The New Borderlands 4 Character Drama...

[@ajwise04]

I think the problem just comes down to the color schemes, they all match too much and just look like any given npc. Even in the past if a design was basic or just clothes, it still in some way stood out from the other vault hunters from that game and in some way emphasized something about that character.

[@maxrosefoxanime7225]

Your not wrong but In every game all the characters look bland from the start ,we end up just changing them ourselves

[@lapisgaming6093]

​@@maxrosefoxanime7225that's my thought as well, i think they went bland on the vault hunters base simply because they know no one gonna keep the original design of the characters in the end. It's a little pointless but I can see why people can be upset.

[@captainzebra2516]

@@ajwise04 agree completely if it's going on a darker tone the characters and colors need to match up

[@naytny5819]

It isn't just the color schemes, some of them feel like they don't fit any specific role and just look like standard npc's.

[@sirdarkon4517]

i afraid of the cringe writing more than anything

[@monkeydetonation]

Just waiting for claptrap barge in and start talking about "vault tuah" and hunt for that thing

[@alexpricefield6969]

Isn't the writer of BO3 still writing on BO4?

[@TheLiveactiongamer]

​@@monkeydetonationonly problem claptrap is meant to be cringe so that would work xD

[@BlueCheeseLucci]

​@@monkeydetonation they already said they aren't including jokes like that on Twitter

[@The8thblock]

I really hope Eva dies offscreen. I'd rather see them kill off her character, but I also don't want to hear her speak again.

[@vontheunknown7982]

I wish we had alien vault hunters. I mean they're a whole galaxy and there's no clue, if there are other alien races out there, other then zero and it has not been truly confirmed yet? 😡🤔

[@FelisImpurrator]

TRUE

[@professorpengu502]

It was confirmed that there were at least when the destroyer was free

[@vontheunknown7982]

@@professorpengu502 Hmm, many alien species would have been destroyed by the destroyer, even so some alien species probably survived after the destroyer was sealed away in the great Vault.

[@mistermann4163]

I once made a Borderlands "Alien" character. It was a human clone spliced with Guardian DNA and given the ability to summon the limbs of Guardians as there ability with it changing depending on what tree you specked into.

[@太有益健康了]

you already commented this before

[@itscutaru]

I just hope the studio really understood why B3 had the reception it did and properly planned ahead, rather than stopping at something very superficial like "oh, borderlands+ funny = bad" with the movie being the most recent thing Borderlands related.

[@SleeperReaper]

thats true, same with bl3 gameplay which imo is the best gameplay in the series, not the story tho.

[@BlueCheeseLucci]

People overacted cause the story was bad, the gameplay was great, vault hunters all cool,dlc was good.

[@SleeperReaper]

@@BlueCheeseLucci fr, I didn’t really care about the story as much as the gameplay but tbh I’m the type of person that doesn’t care about story if gameplay is peak, if gameplay isn’t peak then I hope the story is.

[@TheJCghost]

I love BL3’s Vault Hunters looks all very cool especially Zane, love his jacket, could have bought one in IRL with the Octopus on the back

[@ehoffart529]

Yeah Fl4k was my favorite design. Love me a good robot.

[@TheJCghost]

@ yeah I used to have nickname for all of them «The Irishman» «R0b0 H0b0» «Iron Maiden» & «The Tiger»

[@gerutzu575]

the only reason i replayed bl3 a bunch of times was for the vaulthunters. imo the best in the serie with the exception of amara. i just remember watching the flak and zane trailers over and over again when they got released and getting excited for the game, now i just looked at the bl4 trailer with the same interest i scroll youtube shorts

[@haileyh7465]

I think it's a color palette issue. There's two colors that pop. The pink on the siren, and the bit blue on the big guy. Everything else is a drab and dull earthy palette.

