Just started this game again so I'll be sharing some notes here until I complete the game and then I will post a more formal review. (Playing on gen1 Xbox one)

Note#1 - I own the original 360 version which is backwards compatible with Xb1. I decided to upgrade to this version because it was on sale for about 12$ digitally so I thought it could only be for the better. And for the most part it is.

The key differences are in the visuals. There is higher texture quality across the board. More effects all around specifically with bloom lighting, particles and other atmospheric improvements. The visuals are super sharp and noticeably improved. I went back to the 360 version to compare and it is night and day.

The other improvements come from some quality of life improvements like a mini-map!! Which is so useful. And a POV slider! Which is also useful because the 360s pov is incredibly boxy and suffocating.

The framerate is considerably stable compared to the 360 version as well.

The only slight downside is that the weapon and loot system seems to be outputting things more aggressively than I remember. I'm constantly finding new guns where as I remember grinding a bit before finding a sizeable upgrade before. Oh and there's also skull chests which are kinda pointless.. They only open with keys that you can either buy or get for free by registering with gearboxs platform.

Incredibly baffling. How did they manage to make the Enhanced edition worse than the original?

The Enhanced Edition of the original Borderlands is incredibly unoptimized, even when compared with the original release. When I was playing this game with my friends a while back, we all had to set our framerate limiter to the same cap, otherwise we just wouldn't be able to play together for some reason. Add in the fact that sometimes quests and quest markers would just break, and you have an incredibly baffling experience.

Besides the horrible optimization, most of the new editions just aren't really worth it. The two that stand out to me the most are the golden box in Fyrestone and the new addition to the final boss. The golden box is the same as it is in every other Borderlands game; a cool feature that you'll like a lot at the beginning and inevitably forget about halfway through your playthrough. As for the exciting new additions to the final boss? Just laughable. After defeating the final boss a few chests that weren't there originally will just pop up awkwardly. That's it. Nothing else.

Overall, there's no real reason to play this over the original game of the year edition. Pretty sure if you buy this on steam you'll get the original with it, so just play that one instead.

It couldn't have been any other game.

To what extent should we evaluate a game merely on its own merits? To what extent should we let exterior context color one's assessment? Is it even possible to review in pure technical isolation? Maybe, if you're a freak.

To me the original Borderlands represents so much more than just some stuff some devs slapped on a disc. A summer of growing up and friendships that barely exist anymore (yet you still see each other once a year around Christmas). Hanging out near farmlands that are now home to bricks and concrete instead of potatoes and onions. Once so familiar rooms that I'll never see again and rooms I have seen unexpectedly again after all, unchanged, as if locked in time. A sense of opportunity in the air that embraced you, like cool cling wrap the moment you stepped outside. Maybe you could summarise it all as a general "joie de vivre", if you want to be so-called literary inclined.

Now you could argue that all the above has nothing to do with the game. That's not the stuff they put on the disc. But let me tell you: that stuff wouldn't have been here anymore, if it weren't for the stuff on that darn disc. Let me be clear: it's not my favourite game by a long shot and it never will be. Yet it has quietly solidified those Summer-of-2010 memories into something I can access again with one mouse-click. Unbeknownst to me, it has become a little part of me, just like any other experience that has stuck with me.

Still, you could rightly ask me why I wrote all this stuff down, that I should shut my pretentious mouth and just tell you if I enjoyed the darn game or not. Maybe you feel an urgent desire to point out to me that I'm writing this only to satisfy my own ego and that, in fact, every writer ever has done so. There's probably some truth in that, yes. But honestly, I don't necessarily want you to play this game. Part of me just secretly hopes that this stuff makes you remember a game that means something similar to you.

If this has somehow convinced you to play this game after all, please, do not think of me when you do.

