maliwan Takedown four-man raid to make it scale for different numbers of players. As in, it would be easier for three players, then easier for two, then actually able to be soloed by one in a way that wasn’t inaccessible for 99% of players.
But…it got cancelled. Here’s what Gearbox said yesterday when the event was already supposed to be going live:
“Due to technical issues, today’s event, which would scale the difficulty of “Takedown at the Maliwan Blacksite” to number of players, is being postponed to a future date. We will share more information here when we’re able. Thank you for your patience.”
What’s weird about this is that I still don’t understand why this was ever supposed to be a time-limited “event” in the first place. It seems pretty clear that Maliwan Takedown would benefit from scaling all the time, rather than just in some short window that Gearbox activates it for. This is especially true given that it’s a huge pain to try to matchmake for a session with Gearbox’s archaic system, which is the main barrier for entry for a lot of players. Maybe it’s better now, but when it first launched it would take me something like 5-6 attempts to even get in a four person group to start the activity on most difficulties. I actually wouldn’t be surprised if it was harder now, given that most players have moved on to other activities like the Moxxi’s Heist DLC. And Borderlands 3 does not have the advantage of out-of-game matchmaking tools or apps the way you might see with game like Destiny.
So why is this an event at all? I have a theory.
It’s less of an event and more of a test for Gearbox. If this is a total technical disaster and doesn’t work (and from this delay, that seems likely), maybe they “end” the event and don’t bother with it anymore, cutting their losses and moving on to focusing on future content instead, leaving it as balanced for four players only.
But if it does work? Then they say something like “oh we’ve decided to make this event permanent because of the great response to it” and they look like benevolent heroes.
I would definitely play Maliwan Takedown more if it scaled to fewer than four players. Though I would argue that the biggest problem with the mode is the anti-fun, hyper-punishing respawn system which doesn’t let you rejoin the fight and forces you to spectate your teammates if you’re not revived. Or it just ends it completely if you’re solo. I get that Maliwan Takedown is supposed to be challenging, but this punishing respawn system is much more likely to just have me go boss farm on repeat or do something like Proving Grounds where even if I die, I can still continue to make progress rather than fail the entire thing.
I do want them to move forward with this, but this seems like another example of one of Borderlands 3’s biggest issues, the fact that it’s a game with a huge host of technical problems and it often feels like it’s built on an engine held together by pasta and yarn. In theory, sure, Maliwan Takedown should definitely scale to player level, but I’m not convinced Gearbox will figure out how to make it work, and if they don’t, either don’t expect this event to happen at all, or don’t expect it to be permanent.
Follow me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Pre-order my new sci-fi novel Herokiller, and read my first series, The Earthborn Trilogy, which is also on audiobook.
