BORDERLANDS DIED TWICE

[@galacticknight55544]

You don't mention the pre-sequel in this video. What are your thoughts about it?

[@bigfreakinfrog]

I really liked the second half of it and it has some great skill trees and the story adds a lot to Jack's character. I honestly just didn't have any space left on my computer for recordings lol imma leave this pinned cuz I see this question a lot.

[@sirisaac6225]

@@bigfreakinfrogI appreciate you not jumping on the hate bandwagon for the pre-sequel. It wasn’t perfect but some people bash on it WAY to hard and it makes me sad. In my opinion, it had the best action skills. (Jack Doppelgänger) and made some improvements from the previous games.

[@emanekaf145]

@@bigfreakinfrog I totally forgot about most of this after so many years. Thanks for reminding me of it! It was never really my thing, but there's some nostalgia there all the same.

[@Courier_Seven]

Downright LOVED 1 and 2 and the pre sequel was pretty meh by comparison but I made an Athena build with the super upgraded shield and sword skill trees. Some of the most fun I've had playing a borderlands game.

[@RiveryJerald]

@@sirisaac6225 game is better with the UCP patch, the base game just sucks doo doo

[@sliverlz]

Roland dies: we get Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep, an absolute banger DLC that shows a kid mourning the death of a character that we all knew and loved, and her way of coping with it. Maya dies: we get a shitty 30 seconds speech and an annoying brat. What the fuck Gearbox...

[@ApeirousWolf]

I mean, we did get the Psycho Krieg and the Fantastic Fustercluck, it deals more with Kreig mourning her and trying to bring her back in his own way.... Not as impactful as Tina's one, but it was pretty good for borderlands 3.

[@akuisbestgirl2448]

Dragon Keep was so good they made a game based on it lol

[@e69alpha]

It's such a slap in the taint

[@e69alpha]

​@akuisbestgirl2448 it sucked. Wonderlands. However the skill tree was badass

[@GettinAwayPodcast]

@@e69alpha I think he's talking about the "Tiny Tina's Attack on Dragon's Keep: A One-Shot Wonderlands Adventure"

[@Bathed_In_Pie]

Jack is quite literally the very essence of bl2, and to be honest... he was indeed the hero, of his own story

[@GreenDinoRanger]

Jack is almost the main character of Borderlands. The golden years, anyway.

[@night1952]

As a Mordecai player in BL1, when Bloodwing died in BL2 it made it personal, Jack went from that funny asshole that's shit talking from his space station to someone who hurt me. When Maya dies in BL3 I wasn't angry at the twins, I was angry at Ava for getting her killed and the writers for making the scene so stupid.

[@joshrosario1269]

Agreed with the ava thing, i swear to god gearbox just doesnt want anyone to be a couple from our vault hunters, roland died before him and lilith could get back together, and now maya got killed cuz of idiotic fridging and the worst character ever written in the form of Ava, and krieg is just straight up gone

[@HP-in8pl]

They killed off Maya to replicate the shock value from Roland. But everything about how Maya dies was so stupid. It didn't have the same effect as Roland's death

[@just_a_platypus7134]

I hate how Lilith said sanctuary is yours no way in hell it is hers I’d rather it be claptrap’s or marcuses

[@anthonyfaiell3263]

Yep. I vividly remember my two thoughts at that time were "fuck ava" and "we literally just walked into this room, how are we just standing there watching this happen..." . I agree about bloodwing. It's crazy how much the writing changed.

[@ryanbolson23]

Exactly.

[@Nerdtendo6366]

Crazy how the movie managed to kill Borderlands a third time

[@rus0004]

To paraphrase Jack from Lost: "You’re not [Borderlands], you disrespect his memory by wearing his face, but you are nothing like him."

[@BlurXIII]

BORDERLANDS DIED THRICE

[@truthseekingtillweascend387]

I swear if bl4 is bad we as fans need to cancel gearbox . These idiots ruined BL with he weak writing and lack of consistent lore. They just fucked bl3 all up

[@HERTZZBR]

​@@truthseekingtillweascend387wdym "cancel" them you can't cancel someone for making a bad product 😭

[@extremelycatty4040]

It's worth touching on the fact that BL3 didn't just throw away BL2's story and characters, but it ABSOLUTELY threw away the presequel's story and characters.

[@xnyxiee1784]

Good. Presequel was fucking abysmal.

[@extremelycatty4040]

@@xnyxiee1784 Hey, it's got that in common with three! :D

[@DevilSurvivorsBiggestGlazer]

@xnyxiee1784 the pre sequel has the best story

[@xnyxiee1784]

@@DevilSurvivorsBiggestGlazer not even remotely lmfao

[@Vanished584]

I really like the Pre-Sequel, probably becuase ive realised we may never get this kind of love and passion about another Borderland's entry, period. A Borderlands game, made by fans, for the fans. Bl3's DLCs have been damage control and New Tales just undid all those years of hard work to regain the customer's trust. I will take my bug-filled game over 200 dollars worth of polished Corprorate sludge. And I already know Borderlands 4 is going to have a Battle pass (Limited Weapons, Items and Class mods) and a Season Pass, so im done with any future installments, another 120 dollars + 11 dollars a month for 14 months. Fuck you Gearbox. I will just watch people play it while I hop around Elpis.

[@TheRealDeclou]

The most disappointing thing in bl3 for me was the fact kreig was left to be a dlc and we have no reaction from him when maya died

[@Tony_H_Rapt]

He addresses the death in the DLC, still underwhelming though

[@truekurayami]

The worst part about the Kreig DLC was that it felt like an inferior version of Claptastic Voyage from the Pre-sequel. If the two were reversed in when we got to experience them, or if the Krieg DLC got as much attention as CV it would have been so much better.

[@ethanfuego9648]

​@Akuma Imayaruk I mean it was created at home basically, but yeah, still underwhelming af

[@NEEDLESALAD]

> That and if you looked at the cut stuff from the game..ouch.

[@clydecraft5642]

Bl1 2 and tps are the only true ones

[@coffee0093]

The writing of 3 made me appreciate the minimalism of 1 more, it's like the games are polar opposites in terms of story telling

[@godfrey4461]

I mean 1's lore was equally confusing. BL3 honestly suffers from the lack of lore surronding the Sirens from 1. Reason 2 is so good is because the writers made a narrative that distracted from the Siren issue. 3's villians are so fucking bad they allow the viewer to notice cracks in the whole franchise. Never have I seen a game pull this off lmao.

[@NEEDbacon]

@@godfrey4461 1 didn't put too much into it's story and didn't expect you to really pay attention to it. Do jobs, find vault, get paid. Simple, concise and fits what the game is going for. Borderlands 3 says as much but in far FAR too many words. And the words it does use usually end up in an unfunny joke. It's trying to throw so much at you hoping it sticks. But it straight doesn't and we're left with less then we had (Maya and Lillith all in exchange for a horrible Goblin Child). And it expects you to watch it, or listen to someone prattle on thinking it's so much better then it is.

[@gaelofariandel6747]

BL1's story is a lot clearer if you read all of the quest descriptions & conclusions as well as listen to all the echo recordings. Kinda lazy on the Dev's part, maybe, but their budget wasn't great at the time.

[@bahhumbug5467]

@@gaelofariandel6747 what? I mean the stories easy to understand you’re there to find a vault and legendary loot you find the vault figure out it’s a monster that’s gonna destroy the world and you kill it

[@alyssarichardson2544]

@@NEEDbacon YES, nailed it. They're waaaaay too verbose. I know this is taken from 4chan but it's too true: (I actually had to type it all out myself though, since I could only find a screenshot of the OP. Saved it in notepad so I can use it later, this took way too long to not do that) >Normal line: "If you can get some fuel canisters, I can re-activate the main generator and get our shields back up . I marked the objective on your map" >Gearbox line: "Heeeeyyy buddy, great job killing those mutants and all. You're really good at that. Killing things; that is. One problemo though, a bunch of monsters on this planet are gonna tear our eyeballs out if we don't get the shields back up, and this is just my opinion, but that's gonna suck. Not having eyes sounds terrible! I mean, how am I supposed to read my collection of 'Bodacious Space Babes' without any flippin' eyeballs? So here's my brilliant plan I got written on this here napkin. There's this generator thing, and it needs GAS! Who knew? So maaaaaaybe, you could go fetch some canisters. And then we can get the generator running. And then the shield will go back up, and we won't be horribly, viciously murdered! Doesn't that sound great? I know, right? So, since I did most of the work coming up with the plan, I was thinking you can do the last step and get the canisters. If you see any monsters, shoot them in the face or something. Oh and one more thing, try not to get killed out there, that will put a wrench in this plan - metaphorically that is. I hate people who misuse the word 'literally'. It drives me FIGURATIVELY insane! *Anyway, I'll just be here, cowering in my bunker while you go do that. GO TEAM BADASS!" It honestly scares me how accurate that is. If the BL3 incarnation of Tannis said all that, word for word, I honestly wouldn't even be slightly surprised. Handsome Jack made witty quips, Tyreen just won't stfu... and somehow all of this is less abrasive than FRAN. Jesus christ, why did the Skywell laser not turn her into fried pork?

[@JinxedBear]

If you play the Pre Sequel you will get so much more background on Jack. Dude was trying to do the right thing over and over again but got betrayed by everyone he trusted. He was just broken at the end and for a good reason.

[@KamCarrio]

That's why I personally got it after bl2 it was a perfect look at the origins and me love Jack even more

[@michellima5280]

Nah, he was already a shitty person. The story was between 1 and 2, so he already used the vh in 1 to open the vault.

[@JinxedBear]

@@michellima5280 Wrong. He had nothing to do with the events of Borderlands 1. It was only revealed that he had this plan but he wasnt the one behind it all. But took the opportunity to steal the eye of the destroyer and use it in the Pre Sequel Game.

[@RonJonbon]

@@JinxedBear Yes he did he had angel guide the Hunters into opening the vault for him in bl1 their are multiple voice lines about this

[@emiribranovic2688]

​@@JinxedBearno, in borderlands 2 when angel was lowering sanctuary shield he mentions how he tricked the vault hunters into opening the vault back at borderlands 1.

[@aitoriri1]

The death of maya felt so bad. I played as maya in Borderlands 2 and at that time I loved how they treated the characters of the first game, literal legends in Pandora, even Bloodwing was treated with respect . And here Maya dies and is just a meh moment

[@xXRainWolfXx]

It was written by someone who had no attachment to her character in BL2, and I'm amazed it didn't get overruled in the writers room. IMO, Maya+Krieg should have been inseparable in BL3, and any death of hers should have involved both of them. I'm not against killing her, but godddd they went about it in such a lame and infuriatingly disinterested way.

[@BoneheadPlays]

It was astonishingly bad, she was killed unceremoniously by badly written villains and the death was assisted by a new “protagonist” who proceeds to immediately point the blame at a character who is adored by the community for pretty much no reason. To make matters worse there is absolutely no retribution for this throughout the entire story, we just kind of ignore that her insolence got Maya killed and there was no significant apology about the blame shifting. AND she’s set up to be a super important character in future installments

[@haaxxx9]

For real, That's what stopping me to buy BL3. The story in the 2 previous installments was so interesting that I wanted to see what was next after BL2 and it's DLC. With BL3 came out and was an epig store exclusive for the PC for half a year my little interest in the already terrible story just fell entirely off and I just moved on from there. Sure maybe the Gameplay is the best that the series have ever seen but holy shit BL3 story throws everything out the window and tried to give it a more of a comedic edge then the first 2 games which yes, there humor is also dated but it still have some good jokes that is not incredibly forced in and have to rely on shitty internet humor to entertain the audience which they thought we was all 12 year olds. I still have no desire to play BL3 even if it goes on sale.