(bonus tip: install "globals mod" and "borderlands enhanced light reshade preset" for a Real Good time)

(tl;dr: the most sovlful tech demo ever)

"Childhood Nostalgia Revisited"

"Borderlands" was an absolute classic for me as a kid, and I spent many hours looting, shooting, and goofing around with friends back when voice chat on consoles still felt like a novelty. I'm not even that old, yet the fact that this game is nearly 14 years old now certainly makes me feel like the same adults that used to reminisce on the novelty of the OG "Quake" battles that used to dominate their mindscapes in the late 90's. I had taken a long break from playing this and had completed a solo playthrough in 2018 or 2019, but I recently completed it again with my go-to co-op partner - my girlfriend. Ah, have times changed...

The game still has a simple but interesting premise - explore a chaotic wasteland of a world dominated by corporate greed, reckless roided-out bandits, and lots and lots of rusted steel and gun smoke. The cell shaded visuals have certainly aged a bit, but man were they something that I found fresh as a kid. It was also one of my earliest endeavors into the world of RPGs, or in this game's case, the "ARPG-lite". A sprinkle of perk progression here, some random loot there, and tons of repetitive tasks - breaths in - nothing better to sooth the mind of a ten-year-old kid.

Enough with the nostalgia, because now I'm a (jaded) adult. Once you look past the novelties...the game is really simple. It was definitely a flash in the pan, and the original game doesn't hold a candle to its sequel in pretty much every way. Yet it held such a place in my heart and mind for over a decade, mainly because it has a style that was abandoned from future games in the series. There's a sense of loneliness to your adventure that just doesn't really exist in the sequels, and that helped it feel like you were entering uncharted territory, not "well-observed but rarely ventured" territory - those two things are WAY different in practice.

The shooting is also really awkward at times. It sort of feels like you shoot in the vicinity of enemies rather than "at" them, and entire gun classes feel worse because of this (see the Sniper Rifles and Shotguns). Models either have poor hitboxes, or the guns themselves are glitchy. Either way, it made shooting feel choppy, stunted, and ultimately less satisfying than my childhood brain could recognize.

The audio is still solid, though it cut out a bit here and there. This is likely due to me playing it co-op split screen on my PC...which you're likely wondering about since that doesn't "officially" exist. I used a pretty janky program (won't name drop in case it ends up screwing up someone's PC, but if you look up a guide, you'll absolutely come across it), and this thing just made things so much more difficult than they had to be. There were crashes, some occasional glitches (visual and audio), and it always made me worried about malware. Yet, unlike Gearbox themselves, it allowed me to play co-op without goading someone into buying themselves a gaming PC, buying the game, and setting up the awkward party feature in the game itself. Thanks Gearbox, for once again you prove to be a player-friendly company...

The glitches may have also been an aspect of the version I played, this being the "Enhanced" GOTY edition. The game did look a bit sharper, but seeing comparisons proved that this was a sloppy remaster. Shadow work is not as good, and the additional weapons are cool until you realize they are WAY more powerful than any others you come across - something which ruins the game flow of "loot, compare, sell" with weaponry.

At least this version still includes the DLC, and having played them all again, I definitely think they are worse than "Borderlands 2". They're pretty cheaply made, and even though they can be worth a playthrough (except for Moxie's, since it's crap), the quests and themes never felt fully "realized". The main game has the best curve of "discovery of Pandora" along with "gameplay mechanic introduction" of the bunch, so much so that the main campaign is still "great" in my books.

But since this is a remaster as well as a DLC collection, the "value" increases while the experience drops in quality. The whole "Borderlands 1" package is weaker than the sum of its parts, since many of the DLC's are just "extra whipped cream " rather than "extra dessert".

Still, the game is fun and is worth at least one playthrough (including the DLC's...except Moxie's) for anyone new to the franchise. Hell, check it out if you've played the sequels/spin-offs and want to see where it all started. I can Recommend it for sure. Just don't expect it all to be as funny, addicting, or properly supported as the future titles - Gearbox has always smelled the money when it became available, and thus poured assets into capitalizing that first and foremost. Maybe one day we'll get a return to a more "isolated" or "exploratory" title like this one from them. At least this one will always be a solid memory for me, even if that memory grows a bit dimmer every day.