[@darkjester374]

Yeah I actually agree I mean like you could've given one like green hair or yellow shirt something the eartty tones all over design doesn't help

[@jackofn0trades29]

The thing with BL2’s characters design is that while each one was customizable to a degree, each had their own unique silhouette and color pallet which made them standout against each other. They were also alien enough from other enemies and NPC’s that you could tell who the other vault hunters where just from a glance. While it wasn’t completely lost with 3, they did feel a lot more uniform with one another, the only real standout was Fl4K imo, these new ones look so generic that my initial impression was that 4 was going to have a custom character creator.

[@midgevong41]

Funny you say that because people bashed BL2 characters in the start too and then they saw their specific trailers and changed their minds.

[@gravital2257]

what do you mean ? Zane was the best looking and distinct one, flak is basically a trashcan with robot parts, formless with his huge coat and not appealing

[@PricelessDamnationV2]

I think the main problem with the trailer is that it crams too much into one. The cinematic showing the battle between the Rippers and the Order and the real-time footage that follows should've either been split into two separate trailers or extended. A longer trailer would've given the Vault Hunters much more time to shine. I'm confident they'll rectify that down the line, and I'm still excited as hell for the game.

[@midgevong41]

This is literally the teaser trailer. It sprinkles in a lot of things and then they do more specific trailers for the aspects of the game later on.

[@vforvendetta3074]

Bro, this is the first teaser trailer. You guys need to get off the high horse. I don't want to hear one more thing about color pallette. We have fucking character customization. It literally doesn't matter how they look. We literally will be able to give them alien features, bro.

[@malachiteheart1676]

I could make an hour long essay video as to how borderlands failed Aurelia as a character. One of the greatest Vault Hunters and best designed and set up characters in the series and they used her as a random one-off in Borderlands 3 to fill a villain space for Hammerlock’s house. Such a huge balldrop from Gearbox

[@the1madspirit387]

I think that the colour palette is just not it, there's no contrast and the characters also blend with the colours of the background

[@benjamingiddens6758]

Exactly. If they had chosen a different environment to show off the characters (maybe individually as well) I assume people wouldn't really be reacting like this. It comes down to the light and the colors in the reveal shot being muddy tbh

[@midgevong41]

This feels like a reach to say this about an entire game when we have seen a 2 min teaser

[@Progamer1013]

For me, it’s less that they look “Boring” and more that they look identical. An argument can be made that 3 can feel this way too. However, the designs are diverse enough to make the character’s unique. 4’s currently don’t really have this pop in your face differences. The only things being hair, size and gender. For character design, this should not be the only things that denote a different character. Why not have their clothing be more diverse in colors and accessories? You mention locations: It’s always been nice to have VH’s that are from all walks of life. You are correct in saying that they all look like they come from the same planet. In a universe has vast as Borderlands, that should NOT be the case. If the Siren really is Maliwan, add in more hints like this as a Maliwan solider or from a Maliwan site. The big guy could be more dressed like a robotic version of a hunter or native. The other two, go off of their skills. We may not know them, but using their designs to showcase what they MAY be able to do would speak volumes. The fact that only two of them just off of one glance can have some guesses as to what their abilities are is lackluster. I do hope they slightly change up the designs to make them more unique. Slightly, they don’t need anything over the top. But we will see

[@JDWalker495]

I agree that the trailer was more of an issue cause it was more focused on the story (which I’m grateful for) but the characters just weren’t that striking to me. But the bl franchise is known for its character customization so maybe I can pick up the slack. Personally I was hoping for another robot or alien

[@sandyk9300]

your grateful....for the story?