[@TheClintonio]

Woke writers always do this. They kill legacy characters for cheap emotional hits or to redefine the franchise they way their ideology needs it to be. BL3s writing was cancer

[@aitoriri1]

@@TheClintonio "woke writers"? You guys are obsesed with woke this and woke that. Literally no piece of media is just bas now, is bad becuse somehow its woke...

[@Madd_Jack]

BL 1 was peak atmosphere. BL 2 was peak story. BL 3 was peak gameplay/gunplay. BL PreSequel was peak Australia.

[@ryoryo2884]

Bl3 was peak: use one legendary that just so happens to be the best out of the 17 other copies you have of the exact same legendary.

[@gaelofariandel6747]

@@ryoryo2884 Yeah, agreed. I pretty much did a "purple weapons only" challenge in BL3 because the ideal Dahl AR or Torgue shotgun was harder to find than specific legendaries.

[@JoshMightymouse]

Nah, give more respect on the pre sequels story That shit was fire

[@thesucc990]

The story in TPS is my favorite out of all the Borderlands games. A big reason why it was so entertaining is due to the fact the Vault Hunters are acknowledged by other characters and have their own unique dialogue depending on who you're playing as.

[@HarbingerOfTruth1]

OG Borderlands was peak story as well, but people don't know how to read, so very few actually know the story.

[@lethallegend9883]

I think my biggest gripe with BL3 besides the awful story is that it felt like the player was a spectator in the story. Whenever we got into a cutscene, it’s like we suddenly disappear making our presence in the story felt like it had no meaning at the end of it. You can literally remove the new vault hunters and whatever story that’s left can still stand on its own perfectly fine.

[@falloutglasster7807]

It was the same in every other borderlands tho. I don't think that's a valid criticism of 3 if the previous games did the same.

[@lethallegend9883]

@@falloutglasster7807 it didn’t feel that way in BL2 even though it didn’t have very many cutscenes, prime example is when Roland Died. Jack was talking to you at that moment which immersed me into story. Only moment I can think of that was somewhat similar to this in bl3 was when Troy phase locks you which I guess counts as a cutscene since it’s a scripted event.

[@dylancopenhaver1224]

We’re not even a side dish for the main meal… we’re a fucking appetizer that serves no purpose but to do Liliths bidding cuz she lost her powers and apparently doesn’t remember how a gun works, like come on

[@dylancopenhaver1224]

@@falloutglasster7807 bl2 only had a handful of cutscenes but every character at least acknowledges you by calling you the vault hunter in bl3 they don’t mention you hardly ever and also pulling a Matt hardy and just deleting you from existence for a brief sec

[@PainF-pj6ip]

I just cant get over what they did to Tiny Tina man, just to release a game where she's a kid again. Gross gross gross

[@cynicalpsycho5574]

Kriegs DLC should've ended with his hands around avas throat.

[@tundcwe123]

Agree, but instead of hands it should be buzzaxe and instead of around it shoult be in

[@jobroter]

The cutscenes are also a big problem in bl3, characters that are supossed to be badasses end up being so incompetent and useless during the cutscenes. It was the opposite treatment they gave the vault hunters from bl1 to bl2. The Calypsos end up feeling non threatening or powerful because they just beat everybody while people watch with their decorative guns.

[@TecTitan]

There's a lot of BL3 that feels like awkward bad fanfiction. Generally any time there's a dip in writing quality the product ends up feeling like bad fanfiction.

[@magnusm4]

In game: Wombo combo slam dunking at 100 mph with drones and 5 buffs while switching guns on the fly. In cutscenes: Stands constantly and moves like they're covered in drying paint. Same problem in Far Cry 5. Every cutscene must take away your controls otherwise you'd wipe everyone's asses with lead before they can mutter a syllable.

[@mikkelnpetersen]

Lots of them are based on the player not being there, being completely powerless or just simply not doing anything.

[@BigWheel.]

@@TecTitan so much media now feels like bad fanfiction though, not just borderlands. It's basically the norm. Like all these entertainment companies hired fans of the series, but they hired the fans that were more concerned with their tumblr fanfic self inserts than they were with the actual direction of the media they were using as inspiration.

[@Mendigom]

@@mikkelnpetersen maya dying right after you come out the vault and walk up to her really exemplified this. You waltz out the vault, probably with some new loot ready to shoot and walk up to maya, get forced into a cutscene where suddenly you don't exist anymore, and then she's dead in front of you.

[@KARL00300]

The way they handed Rhys makes me genuinely sad He became a genuine badass learning from one of the most evil people in the series and vowing not to become like him Now he’s an idiot that couldn’t run a bath let alone one of the most advanced galactic corporation WHICH HE BROUGHT BACK FROM THE DEAD almost singlehandedly I’m noticing a theme of wasted potential anyone else?

[@realspartan5206]

they wasted most of the cast from Tales

[@davidwhidden9337]

A male character in BL3 getting to hog the glory? Lmao no. BL3 has ended my love for anything new in the Gearbox Borderlands World.

[@redwiltshire1816]

To be fair that is his character he can fight but he’s ultimately a coward it’s why him and zero make a good duo, however if a BL4 came out and he’s still not at the top then they really are wasting potential because he’s now out lived 3 mega corps

[@KARL00300]

@@redwiltshire1816 -fought off an army of bandits -brought down a space station -fought a vault monster They’re the ones that spring to mind Yes he had help and yes he was terrified the whole time but he kicked ass and ended tales and a legend And 3 took him back to square one a coward an idiot and a complete joke

[@redwiltshire1816]

@@KARL00300 yes but that’s who Rhys is and I think your forgetting all the people Rhys kills in 3 if he just became a total badass then he would literally just be handsome jack and seeing what happened to the twins do you really want to see a badass version of him? Also you forgot that Rhys survived 2 assaults and loses two vault keys

[@eliaspanayi3465]

You have charactets like rhys, a cog in the machine for hyperion who ends up going rouge on pandora, experiencing hardship and learning how the real world works, becoming a dependable leader rebuilding ATLAS from the ground up with a respect for the little guy, being one himself mixed with the nescesary ruthlessness he learned from jack. Now in BL3 he's become a whiny brat begging the vault hunters for help despite having a militarised megacorporation at his disposal.

[@VladGasula]

It's worth noting that he is fighting an equally militarized megacorp, so it's not unheard of that a significantly less prolific company like Atlas would have trouble with Maliwan

[@chrisanderson6466]

In New tales they made him into angry dumb generic white rich man and they focus on the new WaCkY cHaRaCtErS!!! Wow aren't they so zany?!

[@alienonlsd3209]

In the presequel (sorry I meant Tales from the Borderlands)Jack states that he bought Atlas solely for the purpose of gutting it and keeping it as a trophy. Technically speaking Rhys ownership of Atlas is only on A "I happen to have the piece of paper" bearer bonds kinda acquisition. Considering then he would have had to rebuild the company from near scratch id say it makes sense

[@Borotva05]

You know... woke. A straight white male character HAS to be pathetic and need a STRONG WOMAN to save him. 🙄

[@olstar18]

@@VladGasula The problem isn't that atlas was having trouble fighting maliwan but the way the character was portrayed and how it clashed with previous portrayals.

[@OU773HGaming]

I'm disappointed because in the TPS ending they said a war was coming and we needed every vault hunter we can get. Now most of the vault hunters are dead and no war was in BL3.

[@rebeccavdh4803]

BL4 should make all of the surviving vault hunters playable, with stand ins for the dead ones. Say, Ava for Maya A Crimson Lance character for Roland Mordecai gets a new bird to replace Bloodwing the TPS characters would be more difficult... Save for Athena who can just come back.

[@mothichorror446]

Out of all the Vault Hunters in the series, the amount that have died isn't really that high. Only Roland, Maya, Nisha, Wilhelm, Aurelia and Typhon Deleon if you count him (you should, BL3 absolutely wasted him as a critical part of the universe), which is still a quarter of the roster

[@rebeccavdh4803]

@@mothichorror446 There are 20 total playable Vault Hunters. 5/20 of them being dead is a full 25%. Which is pretty significant, it's 1 on 4.

[@jpesicka492]

Ya but pre-sequel is foreshadowing BL2 not BL3, hence the term Pre-Sequel.

[@DanielDangerous]

​@@jpesicka492did you even finish it? The game's ending is after 2, the pre-sequel stuff is being told by someone after 2. it's seems to be setting up 3 at the end, but 3 doesn't use any of the threads.

[@mika9578]

Jack screaming "I AM THE GODDAMN HERO" is honestly the pinnacle of the franchise

[@Yotarnn]

After playing TPS, I ain't saying he's right, but... I understand. Mans saw a lawless wasteland and sought to cleanse it. Can't blame him there

[@andrebenoit404]

​@@Yotarnn absolutely

[@weirdlyred6280]

I always kill jack at this line specifically for dramatic effect

[@gene8447]

@@Yotarnn I can. He had no right, but he did have an unearned savior complex that people seem to love venerating because they see a place that isn't an American suburb. That's exactly what he would have turned pandora into. Colonists always feel like they have the right to step in and change what they don't understand. This kind of thing always reeked of "We have to kill the savages!" mentality that fueled Manifest Destiny's atrocities. It was shitty in 2, it was shittier in TPS.

[@Yotarnn]

@@gene8447 nah bruh your hatred for whitey is showing 🤣

[@Shakercupp]

Just like you said. 3 has so many missed opportunities if troy would have betrayed tyreen it would have worked.

[@bigfreakinfrog]

I would have liked it significantly more if it did that or if Ava had that deleted scene. A betrayal would have been so cool.

[@Cricket0021]

it didn't make any sense as to why Troy wouldn't betray tyreen. i mean, the story was already leading up to that point at Eden-6. Tyreen being a "commander" to troy and the Jakobs guy taunting him calling troy a "leech" the writers are just too stuck up on the "yaaas, slay queen" mentality i guess that's why they didn't make troy the final boss which i think he deserved more than tyreen

[@elton9721]

Genuinely believe if ava was written with similar effort to tina, Maya would still be alive. Her death was completely unexpected and unnecessary. Just because Roland died the way he did in 2, doesn't mean Maya should have similarly.

[@Psycorde]

Way too many people think that for it to be a coincidence. It's what they were setting up but changed their mind for some reason.

[@sagepapi9617]

​@@elton9721 holy shit someone understands, they had to kill off my boo Maya to even make a dent in the game

[@KiteoHatto]

How they treated Maya in 3rd game was criminal.

[@trontosaurusrex9532]

The way they treated her and the addition of Ava ruined alot of my enjoyment for BL3

[@richardg5.052]

​@@trontosaurusrex9532bl3 was ass💀💀

[@OhCrapI_He]

They fucking fridged the fan-favorite femme fatale (Yes, I did it for the alliteration)

[@nathanpierce2541]

If they had to kill any one Salvador mightve actually gotten some applause given the right build up

[@billcipher147]

How they treated half of the characters in BL3 is criminal. Don't let me get started on the TellTale characters... let alone the Pre-Sequel ones.

[@TheOneTheyCallFrost]

The treatment of Rhys and Vaughn was one of the game's biggest offenses. Completely ruined both characters. Should have hired the Telltale writing tesm for this game. They told the greatest Borderlands story.

[@simondoe2772]

Totally agree 💯

[@jpesicka492]

But it’s not a looter shooter so it’s pretty irrelevant.