Final Verdict: 7/10 (Good)

Cela faisait un moment que je voulais me lancer véritablement dans la série des Borderlands, c’est pour cela que je me suis procuré la compilation sur Switch contenant Borderlands 1, Borderlands 2 et The Pre-Sequel et après avoir terminé le premier opus je dois bien le reconnaître: C’était génial.

Vraiment j’ai pris un énorme plaisir à découvrir l’univers et surtout beaucoup de plaisir à looter des tonnes d’armes et objets divers et variés. Car si il y a bien une chose qui me plaît dans ce jeu et cette licence en général, c’est le système de loot et de rareté a la manière d’un MMO. La satisfaction de récupérer du loot légendaire n’a jamais été aussi agréable et le sentiment de puissance qui en découle l’est tout autant. Toute ces variétés d’armes, d’éléments, de compétences en tout genre couplé au gameplay incroyablement satisfaisant à prendre en main, le fun a été immédiat.

Pour un premier épisode, c’est clairement une réussite, le portage switch est véritablement soigné et avec un framerate d’une stabilité rarement atteinte pour des portages d’éditeurs tiers, j’ai pris un véritable plaisir à y jouer presque exclusivement en mode portable tellement le jeu rendait bien sans réellement faire de concessions.

Il y a quand même deux trois trucs qui m’ont chiffonné, notamment le manque flagrant de diversité dans les décors, qui fait qu’on a l’impression de parcourir encore et toujours les mêmes style de zone, juste avec un agencement différent, l’ergonomie des menus qui n’est pas top notamment en ce qui concerne la gestion du loot où l’ont peut vite se sentir envahi par les infos car tout n’est pas clair. Et je ne vais pas vous mentir, j’ai fait le jeu en ayant en tête que la suite serait mieux sur tous les aspects, ce qui fait que je me suis un peu pressé de finir le jeu afin de passer au sequel qui pour beaucoup de monde est le meilleur de cette « trilogie ». Mais cela ne m’a pas empêché de faire pas mal de quêtes annexes et de prendre mon temps pendant les 3/4 du jeu.

Cependant je ne peux pas le nier, j’ai passé un excellent moment à fouiller les moindres coffres, frigos, conteneurs, casiers, etc.. à la recherche de munitions, d’argent et de loot. Toujours plus de loot. Le gameplay se prends en main rapidement et le fun est immédiat, là dessus j’ai rien à redire. L’univers complètement décalé en fait un jeu vraiment unique et je pense que je n’hésiterai pas à revenir dessus afin de compléter quelques quêtes à droite et à gauche.

Et maintenant, c’est bientôt au tour de commencer le 2. J’ai beaucoup d’espoir en ce sequel en espérant qu’il saura corriger les quelques reproches que j’ai pû faire à cet opus, et en espérant qu’il sera à la hauteur de sa réputation. En tout cas, quand je vois ce premier épisode, ça annonce du très bon pour la suite.

This was my first proper playthrough of borderlands, over the years i'd wacked this on and tried to get into it both solo and with mates but could never stick with it

However, we recently moved house and had no internet, I had this installed and thought why not give it a go, never tried it on PC and i didn't put it down for hours, this was mostly the only game i played for a few days!

For an oldish cell shaded game it looks nice especially in certain area's but where the funs at is in the combat
You can pick up all kinds of weapons, Pistols, Smg's Shotguns ect and you get grenade mods for certain grenades and shields
Something i love is when you lose health and get knocked down, if you can kill an enemy before you bleed out you get a second wind and can get back to slaying midgets.

This game has been a tonne of fun plus you get the DLC too and the boss fights are fun too some i found a little challenging properly dying a few times but it was still very fun.

Definitely recommend playing this if you've not already and using the vehicles are a must! Plus you can fast travel!