[@JDWalker495]

​@sandyk9300 yeah I'm grateful they showed more of what direction the story is going in

[@darthvaderreviews6926]

I agree that the lack of a robot/alien is a bummer. I am a big enjoyer of Zer0 and Fl4k, but there's sadly not an equivalent in this roster

[@sandyk9300]

@@JDWalker495 after the shit show that is the third games story...im surprised ppl are expecting better from the sequel

[@JDWalker495]

@@sandyk9300 your low expectations are valid but there’s always potiential for improvement, I’ll withhold criticism till I see for myself. Nobody expected the crazy upgrade in story between BL1 and Bl2, but here we are

[@koakiilereagl5510]

To give the woman on the far right some slack. Tbf if she is ex-Maliwan. Her colors shown are White. Orange and Blue, which is Maliwans primary colors. So it would make sense for them to no longer be popping out and clean as they will have been weathered for however long she has left the corp. Shes not getting brand new uniform clothing to use anymore, she might just be wearing all she still has. Kinda like how Moze with Iron bear just made do with what fuel and parts of scrap she could to maintain iron bear. Maybe this is similar where she was all bright and had a full suit, but overtime its falling apart, leaving bits missing and the remaining parts old and worn out.

[@danielmontoya1069]

Someone mentioned that it would be hilarious if she was related to the traunt brothers

[@christopherzajonskowski7123]

'Realism' and 'believability' never makes for good design. A developer can argue all day that their focus is on 'realism' or whatever - fact is, realism in storytelling and (visual) character-design more often go into different directions than not. Some things are so ingrained in the human psyche, that you can't just argue people's perception away. That's why TV ads are usually flashy, stupid, silly, loud, confusing, etc. - nobody buys a product because some middle-aged guy in a badly sitting suit talked to them over the TV and explained them why buying the product is beneficial for them. Every good designer should know as much at least - so who ever designed the characters for this game/trailer simply ISN'T. Some stuff shown actually fails to meet some entry-level rules of colour-theory. That's nothing that someone accidentally forgets while trying to make believable designs. :D

[@laythalmaskari8870]

The thing that bothers me most with her is that she’s wearing ray bans when their universe is like 200 years ahead in technology. Like it’s the equivalent of having a fantasy world and they’re still using standard wheelchairs instead of some awesome hover chair or mount. At least some HUD goggles or something man

[@Zoidberryable]

Her being ex-Maliwan is a cool theory actually, I'd like another ex-corpo character in the ranks.

[@C28_Music]

This is a great video, and you’ve changed my mind. We’ve become too addicted to borderlands getting flashier that we forgot about its roots. VH#1’s color scheme seems to be something that blends everyone else together. Without him, they all look starkly different. If he was given a spicier green, he would have stood out more.

[@JakeTheZig]

I do think 2 of them look boring... but I'm sure they'll have cool cosmetics

[@RumblyGL]

They're even on the outsides like they were trying to take the focus off of them

[@GibbySmalls]

hot take: who cares, you'll be able to recolor you're characters anyway

[@revyrev28]

^^

[@frankiecedeno3724]

lol, that’s a very funny way to say it but yeah

[@Tagiau]

You'll even have completely different attire. Base skins don't get used much past the first 15 minutes anyway.

[@turbo558]

If not able to “wonderlands” them all together tbh lol

[@AdamSlander888]

Except they don’t look interesting. This is the only thing we have so far, it’s boring to see 4 characters who looks incredibly generic when we had someone like Lilith, zero, maya, Athena and all the bl3 vault hunters in the games before. They all had one or more amazing or cool looking characters who were interesting, these characters are all brunette generic characters. The timekeeper looks more interesting and has many fans more interested than any of them

[@AnAbsoluteUnit]

Character design is half of what makes a character and character personality is important. Zane and Moze was given the same criticisms prior to their own character centric trailers and they became fan favorites. So I'm going to wait until their character centric trailers comes out for my opinions to come out.

[@zachrohler1047]

Zane and moze are still generic and boring lol. I'm a moze main and shes boring so is her story. Zane is atleast barons brother from borderlands 1. Moze is just a random solider. Same with axton from 2.

[@pedrorosa9893]

Tô be honest, they look like downgrade from 3.

[@thedreaming6446]

In the borderlands 3 trailer, within the first minute, they start going through the vault hunters and what they can do. In the borderlands 4 trailer, I have no idea what the vault hunters are called, what their abilities are or what is really going on. on BL3 they spelled it out, a pycho cult run by two idiots needed to be brought down, bring in the vault hunters! On BL4, I don't know, some sort of civil war between two factions we've never seen, on a planet we've never been, fighting for what again? I can pick out the siren easy but have no idea what her power is and in BL3 I played Moze cause I hated Amara and her weird multi siren powers.