[@DanielDangerous]

​@@jpesicka492to write for it, not make it

[@americancapitalist9094]

Borderlands 3 was basically: “How do you do, fellow kids.”

[@L.Reeves]

It was also during the peak psychosis of the wamen empowerment movement too. They sacrificed depth to turn every male into a joke and every female into a power fantasy. And they did that shit so poorly that even if you agreed with that agenda you could still tell how god awful and biased their finished product was.

[@quintrapnell3605]

"how do you do, fellow non-hetero females?"

[@ElZamo92]

@@quintrapnell3605I don’t think there’s anything of that sort in BL3… other than the gay wedding, but the fact that Hammerlock is gay was established since BL2… The absolutely cringe writing feels like a boomer trying to make Zoomers laugh.

[@quintrapnell3605]

You’re just not paying attention most of the female cast has a relationship or crush with another woman

[@thagomizer8485]

​@@ElZamo92not boomers. Aging millennials who think they're still hip and funny, but never really were to begin with.

[@grimmly]

They had the bones of an incredible story but they just cant let go of Handsome Jack, and just tried to copy and paste his personality onto both of them and it just didnt work. They wanted it to be this story where you are terrified of the villains but they open their mouths and spew this generic brand Handsome Jack dialogue lol

[@bigfreakinfrog]

It makes me super curious if they were taken in a completely different direction! Kinda like how Zarpedon left the main characters in the dark in Pre-Sequel. I thought that was pretty neat but definitely left her feeling unmemorable.

[@charlesluikart1799]

It is hard to top handsome jack to be fair

[@slenderhatesmillennials195]

@@charlesluikart1799 they shouldn't have tried to top him and made a brand new unique villain instead.

[@allanredhill8682]

I think another huge issue with them is that their goals just arent well established until late into the story. When you fight jack the objective is clear - open the vault before he does. In bl3 the story is convoluted and unfocused. a lot of the time it feels random and meandering. The only part I remember being interesting is when Roy gets more powerful and starts standing up to his sister... but that plotline gets dropped pretty quick. In general there isnt much motivation behind their actions besides "were a cult and were evil". There are a lot of things that bother me in bl3s writing but I gotta be at least a little bit fair to it. Its not like borderlands 2 was shakespeare either - a lot of its writing is also pretty cringy and most of Jacks genius is less in his script but the delivery of his amazing voice actor.

[@grimmly]

@@allanredhill8682 totally agree, without their goals being clear in the early game they’re just like evil irl twitch streamers lol. Didn’t make any sense. And yeah the BL2 story line would be pretty bland without Jack, the voice acting and dialogue was just perfect.

[@xXDeiviDXx]

My biggest gripe with replaying BL3 is that the main storyline is littered with moments and set-pieces designed to waste your time, like the moment you first meet Tannis there's an objective that says "Please wait for Tannis to finish speaking", all those Zoom calls with the twins at Sanctuary 3 that you can't skip with a simple save-quit and the fact that Gearbox decided to put the fast travel point ON THE BACK OF THE SHIP while everyone important that you need to talk to IS SITTING AT THE FRONT.

[@vasheldiablo507]

oof

[@dribblesg2]

Those two things are what literally get me to question if I want to do a play-through. The unskippable zoom calls are fucking painful.

[@arthurpalha4605]

just muted the game after a point, much better with music than the calypsos random noise

[@Shad0w5carab]

This to me is the biggest reason more people still go back to play BL2 and not BL3. The amount of time you spend in BL3 doing literally nothing is ridiculous. In BL2 you’d turn in a mission, accept a new one and there’s be enough dialogue for you to listen to it all while you refill ammo, buy upgrades and run to the fast travel station. You’re always doing something. In BL3 you just stand around while a bunch of poorly written story that you aren’t attached to at all happens around you. My first playthrough felt like a chore, let alone a TVHM playthrough or starting a new character.

[@jordanlee5594]

@@Shad0w5carab Not to mention when you start getting into the First Vault Hunter parts of the story, you have to fight the exact same eridian (?) enemies for like hours on end. The maps look so fucking cool but it's like... move to next area, kill 300 enemies, move again, 300 enemies... like ugh

[@graven6102]

I definitelly agree with Tannis siren part, Tannis is archeologist and scientist not a mechanic or inventor. Gaige should really get Angel´s powers instead

[@kukuhimanputraraharja8084]

no. that will also means gaige will most likely die a horrible death in the future due to how sirens were written as unfortunate characters that often attracts lots of trouble, suffers a lot and died miserably as plot twist devices.

[@thewanderder2982]

The way this man explained the outline of borderlands 3's story sounded infinitely better then actually experiencing it

[@zacky7572]

And it doesn’t even sound good, so I can’t imagine experiencing it. Glad I stopped at 2

[@Distophic]

​@@zacky7572At launch you couldn't skip cutscenes so i had to mute my tv every time the zoomer twins showed up. Be glad.

[@SMM_NAA]

Yea the third game was so boring I turned it off mid mission and never played it again.

[@GoliathZ13]

"You're a bandit, and I, am the goddamn hero" sends chills down my spine, I love handsome jack and man borderlands as a whole is my favorite IP.

[@Evanflame-rk9xu]

Borderlands 3 turned characters into charicatures.

[@kukuhimanputraraharja8084]

anthony, tftb telltale teams, and 2k australia has all collaborated to the b2+b1.5+tftb ending combinations that paved the easiest and most obvious way for b3 writers to write the most convenient, uncontroversial and profitable way to write b3... the 3 predecessors' endings obviously plan for the next sequel to have the crimson raiders be bigger and stronger with more vault hunters joining the jolly borderlands coop vaultastic adventures... with rhys' gang reunited and work together with the main casts to rebuild the atlas corp to be better than its original b1 era corrupt tyrannical atlas. those 3 endings are analoguous to the team of borderlands vault hunters and their allies standing before a great vault gate... bracing themselves to prepare fighting the vault monsters within and get all those totally not corrupted alien treasures~ instead b3 writers choose to have those main casts shoot themselves in the foot and backflip off cliff offscreen into the lava while being depressed muttering about unfun real life midlife economy crisis... while ava and the twins are having echostream pissing match in their spotlights, and tannis being forced to make quick eulogy funeral speech for maya's death (where our b3 hunters are idly t-posing in the next vault treasure room during maya's death cutscene) despite tannis stating she's bad at doing speech and then they all just moved on to the next plot mcguffins. what a way to kill the story momentum that your legacy teams has worked hard to create, gbx. also: b2 og gaige is a cool nerdy dorky badass cyberpunk anarchist cyborg engineer. she embraces her anarchy loving persona to survive the many deadly situations throughout b2, while simultaneously being a dorky sweet and teasing girl to her fellow vault hunters while also sometimes have fun breaking the 4th wall talking to players. she wants her talent as robo engineer be respected. and she helps free the sanctuary citizens from the lulzy genocidal tyrannical regime of jack's hyperion, just like her true persona as the rebel teenager growing up to fight the good fight while being a dorky nerd inventor too, rising far above her past as a school bully victim due to marcie's snobby bully routines. and she also imply that she acknowledged in craw dlc that she's responsible for accidentally killing marcie through misprogramming dt, muttering that she's saying sorry to mr. holloway. but she knew her accidental crime in killing marcie pales in comparison to the holloways' many years of tyrannical corrupt ruling of eden 5 that needs to be stopped, so she goes back to eden 5 in the debt or alive side novel to free the oppressed people of her home planet just like what she did in pandora. also, b2 og gaige's random quote when killing lots of enemies rapidly: START RUNNING! CLOWNS! and then b3 writers seriously butchered b3 gaige's character... b3 fake nerfed unanarchist uncyberpunkish gaige with blander clothing: ***oversimping for humperlog but overly eager to assist humperlog's hmo marriage because the clowns are running the show in gearbox now. being completely absent and irrelevant in the b3 main story when the main casts desperately needed to reunite b2 hunters to heed the retconned eridian watcher's warning of a great war. didn't attend maya's funeral. depressed drunkard jumping from job to job indecisively because mid life crisis is a totally fun story material. feeling embarrassed for her anarchy chuunibyou personality despite it having helped her get the power to survive deadly battles in b2 and beyond...being invited to be science teacher at her eden 5 school which is badly plagued by traumatic memories of being bullied by her nemesis marcie and the fact that she misprogrammed dt which accidentally ends up killing marcie and forced her to be separated from her parents after tearful goodbyes.*** og b2 gaige written by anthony burch is the only true gaige. long live og b2 gaige. let gearbox and fake nerfed lame controversial b3 gaige written by b3 clown writers embrace the suck as they trudge the damned path of b3+ canon and fade into obscurity. claptrap from claptastic voyage has shown us da way when he rescued tk baha+marian+felicity from their canon deaths... claptrap shows us da way, that when the official canon direction decides to embrace the suck for whatever unfun reasons that disrespect the og characters, then we fans who cares about the og characters can just simply abandon the ugly unfun controversial parts of official canon and make our own headcanons that will give them og characters much better respect+fates.

[@swiftytaco8080]

The entirety of borderlands 3 felt like I was playing a Marvel movie game. Serious scenes that are downplayed with a terribly timed joke, everybody making quips while you're destroying every living being, and overall being a slog to go through if you're here for the story.

[@mutilator97]

And even ignoring the stupid additions that bog down the story, you still don't have a good story that the game is telling. Sure, it COULD have been good. But that would require competent writers who put in the work to make characters earn things. Like having Ava grow as a person before getting Maya's powers. Or utilizing previous characters who have absolutely no reason NOT to be in the game(Kreig). Or maybe, just maybe, making the villains actually feel threatening instead of just uber lucky that they're dealing with winter temperature IQ opponents.

[@SuperHns]

maybe but I always felt that BL2 had a "too good" story almost for the type of game it is... BL3 has best gameplay though

[@yes11889]

You act like bl2 isn't a carbon copy of that

[@BigWheel.]

The only part I actually enjoyed was the eden 6 story mission and the bounty of blood campaign. Rest of the story was hard to get through or forgettable. But I even forgot the parts I liked, so there's that. The games writing is just mid at best.

[@mutilator97]

@@yes11889 There were no jokes made about Roland's death. At all.

[@menekro3168]

as a main krieg it hurt me horribly how they removed the scene where he attends maya's funeral and simply left both his character and his arc in a forgotten corner, without the dlc just for a few facts he completely disappears from the story and I would have liked to see the conflict of the two parts of the character one wanting to fry Ava's face like a hamburger and the other broken by the duel.

[@saintmuerte13]

Krieg was my man and I loved the soft shipping they did with him and Maya.

[@mikemidwood9661]

BL1 is super underrated. I really appreciate the atmosphere and tone before the series became all meme and nerd culture humor. I also like that you can play at endgame without dedicating many hours to farming perfect gear.

[@Takyodor2]

Yeah, Bl1 the GOAT

[@thunderborn3231]

it must have been a game that you had to be there for i tried it after i played bl2, and couldn't stand how empty it felt, bounced off it super hard when sprinting for like 10min just to get to the next quest

[@pavement_sabbatical]

I really like how BL1 still had weird and wacky humour that we see in 2, but balanced out with more realistic characters and writing from time to time. One character that I never see mentioned that is super underrated is Helena Pierce, the mayor of New Haven. I also very much appreciate at the very beginning of BL2, you can find echo logs around the first town revealing she was killed in cold blood by Handsome Jack. While I was kinda bummed they killed her off, it instantly made Handsome Jack a formidable villain to me.

