Borderlands 3 has finally been declared, with a business release date for people to count down the days.
After a number of teasing tweets from developer Gearbox, a formal trailer premiered at PAX East, displaying a number of the new personalities, environments, and also guns making their way to the next entry in the shoot loot franchise. We have even spent some hands-on time with all the sport now.
It’s been over six years since Borderlands two, however we haven’t been short on Borderlands at the meantime – there’ve been VR interfaces , additional DLC expansions, along with a’Pre-Sequel’ follow-up to continue to keep our trigger fingers busy. But fans are clamoring for one more fully-fledged entrance in the series, and Borderlands 3 is on the way.
With larger-than-life characters, a vibrant and colorful alien planet to research, heaps of absurd weapons, and a wisecracking sense of comedy, Borderlands has managed to blow off some fresh air into an FPS genre that often sticks to’gritty’ visuals along with dull urban environments.
This is what we know so far about the newly-announced match, and when it’s finally going to be stepping onto PC and consoles.
[Update: There are reports that Gearbox is planning a Borderlands two DLC which can pave the way for Borderlands 3. Read on to Learn More.]
Image Credit: Gearbox
Cut to the chase
What is it? The next numbered game at the first-person shoot and loot franchiseWhen can I play with it? September 13, 2019What can I play with on it? PS4, Xbox One and PC
Borderlands 3 release date
Gearbox has revealed a release date of September 13, 2019.
That fits with what we learnt from writer Take-Two’s investor forecast this past year, when Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said a “highly anticipated new name from among 2K’s largest franchises” was in development for the fiscal year of 2019 – which works between October 2018 and September 2019.
The release date has been leaked via some leaked cover art (spotted by Wario64), but we know today straight from the horse’s mouth.
Borderlands 3
Borderlands 3 trailers and trailer
While we wait patiently for the match to property, we have a number of trailers to pore over. Gearbox required to the stage at PAX East (March 28-30) to flaunt the most formal announcement trailer below. You get a fantastic look at the new villains of the series (a brother and sister?) , fresh cities and scrapyards, and robot Claptrap performing some breakdancing.
It seems… pretty much exactly the same as any Borderlands game prior to it, which can be both reassuring for fans and somewhat disappointing for those looking for a new spin on the sequence. It’s too early to estimate before we’ve seen more.
What we know for certain is that there’ll be a lot of guns (over 1 billion, and even one with minimal machine legs) plus a good deal of looting in expansive sandbox environments. Oh, and also because why not & #x2013; a saxophone solo?
There’s also another announcement trailer for its release , which also names the four vault hunters as well as the title of the villains: the Calypso Twins…
The official announcement came only days after a’Mask of Mayhem’ teaser you can see below. It’s packed with little clues and hints of the game to come, including everything from a morse code to braille, and what seems to be a broken-up redeem code (C35TB – WS6ST – TXBRK – JJH6H – TTTJT) that we imagine will be usable for some sort of DLC reward or exclusive skin for eagle-eyed viewers.
What’s more, we’ve been able to spend some time with the game thanks to a hands-on gameplay reveal event that TechRadar attended. The gameplay loop, at least, is familiar, with your job to take down enemies, look their corpses, and level up. It looks like Gearbox is putting plenty of detail and imagination into the weaponry this time around.
What’s new is a focus on movement that’s more fluid, and improvements to multiplayer, including the option for allies to revive each other. There’s also “loot instancing”, designed to level the playing field a little for groups of friends who’ve spend different amounts of time in the game. Borderlands 3 also gives you your very own spaceship, the Sanctuary 3.
For a full rundown of everything we saw in our time with the game, check out our hands-on preview in full.
Borderlands 3 news and rumors
Reports of Borderlands 2 DLC
It’s not long until Borderlands 3’s release date but there are reports that Borderlands 2 could soon receive a DLC which will bridge the gap between the titles. The rumors point to an E3 2019 announcement, but nothing has been confirmed just yet. With E3 just around the corner, we don’t have long to wait.
Details, details, details
We managed to have a chat with Amanda Christensen, a concept artist at Gearbox and a key character designer on Borderlands 3. She told us that”the most obvious jump is in terms of our level of detail” in the upcoming game, and that there are a”lot of trendy little details” spread throughout. It’s a revealing chat and you can read everything Christensen had to say about Borderlands 3 here.
DLCs: quality over quantity
The DLC future of Borderlands 3 looks bright enough, after Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford intimated on Twitter that future DLCs would focus on quality over quantity: it seems as though Borderlands 3 might focus on fleshing out the capabilities of the game’s starting classes instead of asking players to start building new ones from scratch, and that’s fine with us.
Epic Games Store exclusive – to start
While Borderlands 3 will launch on PS4, Xbox One and PC, the PC version will start as an Epic Games Store exclusive, before joining the Steam Store six months on.
Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford hinted at this back in December, when he voiced his support for the new marketplace. Epic has been courting various exclusives for its store, including Metro Exodus and The Division 2, so we’re not overly surprised.
Cross-platform co-op could be included
A listing page for Borderlands 3 on the Microsoft store gave a hint to a very-cool potential new feature landing with the game – cross-platform multiplayer. Though the page in question has since been pulled, it showed the game’s feature set to include play across consoles not limited to Microsoft’s own. With the game initially an Epic Games Store exclusive, and that platform’s biggest title, Fortnite, being cross-platform in many console scenarios, there’s certainly the genesis of the infrastructure to support the feature if true.
A representative for the game’s publisher, 2K Games, told IGN that “Cross play is something we’re looking at closely, but don’t have anything to confirm or announce at this time. ”
Vault Hunter names
The release date trailer also gave us the names of the four vault hunters, which offer their own spins on the traditional four classes. We have a Gunner weapons expert (Moze), a Siren with floating fists at the ready (Amara), an android Beastmaster (Fl4x), and a suave, stealthy Operative (Zane). We also got the names of the entry’s villains: the very evil-looking Calypso Twins (not identical).
Borderlands 3 confirmed – as well as a board-game
Gearbox gave us the announcement we wanted on March 28, at PAX East in Boston. The showcase was hit with technical difficulties – like a lot – and for some reason included a really long magic trick. But we got our first look at the anticipated title, as well as a tie-in board-game called Borderlands: Tiny Tina’s Robot Tea Party.
Image Credit: Gearbox
4K remasters (for free!)
Good news for anyone with a copy of Borderlands 1, 2, or the Pre-Sequel: Gearbox is releasing enhanced 4K remasters of the previous games, and anyone who already owns them will get to download the remastered version for free. You’ll need a 4K ready console or PC to make the most of it, but it’s wonderful fan service for those who do.
All coming up PAX
The rumor mill has been turning pretty fast these past few weeks. Earlier in March, the official Gearbox Twitter account posted a photo hinting at the upcoming PAX East indie games conference – and another pixellated still of Borderlands 2, teasing the 4K remasters that were announced alongside the new game.
A tweet the following day shared an image of a half-built robot on some sort of operating table, with a caption stating”Time to tease a second game for PAX!” – which now seems to have been DLC for We Happy Few, launching on April 4.
The Flamethrower
A interaction between Randy Pitchford and Elon Musk in early 2019 threw yet more weight behind the rumor that a new Borderlands game is in development.
After Tesla CEO and all-round benevolent billionaire Elon Musk released a’Boring Company’ flamethrower for sale as a reward for the community having purchased 50,000 hats, Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford got in contact to see if he could put the gun in the”following Borderlands game.”
To everybody’s surprise, Musk consented making the Boring Company Flamethrower the first confirmed weapon at the unannounced game.
Hints of hints
In PAX West 2017, Pitchford declared during a panel that 90% of the Gearbox staff is “functioning on what I believe most of you men need us to be working on. ”
Pitchford also took a part in an IGN Unfiltered interview around precisely exactly the exact identical time, when he said that if another Borderlands game had been to be produced, it would be more of a true sequel instead of another Pre-Sequel spin-off.
Caught in the act
In April 2017, Pitchford chose to Twitter to place a picture of himself wearing a motion capture suit with the caption “Doing a shoot… I may or may not be a little psycho bandit at a movie game we may or may not be working on. Also, happy Bulletstorm launch afternoon! ”
Provided that Psychos are a Borderlands enemy we’d state this tweet could be read with wink and a large nudge.
The GDC presentation
Before all this Pitchford took to the stage during Epic Games’ Unreal presentation at GDC in March 2017, at which he showed off new producing tech that “may be used at a future Gearbox game. ” He said the footage shown was not out of a video game but what was revealed was reminiscent of Borderlands.
He disclosed that this technology is capable of simulating different physics depending on a planet’. He said “there may be different physics and also the sun and the moons may be than that which we’re employed to about Pandora. ”
Which seems to have been fairly prophetic – as we know Borderlands 3 will be making use of some environments beyond that which we saw on Pandora from the prior games.
Some changes
Borderlands routine Mikey Neumann will not be writing on the new game, as he was unfortunately made to resign by the project because of health complications. The lead writer on Borderlands two, Anthony Burch, has also left the company. There’s been no hint to who’ll be taking the pencil after their departures.
Another change is that the voice supporting Claptrap, David Eddings, has left Gearbox for Rooster Teeth therefore that it ’so improbable he’ll be carrying out the job again.
Most anticipated games 2019: forthcoming titles such as PS4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch
Buy Tickets for every event – Sports, Concerts, Festivals and more buy tickets
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.