We are two months away from the nearly simultaneous release of both Borderlands 3 and Destiny 2: Shadowkeep. Borderlands 3 will be out September 13, while Shadowkeep is out just four days later on September 17.
Originally, this was going to be yet another article begging at least one of these two games to move their release date to prevent a loot shooter apocalypse that is going to eat all my sleep and possibly kill me that week. But we are so close to release now that such a request is probably futile, and so I guess we just have to deal with it. And many players who want to play both will have to choose between them, once they’re both live together on the 17th.
I still don’t really understand how this happened. Borderlands has had nearly a decade to figure out the release plan for its third game, and they chose a date that was almost certainly going to be near a big Destiny release, which happens literally every year in the same two-week span. On Bungie’s side, they saw Borderlands pick that date, and despite charting their own course, now free of Activision, still decided they wanted to release not just in that same window, but literally four days later. Either of these games could have been perfectly comfortable in August or October or November, and yet here we are with this madness.
So, which game suffers more from this overlap?
The “logical” answer here, most people’s gut instinct, would say that this spells bad news for Destiny. Borderlands 3, unlike Shadowkeep, is a full game, one that players have been waiting seven years for, and that is shaping up to be quite good (I’ve played it, it’s fun, and has borrowed a lot from Destiny to make its combat better than past games).
I don’t know how long Borderlands 3 will take to beat, but if it’s anything like Borderlands 2, even running through the initial campaign will no doubt take longer than the four days before Shadowkeep comes out unless you’re playing 10+ hours a day. And once you do beat it, naturally, there are dozens, hundreds of hours of farming and character building and alternate playthroughs to experience. It feels like it has the potential to steamroll right over Shadowkeep’s release as a result.
And yet, I’m not so sure.
One thing I’ve discovered when I’ve talked about Borderlands V. Destiny over the past few months is that there are a good amount of people who…have not actually played the first two Borderlands games. Even if Borderlands was the original loot shooter, I’m finding that many people’s first experience with the genre was not the original Borderlands in 2009, but instead Destiny in 2014, or even Destiny 2 in 2017 or sometime in the years that followed as the game gained popularity. Destiny, unlike Borderlands, has been consistently producing content over the past five years, and is now arguably in the best place the series has ever been heading into Shadowkeep. And this is why I’m hearing a lot of people who say they’ll put Borderlands off indefinitely to make sure they can get to Shadowkeep first. That’s if they’re even interested in Borderlands at all, as it’s a series more people than I thought never got into.
Also, the release of Destiny 2: Shadowkeep isn’t just about Shadowkeep. It’s launching with cross-save, a first for the series with the ability to bring disparate platforms together at last (Borderlands doesn’t have cross-save at launch). And past that, it also marks the release of Destiny 2: New Light, the free-to-play experiment that will let players play every bit of content from Destiny 2: Year 1 for free, including the base game, DLC’s Curse of Osiris and Warmind, as well as do things like visit every patrol zone in the game from the Dreaming City to the Moon, even if they ultimately have to pay for access to actual quests and loot there.
Do not underestimate the appeal of a free game in 2019. Much less one that everyone is hyping up that it’s in a really great place right now. Destiny is a very addicting game, and given the choice between free Destiny 2: Year 1 and $60 worth of Borderlands 3, I think there are going to be a good amount of people who choose the former, and get hooked on the series as a result.
Obviously, I think both offerings will ultimately do well. I expect in the end Borderlands 3 will be one of the top selling non-COD, non-FIFA games of the year, and I’m sure Shadowkeep will please Destiny players, and Bungie will get a big boost from new New Light players. But these release dates will do nothing but hamper the release of both games, and I still hate that we’re in this situation.
I don’t know who will “win,” but I think it’s a closer match than many people think. And ultimately, we, the players, are probably the ones who win in the end with the release of two great games. Everyone wins except my sleep schedule, that is.
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