[@Phurzt]

Thank got im not alone, always God sick of seeing people say bl2 was goat especially because of it humor. All I could say was, given five years all these jokes will have aged and be annoying. BL3 went even further down the millennial comedy hole and suffered for it. BL1 is infact, goated.

[@Takyodor2]

@@thunderborn3231 A matter of perspective and preference to some degree I guess, but also a bit up to how you play. If you know when/where to fast travel, and when to use a car, there's really not that much boring running. If you also pick up a bunch of side quests to do while in the area, those help fill the empty space as well. I do agree when it comes to the Knoxx DLC though, for some reason, the only spawn point when reloading is in the middle of a very long, linear world, and you basically have to drive for several minutes to get anywhere (this DLC is the exception, not the rule though).

[@Yuliviee]

They never shut up in bl3.

[@gregspencer7287]

My dad died when I was young and I said some words at his funeral. I finished with “Say not in grief: ‘He is no more.’ but live in thankfulness that he was.” The red text from Scorpio, the gun you get after Roland’s death. I got that tattooed on me with my dads date of birth & death too.

[@bekl0r]

thats an old hebrew proverb

[@nopickles420]

wisdom is so everywhere sometimes @@bekl0r

[@arrayknight9691]

Dude that's really sweet and I plan on doing something similar with my past grandma but with wrestling

[@babycornsnake]

I'm sorry for your loss.

[@EXEMASTER]

No one gives a fuck

[@papabaddad]

The worst part of BL3 is that you can't skip the story and dialogue. You just have to stand there while character monologue at you.

[@dangerousdays2052]

You're souless. Don't even bother playing video games with a story. Go play Candy Crush or something.

[@skoovee]

@@dangerousdays2052 some people just enjoy gameplay over story, i prefer story sometimes but you dont need to bash people for their preferences

[@slof69]

can you at least delete it from the game ive not played bl3 and wouldnt want to put up with that if i got it some time

[@dangerousdays2052]

@@skoovee Wrong. People that don't have an appreciation for story telling in video games are basically just apes pressing buttons. Like I said, souless.

[@SourChicken1856]

All Borderlands do that

[@DamienFrawley]

One of my main gripes was that we are told sirens are so rare and special and yet in this game every second main character turned out to be one. Felt even worse when you playthrough as Amara.

[@rowe8392]

pretty sure there is a lore reason for this like the sirens are naturally attracted to one another or something but yeah i agree it still seems a bit eh

[@Anunnaki_Gula]

It would have been cool if we had a Borderlands game that didn't have any playable sirens. The vault hunters could rely on more skill and superior tech.

[@shcdemolisher]

@@Anunnaki_GulaAgreed! Plus it could've been more interesting to explore the more grounded vault hunters. (aka non-sirens) Which sure the ones in 3 were good, but it felt that we needed more. A squad based one would be cool, hearing the banter back and forth even if you don't have friends to play with would add more depth.

[@shwingleman]

​@@Anunnaki_Gulapre sequel

[@masonwheeler9211]

@@Anunnaki_GulaI’m the other way, I want a story with all sirens or at least one that focuses on their story. I feel like they could be taken in a really interesting direction

[@fnfal763]

I didn’t understand why, during some of the cutscenes the player was present and interacted with, and in others you were just gone. Like during Maya’s death.

[@Deeplycloseted435]

I think that Alicia Keys at the end of BL3, was the most cringe moment I’ve ever felt in gaming. I’ve been gaming for 40 years. It felt so out of place.

[@onerimeuse]

Literally "what the fuck?"ed out loud and smashed escape. Stupidest ending I've ever played to.

[@rashadharris7220]

Me and my roommate literally busted out laughing 😅 such a bad choice in song.

[@TheReZisTLust]

Huh... As in the human???

[@Deeplycloseted435]

@@TheReZisTLust yes, the credits rolled with a song written and performed by Alicia Keys, a human.

[@chillhour6155]

@@Deeplycloseted435 debatable

[@zane714]

I will never forgive gearbox for turning gaige into a wedding planner.

[@MrNo1fan]

She needs to be playable again if they make a BL4, and also TINA ffs. 😥

[@oIJustForFunIo]

@@MrNo1fan playing tina would be so fcking awesome

[@chriscormac231]

@@MrNo1fan along with Timothy

[@PeachDragon_]

​@@MrNo1fantina and gaige are ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY in bl4

[@hairlessgrizzly559]

I thought it was alright Definitely my second favorite DLC of BL3, behind Fustercluck, just cause Hammy and Winny are the best, but Gaige was alright

[@GilTheKing-yx7gz]

8:45 Jack technically, if you follow the events of TPS, knew all of this would happen, and probably planned for everything that happened to happen. Even his locking of Angel in the bunker was probably an attempt to keep her safe from the harm he knew was coming. Jack really thought he was a hero, but... Pandora simply was no place for a hero.

[@charliedulol]

this is no place for no better man.

[@AAAA90175]

@@charliedulol This ain't no place for no hero, to call home

[@chloewebb5526]

I love this reading.

[@Dvdh2903]

Idk I just fuck with Jack’s Origin Story so hard. I was really rooting for him. Also when Moxxi betrayed the fck outta him together with lilith and Roland. Actually it’s kinda their fault Jack was going nuts, and I actually can’t blame him.

[@pokerfejsik5072]

​@D H jack was fucked up even before the betrayal. It's too bad they just escaped from him instead of killing him. Oh well, but we got bl2, sooo

[@DDawg612]

Biggest change I would have made would be to actually NOT kill Maya. By the end of three, I was so sick of Lilith's cocky ass. They should have killed Lilith off and given the reins to Maya. We barely got to see Maya as an actual character at all. Lilith had her time in BL2 to be the big bad siren. Maya deserved a bigger spotlight. Could have even brought Krieg in on the main story and we could've seen a sane version of him that only goes full rampage psycho mode when he has to for combat. Like the hulk. Maya could give him the old "The suns gettin' real low..." treatment to reel him back to sanity. We could have seen him in control and her help him through the tough spots of recovering his sanity, only slipping to fight and protect her and others he cares about. Lilith dropping out of the story would also leave room for more ex-main cast characters to come help her run things. With Lilith gone, Maya would need to reach out for help like the B Team you mentioned. They could've gotten more screen time helping Maya keep things under control. Maybe Maya decides one leader is stupid and they can run things as a team. Who knows, the possibilities could've been endless. But no. They got rid of her the instant she got a chance to be an actual character. Best of all, there would be no need for Ava to exist. Stupid, stupid game.

[@Potent_Imp]

The whole "Chilling in Sanctuary" part hits so close to home! The amount of parkour/grenade jumps you can do is just crazy, and my mates are certified gambling addicts too! Plus the atmosphere is so dope.

[@Chad_Losey]

I think I know why the twins weren't threatening. The writers tried to make you hate them by making them annoying. You didn't hate them because they were evil with enough power to do evil things, but rather because they were just so very annoying. It's hard to take them seriously when they're just Jake and Logan Paul in borderlands form. Also I see we don't talk about the pre-sequel.

[@TheAndrewBen]

And that they look like they are about to walk across Project Runway with their 10 layers of clothing and as many accessories you can come up with. Their character designs are way too over the top and not fitting. Same goes with the playable characters.

[@jameshalle558]

I've been talking about this with a friend since this game came out. They over focused on making them annoying, to the point that it almost feels like 2K actually wrote them to take a piss at the fanbase, specially content creators. Not only they kept taking a crap on the sirens who have been constantly fan favorites, the streamer idea is so out of touch that it legit feels like one of the guys at 2K came to the office one day pissed at a streamer who criticized something about BL and decided to write a story based on that spite. Also, the dialogue is overall awful. I can't imagine having to voice Tyreen, looking at those insanely cringy lines and just "smile and wave". Her VA, if anything, did a fantastic job for actually trying with the abysmal quality that was handed to her.

[@xBINARYGODx]

"Also I see we don't talk about the pre-sequel." are you saying here that you dont like it so we ignore it? I love the PS.

[@xBINARYGODx]

@@jameshalle558 "it almost feels like 2K actually wrote them to take a piss at the fanbase, specially content creators. " oh palease - whining content creators came up with that, and their sycophantic fanbases spread it. but even if true - who cares?

[@xXRainWolfXx]

Honestly? Presequel was a ton of fun. Space mechanics slotted into BL2 gameplay nicely, and the characters were great. I hated it at the time, because it *wasnt* 3, and I wanted 3 so badly. It felt like a diversion, like they were stalling for time and I was frustrated with that feeling. But playing the Handsome Jack collection in local co-op, it works perfectly if you drop that baggage.

[@sugoistalin7809]

For as good as BL2 is, it wouldn't be nearly as good if not for Handsome Jack. He *made* that game.

[@Bladerunner5146]

One of if not the best villain of all time imo

[@Dickstick]

Handsome Jack was the reason why BL2, BL:Presequel and Tales from the Borderlands had you interested in the story. To this day I don't understand how out of touch the writers have to be to actually try to replace this guy with two cringe, bipolar zoomer kids with Mary Sue powers that somehow got more people behind them than the calculating, psychopathic but charismatic CEO of one of the biggest company ever. Those kids are quite the opposite of what makes a cult leader.

[@sosa8549]

@@Bladerunner5146 best villain and BL does not go together lol

[@itsagabe]

That's a testament to the writing overall, not just the effort the writers, director, and the actor put on Jack's characterization. He is a fantastic villain to go against, yes. His constant presence does add a lot to the game, but other characters stand out just as much as he does. I'm finally playing Dragon Keep and I'm finding the sorcerer to be the most forgettable part of the DLC while Tiny Tina, together with the 1st gen VHs, are the most memorable. Not because they're constantly present story-wise, but because their personalities have a chance to shine through and you really feel the bond they all share. BL2 would probably not have had the same impact it had were it not for Handsome Jack, but there's a lot more to that game than him alone. The intricate level design, the interconnected world, the atmosphere (yes, BL2 has an atmosphere despite it not being the same as BL1, and you can really tell by how different BL3 feels right out of the gate), the playable characters, the loot, the DLC... If none of that was on par with the writing and Jack's characterization, BL2 wouldn't have been as influential.

[@wildnugget1675]

@@sosa8549 opinion discarded lil bro

[@Spartan-703]

I loved the old west feeling of bounty of blood, the feeling that you are a cowboy, on the hover cycle, a revolver in your hand, hunting bounty’s and killing monsters

[@ShaeFur]

I’ve been playing through BL3 for months now, and I really have to say that when you completely ignore how annoying the story is, the gameplay is just so much fun, especially when you get to that completely broken level of every character. If only the game’s intro was actually fun… sad to see how much of a game can be ruined by a bad story

[@MuTHa_BLeePuH]

idk i think getting max level and end game is really bad rn, the grind to get good rolls on weapons is horrendous but even then the 4 characters are so OP that there isnt really even any challenge to the game. I can go in on any character and nuke raid bosses or in zane and moze's case they can just afk and nuke bosses. I prefer the challenge that OP levels brought

[@sloppyjoebreadbowl5184]

It’s seriously such a fun game, it’s a shame how obnoxious the story is. I usually skip all the cutscenes and listen to videos/ audiobooks when I play.

[@doyoulikeworms3151]

Which is why I appreciate the fact that they added the ability to jump right into a DLC. I started a new Zane right into bounty of blood and I've been playing through the DLCs and ignoring the main game entirely, it's been pretty awesome. IMO the writing in the DLCs is FAR tamer and more palatable than the base game which actually equals out to a pretty fun experience.