[@Elittys]

The more I look at the design and overall look of the guy on the far left, the more I think of Zane. Its just in this instance he looks like a hobo who has a part time job in assassinations which is cool. Zane just looks like a futuristic irish man whos full time job is being an assassin. Slowly warming up to the hobo dude.

[@MucsenWitticus]

100% agree on the hair note. That beige tone blends them together way too much and tbh it’s not a very flattering colour. Compare that to the different colours and accessories used in bl 1 and 2 for example there was so much more going on like mordercai and Roland’s unique hats, liliths red hair, zeroes helmet and salvadors blueish hair. You could glance at these characters and find so much variety in their expression.

[@SkaterBlades]

A good way to determine if a design is good or not for characters/classes is if you can tell roughly what their role is with just a look. In borderlands we generally have 4 "classes" which i will call assassin, soldier, heavy and siren. Axton, roland, moze and wilhelm you can pretty much see as soldiers without needing much else. The sirens are easy because they just need the tatoos, i personally think amara has the best look out of them because her muscles say she's a fighter and that fits in with her siren powers. Heavies are generally more noticeable, being bigger and more muscular than others, brick, salvador and krieg fall into this category, salvadors outfit does look kind of plain but his tree trunk arms give off the vibe that he's a heavy/berserker role. The assassin role tends to have their face covered and a more slender frame, zero and mordecai being pretty much perfect designs in my humble opinion. Obviously we have some outliers like aurelia and gaige who don't really fall into these archetypes and it's a bit harder to put fl4k in there given the variety of roles they have, but these are generally the core design principles, fl4k is never without a pet so you can tell they have something to do with animals. Aurelias blue coat and ice themed jewellery makes you think her ability is ice themed. I cannot, for the life of me, tell what the dude on the left and girl on the right might do from that shot alone. The siren will obviously have some siren power and the big guy might be tanked out or be extremely aggressive, but what the hell would the others be able to do? Get shot in the head and die? They look like they just wandered into the shot when walking to the store

[@syrienangel4137]

Those two look like NPC's that would die in a gag in BL2

[@josefstalin9678]

You may be able to tell Moze is a soldier from a single still image of her, but could you tell what she actually does? Like, how would you have guessed that she had a mech instead of a turret like Roland and Axton had? Looking at the character on the left in the BL4 trailer, you can see he has the same kind of cybernetic looking legs as Zane, as well as some sort of exoskeleton on his arms. This tells me he's probably similar to Zane in the sense that he uses gadgets, but perhaps more melee oriented. Then, a few seconds later, you see him with an even larger exoskeleton with giant energy blades coming out of it. I feel like him and the big guy are the only ones we currently know the ability of

[@AdamSlander888]

The only guess I have for the character on the left is that they will be a melee character, what else will they do? I have no idea. The siren, what will be power be? No one knows. The tank, what? No idea. Finally the character on the right has literally nothing going for her, she looks like the average npc you find in sanctuary (not like the rest are better)

[@dark2deeds]

dont have any issues with the trailer i am ready to play the hell out of it

[@grshen]

I honestly saw Ava and thought it was Moze and I was wondering how tf Moze became a siren and then I remembered that Ava existed…

[@radiantumbra2776]

If they just tweak some of the colors, clothes, and hair they'll be fine. Like give the ninja dude more tech on him and give the Maliwan chick a more engineer look.

[@mytlihios5534]

You know what I think. I think that gear box plans to release a shit ton of different body as dlc, like the one's in bl3, and that's why they look so casual

[@Joi2212]

I think their colour palet and especially their hair colour or hats or something, are the biggest problem with their design. Like while sure Axton and Salvador looked plain, but their colours just popped.

