Six years between Borderlands games may have been exactly what the franchise needed to reinvent and reinvigorate itself. After many (myself included) felt disappointed by Borderlands 3 for a variety of reasons, the iconic looter shooter series is back with vastly improved gameplay, a darker tone, and a whole new world to explore in Borderlands 4.
Hampered by a few very minor setbacks and worrisome PC performance in the pre-release build, this could still easily be remembered as the best Borderlands game ever made with some well-executed updates and post-launch support.
It just feels so good
Borderlands 4 sets a new benchmark for core gameplay in the franchise. I can't express enough how fun BL4 is to play, at a base level, and it's far and away the best the series has ever had to offer. New movement tech includes gliding, double-jumping, sliding, dashing front to back or side to side à la DOOM, and ziplining to traverse the battlefield, all while raining hell on a variety of foes.
It's addictive and refined, and the main reason I will keep coming back to the game, in both co-op and solo play. It all just feels so good to play. The guns, the movement, and the action skills all work together in harmony to create the most fluid and exciting core gameplay loop that the series has ever seen.
Players choose from four unique playable Vault Hunters–Vex, Harlowe, Amon, and Rafa (my pick for my first journey)–and customize their skills as they level up and pick their builds, which now have more flexibility than ever. Utilizing the different characters, abilities, weapons, class mods, grenades, and other loadout options, you can truly craft the playstyle and experience you want with what feels like endless possibilities. And when it comes to being truly "endless," that's also how it feels when chasing down different weapon rolls.
Weapons in BL4 can roll with unique perks and traits, but also borrow characteristics from other weapon manufacturers. Borderlands fans will remember such names as Tediore, Maliwan, and Torgue, all offering different styles. A few new manufacturers join the fray, too, creating an RNG bonanza where your weapon will either be overpowered and ridiculous or borderline useless. And that's where a lot of the fun comes into play for a game in this genre.
There's potential for countless hours of farming specific weapons and rolls, and it's now easier than ever to target-farm certain guns dropped by bosses with the ability to replay boss fights to your heart's content until you get what you're looking for.
I suspect many gamers will play through the storyline and maybe dabble in some endgame material before moving on. But for the true grinders, there does seem to be a good amount of potential for playing BL4 for months on end, especially with new content in the pipeline. This game also adds the ability to skip the story and begin at level 30 on a new character, which is instantly more inviting for multiple playthroughs and variety.
More down-to-earth (or Kairos) than ever
The upped stakes of BL4's plot on its new location of Kairos make for a more serious-feeling game than before, which is a good thing. One of the main complaints about the Borderlands series has been its increasing reliance on toilet humor and dumb jokes. Kairo has a bit more of a darker tone than the previous planet of Pandora, and it makes for a more muted experience when it comes to humor.
Make no mistake, though. This is Borderlands. Side quests galore are filled with silly references and jokes, and they range from flat and cringy to genuinely kind of funny. One quest I found was inspired by Pokémon, and tasked me with using tech to catch runaway mini bipedal Tediore guns like pocket monsters. The quest giver, Bash, could only look on in horror as I was assaulted by Team Rocket lampoons named Bomb Squad Jake and Josey.
There's another side quest where a Kairos resident named Crack MaBacky wanted me to crack his back several times. Seriously. It's the kind of stuff you roll your eyes at and get your XP and money from, but it's a reminder that you are indeed still playing a Borderlands game. This time around, it's more ancillary and less egregious than before, so it works.
One of my main issues with BL4 was that the game's storyline takes quite a while to get going. It wasn't until after entering the map's third biome that the events really hooked me and made me want to play the storyline to its completion. Before that, I felt myself trudging through the map, exploring and learning the combat more than engaging with the growing plot—early on, it's all about world-building, and it felt like a slog before I locked in to the events.
It doesn't help that Kairos's tone creates some more realistic, albeit bland-feeling, new NPCs when compared to the previous game's outrageous characters like Tiny Tina, Sir Hammerlock, or Claptrap (the bot takes a big backseat in this game), but returning characters and the storyline's crescendo in its second half made everything feel satisfying in the end, even if the main villain ended up falling flat by the time the credits roll.
Still, basically every voiced character in the game is brought to life with immaculate care and professional execution, from the Vault Hunters to random Psychos screaming in pain as they get targeted by my auto-aiming grenades. Coupled with appropriate combat music and ambience matching the flora and fauna, the game sounds as good as it plays.
All of these things help Kairos feel like a joy to explore while finishing out the map by finding collectibles, clearing multi-step side missions and quests, and stumbling across randomly-spawned events or world bosses that drop high-tier loot. This process is only enhanced with the new Digirunner personal vehicle always at your disposal, instead of having to use a Catch-A-Ride somewhere.
Optimize THIS!
I reviewed BL4 on PC, and the pre-release build was less than stellar when it comes to optimization on my rig, which is admittedly aging at about four years old. Hitching while moving between areas of the map, freezing during gunfights, framerate drops, and a handful of game crashes mired my experience and took what could have been an instant classic and made it more of a frustrating experience than I would've hoped for.
Thankfully (for the game, not for me), it appears that an issue with my dying power supply was causing the bulk of my worst problems. Gearbox says the day one patch for BL4 will fix many of these issues, like hitching when moving between areas of the large open world map, and I have faith that things should feel better, but I can only speak on my own personal time with the game thus far.
A lot of my hours early on were spent tweaking settings on my PC, which fit within the game's minimum specifications, but I still had a hard time getting it to play smoothly, even on the absolute lowest settings. Eventually, I did find a sweet spot of Low settings with some exceptions trickled in to land at a relatively stable 60 FPS with less frequent drops and hitches, thanks to help from 2K and Gearbox figuring out what was best for my machine.
If you're like me with an aging rig and comparable specs (i7-12700K, NVIDIA RTX 3070, 16 GB RAM), then beware that this could hamper your experience. And if you're like me, it may be time for some upgrades.
I hope the incoming optimization updates help bring BL4 to its max potential, which is to say, absolutely in the discussion for the best overall game in the franchise at its launch. For now, I'd maybe suggest picking this one up on console if you're worried about how it may play on your own PC, or wait for an optimization patch if these potential issues bug you.
For clarity, here are my PC specs and game settings:
- OS: Windows 11
- CPU: 12th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-12700K (3.60 GHz)
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070
- RAM: 16 GB RAM
- Borderlands 4 video settings: Low preset, 1080p resolution
And here are the recommended and minimum specs for BL4 on Steam:
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