[@Loderyod]

I just make a boosted character and play through the dlcs with modded difficulty Dlcs are unironically awesome

[@truekurayami]

@@doyoulikeworms3151 Calling the DLCs tamer in writing doesn't seem right. They are more polished for sure with maybe the exception of the Krieg DLC being the only one that felt lacking the same way the main story did to me.

[@nadlanod5897]

The Calypso Twins made me mute the dialogue volume for the entire game and just listen to podcasts instead. Gearbox devs really wrote the worst villains possible.

[@agama5538]

It took them three WHOLE games to deal with Jack and he was fan-fucking-tastic. Then we got some pre-teens trying to be 'Cool' with the Pandora version of TikTok and it hurt me, it physically hurt me to see them kill professionals like they were skags walking into shotgun range.

[@riv2052]

I felt like troy was suppose to be the final boss and they quickly changed it at some point because everything you hear from the point he absorbs maya kinda hints towards it. even his fight felt more cinamatic and harder than tyreens

[@coldeed]

The amount of odd changes they made to just put in as many like politic grifts is pretty much to the detriment of the story. It's like directly foreshadowed there, and then just doesn't happen. The credits song really annoyed me and my buddy and was the nail in the coffin for the joke we had about it. Gearbox lead writer is just an autistic man that screams "MORE STRONG WOMAN" and puts in stupid shit like >The villains are a super popular mean girl with super powers, and her useless brother that has to leech off her to survive >Lilith is stunning and brave with deep complex struggle (that comes off as her being useless 90% of the time because she pretty much mopes about being normal all game, than is the cow that jumped over the moon, somehow saving the planet lmao) >Tannis is siren. It doesn't matter. Plus she waits for you to save her than frees herself. >Ellie replaces scooter (I know why, and that's not at all a problem. Moxie taught both, but it's about the vibe that the writers probably greatly enjoyed that being the case) > Maya is a strong single mother that need no man. Strong single mother btfo by leech of a man. > Moxie pretty much being significantly more useful and involved than Marcus (gotta spotlight the ladies) > Hammerlock kinda relegated to "faghag" of the bunch of you'll pardon the expression (which, remind you it's an autistic writer, that probably gets confused and says gay men have girl power) > Random woman commando running atlases shit because Reese is a wimp that's really not fit for running it (also not a problem, just them optimizing girl power farther) > Claptrap rebuilds one of his own to not be alone, and they turned that into a gross meanspirited joke, with of course more girl power for like no reason. Could have landed if he just powered her off and said "being singles not so bad" imo. > Put the little girl in charge? I mean there's like 1000 of these forced things all over the game. This script is a stunning and brave example of how far a mentally challenged writer can make it in the gaming industry. Yasss queen

[@kobban63]

@@coldeed agree

[@coldeed]

@@G396 I genuinely think they just had really stupid people in the writing room. They thought Lilith was a inspiring character in 3, but she comes off as a very sad loser that gives up for far too much of the game, and a redemption comes really late with a hero said. That's far too stupid and out of nothing. I don't think they realized that Maya is just an actual inspiring version of Lilith, that's far more active and actually jumped into the fray knowing the risk that Lilith didn't. And because things weren't going well up to that point, they basically got a lot of people more into a character that they heavily plan to kill off like they did rolling for the same kind of payoff, be killing her off at that moment just made the entire story worse, frustrating literally anyone because there was no good way for it to go, because I'm borderlands 3 you're the only game that has a total crew behind you that does what feels like significantly less than in the first or second.

[@vladfotev1550]

I think what the story and Lilith both really needed is Roland's replacement. Either by establishing a new character or choosing someone from those who we know. What bl2 showed us is that Roland and Lilith were a match made in Haven, they both were complementing each other, Lilith is passionate and impulsive, Roland is calm and focused. And now, in bl3 Lilith lacks someone who could inspire and also would always come up with a plan. Aaaand it sounds strange, but obvious choice here would be Rhys. He is not Roland at all, and there is no need in another Roland, but what Roland essentially was bringing to the table. While Roland was a brave collected soldier who never gives up and in the charge of his own band, Rhys is an intellectual who never gives up and in the charge of a big weapon corporation. Atlas easily could take new Sanctuary under their wing. Rhys's and Lilith's relationship could be not romantic at all (though with Sasha's and Fiona's absence it could be brought even to that extent), but, again, the story itself needed for Lilith to meet someone who could bring in a new hope to her. But that would mean to give a man leading role in the plot, which is the thing that bl3's writers couldn't let themselves to allow somehow.

[@jackh7977]

​@@coldeed so I played a shitload of 1 and 2 and haven't played the pre sequel or 3.... Today is very depressing seeing how they massacred this series

[@Yefiem]

"T.K. baha he's my slime bro" Truer words have never been spoken.

[@zubetube7111]

Personally, the worst part for me was how they handled cutscenes in the 3rd game. Now, I’ve only played the 2nd and 3rd games, but a HUGE difference I noticed between them was how the player presence was handled in them. Playing through BL2, it felt like when I watched cutscenes, I couldn’t interact because things happened too fast for my character to react, or there were situations where you couldn’t do anything. In BL3 it felt like you were just totally sidelined, and helplessly watching the cutscenes play out for no discernible reason. For instance, rolands death in BL2 catches the player off guard, he teleports behind Roland and shoots him through the chest, and the player is sort of stunned and doesn’t react fast enough to help Lilith. But in BL3, in the scene where Lilith loses her powers, the players are there, they watch the twins teleport in, but just... sit there and watch it happen? Same when Maya dies, the players leave the vault, and just kinda sit there while the scene plays out. It feels like in those scenes the players aren’t even acknowledged as existing.

[@shcdemolisher]

Yeah i seriously hate how that was done! It was a bad decision that really killed all interactivity with the world and characters.

[@stevekarns8416]

I just posted a long rant about this and I am relieved to see I'm not the only one who grated with this. Cutscenes are supposed to be the anchor point of the narrative, but for half of them you're unsubtly put in a box because obviously your presence would disrupt them, then half just trundle on like you never existed. Roland's death was too quick to react to, but there's the other key detail: He wasn't talking to Lilith or on the radio with Brick or Mordecai when he died. He was looking at you, the Vault Hunter, the player, in the eye and talking directly to you when he got shot. Handsome Jack was slagging off directly at you, establishing that now with Roland dead, you are now his primary concern. It was a moment of passing the mantle of plot significance from Roland to the player, Brick and Mordecai set up the missions and opportunities from there but they were backing your play.

[@shcdemolisher]

@@stevekarns8416 Perfectly explained! It was a shock but done right! The BL3 cutscenes we’re just done fully differently like it was a whole different game.

[@magnusm4]

For BL2 yes. Except when Jack appeared. You should've quick scoped him the moment Roland's body dropped.

[@chriskantz5163]

What made BL1 so great to me was the grit. BL1’s side characters and many of it’s protagonists were simply honest people that were left for dead in a lawless wasteland, and find themselves needing to fight to survive. The humor in BL1 feels as if it naturally came from these such people trying to make light of their traumatic situation, with occasional shock factor mixed in to display the MC shares this predicament. Think the “Find the key to the mine” mission, where the “key” turns out to be a severed human thumb. Likewise, the humor in BL2 feels as if it naturally came from the same demographic of people. Theyve had 5 years to survive, adjust, and thrive, and what and how they joke about reflects their adjustment to the pain, conflict, and harshness of life on pandora. The humor in BL3 is either just edgy for the sake of edginess, or outright satire. Borderlands is part of the sci-fi fantasy genre, and when your fantasy work too closely draws parallel to any real-life personality or concept, it destroys the immersion and suspension of disbelief that makes all the difference between good and bad fantasy. tl,dr: comedy in Borderlands is a worldbuilding/ character development tool and BL3 botched it.

[@Phurzt]

I dont think BL2's writing hit the mark aswell as 1 did. I will say the writing had some notable high parts, but there was a lot of millenial sarcasm that just isn't funny for longer than 5 minutes and actively puts a bad taste in my mouth. BL3 shifted even further into that and at eden6 I finally just turned the dialouge off and imagined the story instead a la dark souls.

[@Memphis_ritz]

I think your statement on how humor is used in borderlands 1 compared to the rest of the more recent games is honestly almost identical to fallout 3 compared to the modern fallout games. Was much grittier in the beginning

[@mrbri6463]

Was just gonna say this.

[@okagron]

@@Phurzt Yeah, a lot of the humor in Borderlands 2 is honestly dated at this point, making references to memes that over 10 years old at this point. I will say it's with Borderlands 2 where the humor started to drop in quality.

[@okagron]

@@Memphis_ritz Fallout 3 has an incredible amount of silly, unfunny shit like people playing fake democracy, a town literally ruled by children, people pretending to be super heroes and vampires. New Vegas was far more serious, even if it had its fair share of silly stuff, but a lot of its humor was used to hide a lot of dark undertones like in Old World Blues. And if you want to compare it to the games before, It was also far more sillier than Fallout 2 and Fallout 2 has dumb shit like scorpion playing chess and the implication that ghosts exist. But it was still far more gritty and grounded than Fallout 3.

[@abesmissioncontrol2013]

5:16 "Old vault hunters make appearances and are treated with immense respect" I know where you're going with this

[@Abedeuss]

BL3: "Now this looks like a job for me."

[@gaelofariandel6747]

I mean, there were plenty of opportunities to get quests on Pandora from either BL2 Vault Hunters while they were dealing with matters off world (IE Axton, Salvador, Gage & even Krieg in his cage) or even put them on other planets. Who said Zero was hired by Reese and that's it? Having Zero AND Axton running the Atlas PMC would have been great!

[@nathanlaleff4273]

The biggest reason that BL3 feels so bad to play is entirely due to the fact that they REFUSE to not try to make EVERY damn line and second into a joke. It's prevalent from moment 1 with the Claptrap "Stealth" intro, to Maya's Eulogy, to Rhys' ship getting lasered. It's all compounded with the campy "twists" like Ava gaining Maya's powers after Troy's death or how after Typhon gets killed, they just open a portal immediately to go to the last boss fight with no delay. I actually want to see someone do a full-on breakdown on the comedy density and quality differences between BL2 and BL3, like how many of the side-quests are meant to be comedic vs how many were more grounded or lore based. Then there is the problem of just how much fluff there is with the Claptrap salvages, Vehicle Parts, the various lore logs, and the misbalancing of Mayhem Mode and Anointments. And how TERRIBLY Gearbox handled bug-fixing and Nerfs/Buffs. If players are doing something, it's usually because it's fun and not because it's "meta". Even if it is because it's meta, that doesn't mean that it should be nerfed until it goes to the grave.

[@AgentAshe]

Yeah killing Maya killed a lot of the game for me. She was my favorite overall character and they treated her death stupidly.

[@ChocolateLoveKitten]

Not to mention flat out disrespectful with how quick they were to turn a serious moment that was supposed to be eulogy, only to turn it into a "haha" moment immediately after. Smh.

[@absolutelydegenerate1900]

@@ChocolateLoveKitten honestly if I didn’t know any better I would have thought they picked up writers from marvel. You need only to see Thor love and thunder, as well as the new ant man to see it. Especially love and thunder where there is joke after joke after joke and even the serious moments aren’t allowed to be serious for more than a minute even though one of the main characters is dying of cancer. You’d think they dragged some of those people over to write BL3 before they came out with that movie.

[@ChocolateLoveKitten]

@@absolutelydegenerate1900 Oh lord. I’ve heard things about Thor: Love and Thunder, and even watched videos that were using clips of the movie. Whilst critiquing the use of over abundance of jokes. Like- I’m someone who loves comedy to an extent (I also like to tell jokes and puns), but even I know full well that not every moment should be something funny. There needs to be a balance if you’re going to have some funny moments as well as grim ones. It’s tricky to find that balance, but it can be done. Sad, because I remember how they handled Roland’s death back in BL2 and how you saw the NPC’s reaction when telling them of his passing. They handled Roland’s death with care and respect- Even giving him his statue as a final send off in Tiny Tina’s DLC. The end of that DLC to this day makes me feel emotional. But with Maya? It’s like they said “screw her. She doesn’t get a memorial” and continued to take a piss on her in-game grave.

[@alyssarahn2650]

and it’s not even that they killed her, it’s that they killed her in no honorable way. there was NO REAPSN for her to die.

[@NEEDbacon]

@@alyssarahn2650 Yeah, like Lillith gets her powers stolen, but she's mostly fine after. Maya just MELTS like WHAT?

[@TheZajicekfarber]

I think Handsome Jack is one of the best villains in video games. Just a perfect balance of funny and terrifying, and even understandable motives. I'll forever remember the scene of him killing Roland because my game ui broke at the exact moment and I thought it was intentional to show the emotional impact. The problem with BL3's story was that us the player characters were irrelevant to the story. The whole story is about the Sirens, but Amara being another Siren has no impact at all.

[@nosidenoside2458]

I feel like they should have made it clear that rys was putting up a front for maliwan to make them target like frozen yogurt stands instead of important military structures

[@Divergent-ym3py]

That would fit the humor more, a little. “Guys please stop destroying!- No please I can’t take it-“ quickly whispers to you. “Damn I hope they take the bait. I mean yeah, I may be lactose intolerant. But the lunch breaks of my workers have suffered enough, so hurry vault hunter!”

[@thesupreme8062]

​@@Divergent-ym3pythat is actually such a good line, and it stilla allows for the braindead frogurt joke the writers liked

[@Buglin_Burger7878]

What killed Borderlands 3 for me was Maya's scripted cutscene where she dies and the hunters don't take a shot and the entire fact they didn't take advantage of Troy being a male siren. They could've done a lot if Troy adsorbed her power and there were consequences, a reason to why sirens are as they are. We could even use Maya's death to illustrate this if it happened later in the story where a male siren absorbs power in mass and if given time to fuse with the vault monster would literally become an super black hole. Instead it was a simple play by play, the parasite is told that the sister always wins and he dies first so the sister always wins and even if you're in the lead it still feels like you're losing because she has some Mary Sue level powers.

[@Leostar-Regalius]

yeah, maya's death would've been more acceptable if they had made it so your character ACTUALLY DID SOMETHING in the cutscene but it still failed, the siren character in 3 sure as hell wouldn't have stood there and watched, at least in BL2 Roland's death is understandable because 1 you didn't expect it and 2 jack teleported right behind him before anyone knew what was happening

[@judsongaiden9878]

Also, they could have gone with a Taoist/duality/dyad motif. They had a hint of that with the twins' general color scheme. With a male yin and female yang, even!

[@excaliburofgachagames9241]

The cutscenes killed me cause it's like the vault hunters never existed in them

[@pjchayer1012]

if i remember correctly someone from gearbox said that during Maya getting killed the vault hunter was still in the vault hence why they did nothing. But at the same time how the fuck were we supposed to know that we we're still in the vault during all that

[@excaliburofgachagames9241]

@@pjchayer1012 How do they explain the other cutscenes where the vault hunters are just, none existent.

[@odessawild7798]

Aside from the billboarding and near-mary-sue nature of ava, the major problem of borderlands 3 is that they tried to copy the successful storybeats of borderlands 2 with little to no understanding of *why* it worked, making everything feel.. meaningless and shallow.

[@soltythomas]

Borderlands 3 feels like you are the camera man for the old cast. The scene in the mansion with Troy is one of the few scenes that they are talking to the player character. Almost every other time someone talks, they talk to other people with you listening in or spouting exposition.

[@shcdemolisher]

Yeah. it feels like you aren't there, which really sucks you out of the game. I wish we did have one new game that fully included us in the cutscenes, no matter what we are wearing, and have us be CHARACTERS!

[@GORILLA_PIMP]

Wtf you talking about They constantly talking to me

[@mushymcmushington7176]

My biggest gripe with BL3 is how they MASSACRED my girl Aurelia. I loved her in TPS, practically the only character I ever played. It seemed like throughout the story she was slowly growing a conscience. She shows remorse for what happens to Felicity, and when Jack vents the scientists out of the airlock, and she even has that dying line where she says "Tell Alistair I'm... sorry.". She tells Jack at the end "Darling, I'm evil, let's not kid ourselves, but YOU. You're just something else entirely!" She was a rich, snooty bitch by nurture but a hero by nature, I couldn't WAIT to see what kind of person she'd grow into in Borderlands 3. Maybe they'd continue her growth and she'd be a reluctant anti-hero. Imagine rummaging through her things and finding out she had been donating large sums of money to charities or something, and her trying to kill you so that you won't tell anyone. AGH, it's like the writers for BL3 took a quick glance at her concept art and said "yeah sure whatever she's evil and rich."

[@harry2597]

That's an underrated part of presequal, the fact all the characters react to what's going on in their own way. Timothy grows more sheepish as jack's character gets darker. Wilhelm and Nisha become more unhinged and grow into the villains they become in borderlands 2 and well claptrap is claptrap. Can't speak for Athena as I never played her

[@Reidlos1773]

@@harry2597 Athena was very neutral and focused purely on the mission (Outside of Janey flirting with her which threw her off her game), but as soon as Jack started to go darker she began regretting taking the mission and just wanted to get it over with so she could get the fuck out. A lot of Athena's changing thoughts are kind of heard in her telling the story to Lilith and co.

[@harry2597]

@@Reidlos1773 ah ok, as I expected then

[@alyssarahn2650]

the fact that in the sequel she says “tell hammerlock i’m sorry for being a bad sister” AND THE. COMPLETELY 360?????

[@harry2597]

@@alyssarahn2650 is that in 3 or TPS?

[@flashgnash]

Bl1 felt like an indie project a group of friends decided to put together, not particularly polished but the start of something great. Bl2 feels like that group were picked up by a games company and given a team and full control, 3 feels like that control has been taken away and they're now being pressured by said company/replaced entirely

[@V8chump]

Yep. Bl2 just felt so cohesive and all the characters felt authentic. When sanctuary lifts off and teleports you can go into the caustic caverns, amazing detail on top of sanctuary’s lift off being fucking awesome in itself. Roland’s death was also a true WTF outta nowhere moment that didn’t feel absolutely shoehorned in like Lilith

[@MingeBorea]

BL1 and 2 felt like games made with money intended for a game based on Aliens. Wonder what the sounds like.

[@jjay350]

Spot on, that's exactly how it always felt to me as well.

[@nellzdablackking]

Couldn't have said it any better myself.

[@_ANDRE.]

That is the perfect way to describe it. Whenever i express my hatred for BL3 i always say that i cant fully explain it, but BL3 feels like generic corporate trash. Everything about BL3 just feels to polished, too save, too generic. Like even aside from the terrible writing and characters, something about the game and gameplay just doesnt feel right. Its exactly as you put it, BL1 feels like a good indie game, BL2 feels like Indie game devs got injected with money, Pre Sequel is them trying something different but with the same basis and sadly flopping, which made them sell the rights to a huge company, and that company tried to make their own BL game without understanding what made the other games so great. Edit: And Tales 1 is them trying to successfully expend the lore. And Tales 2 is trying the same but its written by modern soulles writers.

[@jaimyyelvingtonmusic]

Borderlands died 3 times now after this movie release

[@hoofhearted4]

Sirens were completely changed. they went from being random and rare to, you can choose who gets your powers now? unless im mistaken. but i always thought it was weird Tannis for Siren powers out of everyone in the universe.

[@vexedmirage4678]

Tannis getting angel's powers made ZERO sense to me. Gaige getting them made far more sense. Tannis was and always has been a wack schizophrenic loon. Why on earth would angel choose her over someone who actually loves machines and mechanical objects and would make much better use of her siren powers? Just a bunch of crap retcon writing from morons who didnt love nor respect the original games

[@Desaundrea]

Sirens are still rare and still mysterious. No one knows how they came to be. And though not explained well by the devs, it was clear that not only did Sirens already KNOW about their successors, they also know the moment of their death. Maya knew her successor, trained her as best as she could and TOLD AVA TO STAY ON THE SHIP, WHY? Because she knew Ava being present would cause her premature death. And that is exactly what happened. And so Ava, like Maya doesn’t get to learn about her powers or how to evolve them, she learns nothing but what Maya tried to teach her. And remember this is why Maya went back to planet Athena, to learn more about what she is. But she is largely left without answers and could only teach Ava what she knew. Not everyone gets to or can “BE” a Siren. If you take some of the comic’s explanation into account: Sirens know their successors and they will travel to that person to make them aware that they were chosen and that they will become FULL Sirens (Lilith not having the tattoos on her body when The Eldest came to her after her father had died), pass their powers and psychic telepathy on and die as there can not be more than 7 in existence at a time. It also kind of explains why Troy was not a “full Siren” at birth. Sirens are females, he was a male who was never intended to be a Siren hence his need to “ leech” of of his sister to survive until he killed and STOLE Maya’s powers. Not everyone gets to or can be a Siren.

[@DK22200]

Tannis was always going to be a Siren, ever since your meeting with her in the Dahl excavation site

[@vexedmirage4678]

@@DK22200 please point out where it is even hinted at that Tannis was always going to be a siren? I'll keep waiting for your evidence. Don't bother using BL3 as your evidence, as that would be circular reasoning.

[@DK22200]

@@vexedmirage4678 She’s a fucking rogue Dahl scientist obsessed with Eridian technology, she knows more about siren capabilities than anyone else in the galaxy. If you listened to her ECHO logs in BL1 you’d understand. Don’t bother arguing against something you know fuck all about, as that would be irony rhetorical. Stupid fuck

[@schidtstain]

BL2 Torgue's campaign was funnier than any stand-up comedy show I've ever seen. Guy voicing Torgue needs an award.

[@Gabesgroovin]

Chris Rager! Otherwise known as Mr Satan from Dragonball z!!

[@ntggamer3613]

The grandma tongue was the best thing I’ve ever sat through

[@The4stro]

he needs an award and something for his throat, that must've been brutal in that regard

[@BoneheadPlays]

I loved him in the original Tiny Tina’s assault on dragon keep as well

[@kitcarson7572]

Torque is not funny. He is an evil loudmouthed, lying, cheating Jackass and a few other choice words I cannot say on KZbin. A character one must endure a few times to play other fantastic content. When he gets imprisoned in the stocks in the Tiny Tina DLC I just leave him there. Up to me he would be executed at dawn. Kit

[@noliferetiree1354]

One thing that BL3 had me and my ex joking the entire time during our play through was how everyone was a siren. There are only supposed to be a few around in the entire universe at one time. And literally every single one possible are there in the story. Sirens were kinda more mythical in the first two games, and now just, everyone is. So much so we predicted tannis becoming a siren. It just got old. It went from a cool super rare and battle changing presence to oh, look, more magic powers from another character. Felt like they were pulling shit out of there ass with plenty of “and then” story telling elements. “And then the twins show up and take liliths powers” “and then tannis gets siren powers” “and then this kid you just met tags along in secret the entire time and then the twins show up and then maya dies” it got to the point where we were just waiting for what bullshit they were gonna come up with next. I couldn’t get invested if every mission ended with a twist. Even zero going rogue. OH WOW ANOTHER TWIST! Shockerrrrr. I was getting hyped cause I played as zero in BL2 like oh shit maybe me knows something we don’t. Maybe there’s a bigger thing in play. Oh, no. Just an impersonator. Like bruh I had mental fatigue by the end of it where I just didn’t care. “And then the planet is gonna blow up, and then lilith flies into the sky and saves it” and I’m just asking why the entire time. Honestly the twins showing up to take liliths powers was so in left field. Like half the characters forget how to fight during cut scenes. In fact, now that I’m rambling, WHY do your characters just VANISH from the story whenever there is a cutscene. Like you’re 4 bad asses killing thousands of peoples and monsters but as soon as a main character is in danger in a cut scene the player just decided to grab some pop corn and watch? Like ain’t no fuckin way. When Roland dies you are literally trapped. Jack talks DIRECTLY TO YOU. There is a reason you can’t put a 50 cal round through his skull. But the twins like when they kill maya? WHY are we just standing there? We literally have two sirens and a group of highly experienced killers available to us. Nah we just watch.

[@vincelupo8419]

Pitch Meeting guy would say, "for the story to happen". "Oh! ok then!"

[@randybutternubs5639]

"when everyone's super, no one will be"

[@lolilol3396]

Yes cutscene are a complete fail in BL3, it like you are the neutral cameraman...

[@BeeTheBee]

Slight correction, with 3 we are still missing 1 Siren power. We've seen 5 Siren powers and the "phaseleech" power was split in 2 with the twins. It's debatable whether the "animal control" siren power is canon as its not seen in any games thus far

[@ebarobyre2720]

I have zero sympathy for anyone that got hyped by BL3 and felt let down. They literally gave everyone a free preview weeks before release in that BL2 DLC I was a huge fan of the series with thousands of hours of playtime and that DLC was the perfect "Oh, Borderlands is dead," moment They both ruined the BL2 Scene and showcased exactly what type of people were handling the writing for BL3

[@davemardrov777]

“Borderlands was a vibe.” Bro I’m happy I’m not the only one who thought that. There was always something vibey about the og. ❤

[@GaigeStorm]

Gaige was one of the coolest and most interesting characters in the series that had so much potential and they dragged her through the mud to be frigging wedding planner. Look how they massacred my girl

[@huunhanle3809]

Aye, not to mention she doesn't have a proper debut trailer like Krieg in BL2 is also a huge let down for me.

[@Bludobi9001]

In a sense she is kinda Cucked too because she had a crush on Sir Hammerlock.

[@googleisevil8958]

Remember during the Claptrap DLC in Pre-Sequel when they hinted at her and Axton hunting down allies for a future war they were gonna have? Yeah... that would have been awesome... But no, let's have her be a wedding planner and do NOTHING ELSE!

[@jaydmaster8824]

Massacred her, how so?

[@itstylerr1323]

Salvador got shafted just the same

[@malicious_joy]

Well made video! In addition, I would like to add that unfortunately aspects of the gameplay have also gotten worse. If I get loot dumped in masses at my feet, ALL of it is also legendary AND also has tons of random variables, then that unfortunately reduces the meaning of an RPG enormously for me...

[@arynkile]

so true bestie

[@bigfreakinfrog]

AAAH I knew I forgot something. I got so tunnel visioned on the story. Yeah I shoulda talked about how a legendary in 1 and 2 meant something way more in a standard playthrough and how I don't even look at a gun in Borderlands 3 if it isn't a legendary. 😥

[@doriandidluck261]

@@bigfreakinfrog But that also means there’s just a lot more legendaries and more potential for fun builds, and there’s actually lots of good purple weapons in bl3🤷‍♂️

[@bigfreakinfrog]

@@doriandidluck261 You're prolly right. I just like a good farming loop over tinkering with my build. I felt like I got all the guns I wanted super quickly and ran all the raids they released on highest mayhem. Just got bored at that point.

[@destroyerofranch8008]

I don't think increasing the occurrence of legendaries was a bad thing, I think the insane extent of the increase was overtuned and was a bad thing. In BL2 it was insulting to kill a raidboss and have there be a very good chance of only seeing blues, but at the same time killing a normie boss in BL3 and getting like 3 is insulting too.

[@Skyumi-Vk]

I think what hurt the most was what they did to the Tales characters. Really REALLY broke my heart since from the trailer I thought they where going to be pretty cool, like Rhys becoming the head of the atlas corporation and bringing it back and going to war with the Maliwan corporation sounded like it was going to be huge but it all kind of fell a flat :( Just felt like he should have been cooler since he was making a mega corp that was going to be on our side.

[@tokyodeathghoul2313]

Tales is my personal favorite Borderlands and when I saw Rhys i was so excited because I thought we were going to get to see the whole gang back together and yet Sasha isn't even mentioned....

[@NinjapowerMS]

For what it's worth I appreciate the broship between Rhys and Zer0

[@ouchiegiverjr]

@@NinjapowerMSnot even recalling the underwear guy shows just how much they butchered his character

[@BitrateBilly]

Honestly all the sections where maliwan is the main threat honestly feel 20x better then anything with the twins, their whole super-scifi asthetic was a gigantic breath of fresh air, atlas and dahl felt like military corps, hyperion had a whole "industrialized" feel to it, maliwan meanwhile is super advanced and alien, really felt like we were punching above the usual mega-corporation weight class.

[@KayQue404]

@@BitrateBillynot to mention Katagawa was way more charismatic than the twins

[@terrorhuhn9192]

borderlands 3 was like picking the right legendary pistol out of the 15793124 that you'll find, walking though the game.. drop chance is a bit to high, if you ask me

[@WowbaggerTheInfinitelyProlonge]

I know - make all the guns "epic" and suddenly none of them are special.

[@googleisevil8958]

I think you should have also mentioned how Axton and Especially Salvador were pretty much just forgotten about in this game. It feels weird to have the second gen vault hunters just forgotten about in the main story and most of them locked by DLC instead of being in the main game. Especially with the Pre-Sequel hinting that they were still working with Lilith and the Raiders to find those other vault the map showed at the end of 2.

[@_Devil]

The gigachad Tales From The Borderlands did more for the franchise than Borderlands 3 ever did or will do, and that is a hill I'm willing to die on

[@charaznable8072]

Sad what happened to the sequel though.

[@Exel3nce]

it did more for the franchise than all games together

[@mouseymousey02]

They killed vaughn's character because he was too powerful :(

[@charaznable8072]

@@Exel3nce Kind of a broad statement, in what way did it do more for the franchise then say 1 or 2?

[@stellarr1]

Slightly disagree, I loved all of TFTB until the ending portions. Even though Jack's death was actually really well displayed, it sucks he had character development for every single chapter until the end where he just 'randomly becomes a villain' no matter how much you actually see him change before then. Telltale really dropped the ball. That was so disappointing - cause he sorta transforms into this normal-ish mentor for Rhys but the writers decided they had to have a conflict eventually.

[@baby_ghoul]

The Jakobs Family story section was so close to being good, but they had to go and butcher Aurelia's character. I get that the Pre-Sequel is not fondly remembered, but she was certainly a highlight of it and although she's cold at times, she was never the psychopath they portray her as in BL3. She has shown herself to have morals and principles that she abides by, so to see her change with nothing to support why she's evil now was so disappointing to me.

[@bigfreakinfrog]

Oh yeah I loved her. Wanted her to be a rude af ally.

[@alyssarahn2650]

not to mention SHE LITERALLY GOT SAVED FROM ELPIS TO TAKE BACK TO SANCTUARY????????????? she was gonna be good 😭😭

[@sked11]

The twins were the worst super villans I have seen in a long time. They didnt seem evil. They were just teenagers fucking around with this power and influence they have. BL3 took me out of the fantasy BL2 established and made me realize I was playing a game.

[@bakubread9308]

My main issue with 3 was just that it felt like they didn't want me to actually PLAY their game. So many-- and I mean SO many minutes of this game are spent standing in a room listening to characters talk when I would really much rather be playing the damn game.

[@umairashraf5167]

I mean that's kinda the same for all the bl games, so it's not much of a valid criticism towards bl3 specifically

[@spy-the-cuddlefish6459]

@@umairashraf5167 Nah its much more egregious in 3, in 1 and 2 you can really walk away from most conversations or do a side quest to pass the time, there's even simple little tricks you can use to skip dialogue. Pre Sequal does keep you still for a bit but its a much shorter game then the others so it doesn't feel as long. 3 though just seriously forces you to stay near the character or else you wont progress through the mission and there are so many instances that right after a long bit of dialogue, you have to talk to the character again to just continue the story, you cant walk away and you gotta listen unable to do much else, they even lock doors sometimes until you hear everything.

[@Dickstick]

This wouldn't be a problem if the characters and story are exciting. And if zoomers had patience...

[@spy-the-cuddlefish6459]

@@Dickstick True, but when you do replay the game every now and then you just wanna get a move on, you know the story and if its your third or fourth time playing then you start to care less and less.

[@undefined1509]

​@@Dickstickwhat does zoomers and their patience have to do with this?

[@cutespacedragon1012]

Your idea of Gaige being in the main story and getting Angel's siren powers has me so sad, because its such a good idea. Gaige would have actually talked with Angel through out BL2, so you could even interpret them as friends. This would also make her the perfect role of someone to be a friend and secondary mentor to Ava, both having lost and inherited the powers of someone they knew. Ava having a friend around her age would have probably made her more tolerable and interesting too... but instead they gave it to Tannis for funsies to fulfill fan theories or whatever. 😭 I'm actually so steamed rn.

[@thatonerotom8999]

God they blew what potential they had hard lmao

[@JoshNicholson-g5k]

Bro that cut cutscene was like 10000x better than what we got. Just seeing zero paying tribute made me sad.

[@mrfunnyman1061]

In my mind, my "perfect" borderlands game would be bl1's feel and setting, bl2's storytelling and bl3's gameplay. Also, I know that the weapons in borderlands are made by actual companies, but I love how jury-rigged the guns looked and felt In borderlands 1, a lot of them were revolving (a reliable and cheap way to make a gun), most of them looked weird and alien, that made them feel more "wasteland-like", it really felt like something you would find in a desolate desert.

[@nasenbrille]

One will forever be my favourite part of the series because of the darker, desolate atmosphere. Couldn't agree more with your comment

[@FruitsBootG]

Characters in BL3 just never shut up. Anytime you're running anywhere, killing anything, there's always some ear grating commentary playing in the background. The voice removal mod makes it so much easier to play on subsequent playthroughs

[@nightmareTomek]

That wasn't any different in BL2 though.

[@pants35]

​@@nightmareTomekwasn't that annoying though

[@nightmareTomek]

@@pants35 But ya putting BL2 on a pedestal by conveniently forgetting that it was just as bad.

[@DeathByAnvil]

@@nightmareTomekno? BL2 was so much better

[@nightmareTomek]

@@DeathByAnvil Nah. It was only slightly better, all that annoying stuff was just as present, only players were more willing to overlook it, because of Handsome Jack. On the other hand I didn't like the balance around slugs and how long the grind took to reach max level. That's something BL3 does much better.

[@eminempreg]

Sanctuary in a weird way feels like a home away from home just from the sheer amount of time my friends and I spent there. Towards the later hours of the night, when we were a little too tired to do boss fight after boss fight wed just run around sanctuary and explore. It got to the point we just got bored enough to start playing hide and seek in it instead of playing the actual game. (We were all like 13-14). The layout of that place is engraved in my mind at this point.

[@saladdodger4722]

One thing I noticed in my recent play through of 2 and 3, almost every sidequest in 2 provides some kind of information and backstory to one of the side or main characters and you get to know them better. Scooter will have you trying to help him get a girlfriend (and some porno mags) and along the way you see he's kind of weird and whilst you don't blame the girls he chases for not being into him, you still see this sweetness in to him. Marcus will have you retrieving lost posessions or collecting usually pretty petty debts, you learn about how he's a ruthless capitalist who is willing to side with anyone and do anything to make a quick buck. Zed has you investigating strange gun wounds and has a Frankenstein monster plot, building on this idea of a mad doctor who clearly doesn't have any ethics. I could go on for every character as they all have their brilliant moments, whereas with Borderlands 3, there really aren't that many sidequests with any of the characters. Most of the sidequests are for or based around generic looking NPCs who mostly seem weirdly plain and boring for the world of Borderlands and the ones that do focus on specific characters aren't that great and don't give you much information or backstory on them. Vaughn has one where he gets you to replace bandit statues with one of him for some reason, just so he can admire his abs or something. Moxxi has a quest involving killing her ex, Killavolt, we don't really know much about their relationship or him, just that he's annoying and insecure. Lorelai, the woman helping Rhys has you get her coffee and all we learn from that is that she and Maliwan commanders both like coffee? Ironically, depite being widely hated as a shit character, I think Ava has one of the only sidequests where you actually learn something about her and delve into her character and backstory somewhat when collecting her possessions on Athenas Characters like Ellie and Zero are practically forgotten about, Ellie especially. Besides stealing the occasional car she is practically not there since entering Sanctuary III. Instead they focus on side missions around how dank memes are,helping a random elderly couple on a ranch or killing some prisoners for another weird and creepy prisoner. Borderlands 3 was such a dissapointment personally.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

That's something I hadn't really thought about much, but you're absolutely right. Borderlands 1 is the same way as 2, side quests almost exclusively give more in depth characterization to someone you know.

[@Benjamin-mj9pd]

One moment in 2 that hit me was when you’re doing a side quest and Tannis interrupts to talk about how the Dahl corporation created the bandits. “They used to be workers, astronauts, scientists. We’re all broken because of them.”

[@dribblesg2]

Great point! Very true. Making the quests include character development is what puts the ‘soul’ into the otherwise generic fetch quest

[@BitrateBilly]

The only time I felt like this applied in borderlands 3 is the one side quest where you help claptrap dance with a lady in a wheelchair.

[@HarshNerf]

borderlands 3 is written like it's some triumphant capstone to a series but in reality feels like a side story that you might read in a novel about the game universe

[@AJ-oj1xy]

The thing that killed borderlands 3 is that they wasted any resources writing Ava, and making MANY of the returning characters shells of their former selves

[@whatamelon7074]

I would've loved to see the conflict between the twins actually matter. Like you could convince Troy during the story that Tyrene is using him and he would drain her and become the final villain. Tyrene's story would essentially be the same but she would be so power hungry that she neglects her brother entirely and kills him off since he was holding her back. It would've been quite unique for a borderlands game where the final boss is determined through your actions during the story. I also feel as though a lot of quest objectives (especially the ones that were just goofs) could have just been optional objectives that rewarded you with dialogue.

[@truekurayami]

Branching paths to a different "final" boss wouldn't feel right. Now actually provoking Troy to actually try to kill Tyrene when you actually fight him instead of out neglecting to pay attention to her nearly doing it would have been much better.

[@HarshNerf]

modern writers don't like giving players a choice, they think it devalues their work if they can't force you through the story they thought was best

[@That1Gam3r]

they really did Rhys and Vaughn dirty. they we're well written characters in Tales from the Borderlands

[@mouseymousey02]

Bl3 writers based their entire characterisation on something that only happened in Fiona's imagination smh

[@Jam_MG]

at least a movie can't bring down a game. right guys?

[@NewWave3313]

I enjoyed BL1, and I loved BL2. I wish they could revive the series with the same feel and story as 1 and 2, but I don’t have much hope for that these days. We can always dream.

[@slaterock4612]

With you 100% and yeah, given the direction after 2 and where they are with 3 and that wonderlands game, it won't happen.

[@DeeMulaah]

I loved Captain Traunt over the Twins by a looooooong shot It felt like he came straight out of BL2 Katagawa was also awesome as well, I would've preferred him to be the main villain honestly

[@gaelofariandel6747]

Honestly having the Soldier once again be originated from the primary BBEG company would have been cool but they did a good job with Maliwan & I love Moze so it's for the best they didn't swap either. But the reason I was fine with the idea of Bandits being the primary focus (even though executed horribly) was because corporations had their time in the sun for 2 games. Changing the focus was a good call IMO they just botched it.

[@Naindurth]

Captain Traunt was fantastic! and The twins are a constant reminder of how fucking good was Handsome Jack as a villain, it was THAT good

[@KongGig]

Borderlands 1 give me the same vibes as when I play diablo 2 the first time. Timeless environments, addictied gameplay, and a story that you forget after playing the game.

[@eggmug562]

Oh also for clarity Dlc was written by completely different people than the 3 who wrote the main story. Irrc they got fired right after.

[@remygallardo7364]

I never really connected much with BL2, but BL1 was the second game that I put over 2,000 hours into and felt replaying wasn't boring because I enjoyed the idea of challenging myself to fully engage with each character's skill trees, and also limiting myself to challenges for fun. But yes, the environments and just the vibe of the world was special. It hit me like Shadow of the Colossus hits me. That empty desolation and serenity, you know? Like there's something incredible to this place and somehow something wrong at the same time, and you're just there.

[@harry2597]

When people say BL3 was too 'woke', which I also hear alot, I think part of what they mean is that its all very safe. Replacement of midgets for 'tinks', dialogue becomes overtly silly and childish and a story that's overly up to date/trying too hard to be relevant. The main villains are streamers, vaugn speaks like my friends did in high school. I think they kind of forgot this is a different universe to ours and in trying to make it relatable, it felt uncanny. That paired with killing off maya, a fan favourite and replacing her with an almost universally hated character. Then that final cheesy shot of the three women acting out the scene that doesn't really acknowledge the player achievement (litterally beating the game) because it's too busy showing Lilith's self sacrifice and Avas moment of ascension after which she immediately starts speaking as if she's wise and not the childish character we've experienced up to that point.

[@slipperysteve8]

Safe is part of it. The other part is when you see gender/race/sexuality quotas being met in the game. No problem with having these characters in the game. But when it feels like inserting those characters in the story takes priority over the story, it becomes an issue. And that is when woke gets thrown around. And bl3 seems to have prioritized "diversity" in its cast versus good characters and storytelling

[@harry2597]

@@slipperysteve8 yeah that's why I mentioned the three women at the end. Sirens are a pivotal part of story, no doubt. But in an attempt to make 'empowered female characters' they litterally empowered them. It would be more impressive and well received if they used a character trait to accomplish there goals, like Lilith actually learning leadership or Ava steadily maturing through the story. Imo tannis being a Siren was such a bizarre choice and felt like more of a plot device than a character development. Also, only six sirens can exist at one time and you're telling me that four of them are in the story and are all present for the ending?

[@harry2597]

@@slipperysteve8 TL;DR yeah, you're 100% right. They sacrificed story for PC quotas and I think that's why the story is as bad as it is.

[@quadkoos18]

I am a completionist and to get 100% on Borderland 1 and 2 you have to play the story several times as each of the character (you had to use their special an set number of time or kill so many with it) and I was fine with doing it because i love those games. In 3 however you just had to play the story once and i was SO HAPPY about that. I did not want to play through 3 ever again!

[@WaterflameMusic]

This was awesome. and basically, I agree. With all of it. Love borderlands.. but its kinda cringe. But when its not its actually funny. BL1 and 2 dlcs were some of the best to me, and of course the endgame of bl2 with all dlc hunting bosses for pearls with friends. All the games ever needed for me was a SKIP DIALOGUE button. - My dream is the maps of Bl1,bl2,bl3 and all dlc + presequel in one gigantic MMORPG world. It could still be instanced and have channels in the hub cities. Anyways, really great video. 😍 I think im gonna just send this the next time someone asks me what I think of BL.

[@thewanderingartists]

There can only be 6 sirens and the 7th must never be found, in the entire god damn universe so the powers passing to the next girl standing in line was so stupid.

[@Solkpjish]

The villains of BL3 feel so hard like the writers are boomers trying to make social commentary. "Streamers are like cult leaders!" It's like those awful paintings you see of cellphone zombies.

[@redhead9253]

It feels more like millennial writing, still thinking that 2012 humour is the norm.

[@c31l]

Ava felt like one of the writers self insert character

[@ABonafideSkeleton]

Ava is essentially the personification of the ‘writers pet’ trope. She’s not quite a Mary Sue but the plot does bend around her when required and she gets a lot of leniency for her mistakes.

[@ihateallthethings2683]

Man I hadn’t considered that but now that you say it you’re absolutely right

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

@@ABonafideSkeleton I think you might be wrong about that... she *is* a Mary Sue. She gets all the cool things despite not deserving them, and everyone in the canon of the story likes her despite not having reason to. That's like, the definition of a Mary Sue.

[@andrewalba336]

Oh man, all your thoughts on how to improve the Calypso twins are actually spot on. Instead of just making them annoying caricatures of online personalities, delve into the psychological tropes that surround the culture, the constant validation, etc. And then delving into their history to see what shaped them and made them feel the need to be validated externally. Man you're on to something there. Great job.

[@sedefendendo8851]

Now that I think about it. Tannis expressed and admitted sadness at the news of Roland's death in Borderlands 2. I suppose that was sandblasted from her character when they wrote her for 3.

[@jirredvang901]

Jack is probably up there in my favorite antagonists, loved how the pre sequel went into his back story and you see his descent into madness

[@sharrpshooter1]

9:55 I actually disagree with this point. It didnt take itself seriously to a point, there is a distinct tonal shift after Roland dies that you can really feel throughout the story. Like before his death is all just kinda having fun and doing it for whatever, but once he dies there is a serious background tone that doesnt really go away, both in the NPCs voices or even in the pacing and purpose.

[@kaingates]

100% this. Handsome Jack goes from "lol this guy is CRAZY" to "HOLY SHIT this guy is crazy" in one scene. Worst part is it that its kinda justified since we just killed his daughter.

[@Bakes14]

@@kaingateshe locked his daughter away to stop her from hurting more people after she killed her mom. It isn’t ok to do that and she wanted out she asked to be killed because she wasn’t able to live her life.

[@quadriplegic2789]

He literally says it doesn't all the time, there are breaks from seriousness.

[@drb0mb]

Right, it's not common in a game for the primary objective giver to die, and the "flying blind" sentiment reflected by the ingame characters reinforces that chaotic nagging feeling that you don't want to be true.

[@sharrpshooter1]

@@quadriplegic2789 Yeah but my problem with bl3 is that, imo, it doesn't have a single serious moment. Like sure there is times when "serious stuff happens" but its so badly ruined by just locking the player out of the cutscene WHEN WE ARE LITERALLY IN THE SAME ROOM. Like when Roland dies it makes senses that everyone there is literally shocked because it happens so fast, but when the twins show up after a boss for like the 4th time how on earth is our character not expecting them and there to counteract whats happening? Bl2 understood the difference between funny and serious, I dont think bl3 ever did

[@Larry]

And now it's died for a third time :D

[@Thebossstage1]

When are you coming back?

[@Larry]

@@Thebossstage1 Hopefully soon, I'm fed up being sick and want to get back to work ASAP >:(

[@Thebossstage1]

@@Larry Get well soon