[@IV-fad]

I'm sure once we get more info about them the VH's will grow on the community. The trailer focused on the story as you mentioned which brings me to something I wish Gearbox does with the story: involve the Vault Hunters! In the first three games the Vault Hunters just do grunt work to move the story along, not being essential to or even involved in the plot until they return in sequels as NPCs. I want them to be part of the plot and appear in cutscenes, interacting with other characters and having echo conversations. Have the non-player VH's in the cutscenes and radio chatter as well!

[@kierancrossan7644]

One looks like he came from the cyberpunk NPC roster, another one looks like he'd be starring on WWE against John Cena for like 2 matches, another looks really badass, and another looks like someone accidentally slid one of the sliders in character customization too high

[@Creepymoose135]

Unironically, I believe that the Borderlands community is worse to deal with the vast majority of the time than BL3s story could ever be. Anyone trying to turn this into an actual problem is either a grifter or desperately needs to touch grass and there is no in-between.

[@pio0055]

Unfortunately for this trailer the villains made more of an impression than the vault hunters but they could always bring out two more vault hunters just like BL2's Gauge and Krieg

[@midgevong41]

The villains are always the focus in the games. They are the entity causing everything around you to be happening and you always start as some rando who wandered into the story

[@menosgod]

Looking at BL2 clips Maya and Salvador only stand out a bit more because they wear bright colors while Axton and Zero wear muted colors. Hopefully the group for 4 will have some good skins and heads to mix up their designs better.

[@AnAbsoluteUnit]

Zer0 made sense cuz well... he's an NINJA in every sense of the words.

[@monkeydetonation]

Salvador's short and stoutedness I think is a key part of his design that makes him stand out as well

[@NobleSixElite0000]

That’s just social media being social media I love the design

[@chop25official]

They all look like the side characters, not the main characters. Not like gearbox is going to change it, since y'know, its gearbox. At the end of the day I love borderlands 1 (I have 1,000 hours in it.) and the characters in that game had the same issue, but their outfits tell a story. I mean Roland wears Crimson Lance armor telling the player that he was at one point a soldier, its pretty cool. I kinda wish the characters in this game were more unique, but its not going to change so might as well accept the fact. Good video!

[@ryanspencer9602]

Hearing this guy say "shit" after hearing his calm voice for the timeline videos blindsided me lmao

[@williamfranciswhite450]

Wait, when did he say that?

[@Rejani33]

Here to defend against the Salvador slander Sure my guy is like buff and all and that's kinda generic but hes a midget or stunted which I think is very cool character design Also the mohawk Just imagine there's all these tall bozos and down there is Salvador , a mini dwarf mountain of muscles

[@Glorpious5]

Yeah his silhouette looks like a rhino he’s got such an interesting shape

[@user-kb6ey3dq7c]

Speak about it in the same sense with what we know of the new vault hunters, he was just a midget with a mowhawk, it was different yeah but, from what we knew there wasn't much of a craze over his character

[@TehSeksyManz]

Brick was my first choice in BL1, Salv was my first choice in BL2. The big dude in 4 will almost certainly be my first choice. I do like me some zerker style characters.

[@Rejani33]

@user-kb6ey3dq7c Yeah his character like his voice lines is really reallly bland but his design does stand out tho Imo

[@fre4k214]

It kinda makes sense why vault hunters look so simple in comparison to other NPC's, you will be playing for the most part from the first person perspective so even if they had the most extravagant designs you wont see it most of the time. So why waste resources on that

[@GiarcMcDerp]

Thank you for actually articulating what was wrong with the trailer instead of saying "characters generic, game bad". My only qualm with the trailer was the lack of detail on the vault hunters. I like their visual design and everything else about it. But I can see where you are coming from, and your opinion is thought out and in good faith.

[@SirTeaOfBagz]

It sucks that everyone’s throwing a tantrum when nothings been shown of the VH.

[@The_easy_mac]

I think once the game is fully released and they’re done with adding more stuff like couple years later after it’s released I think they should do a update adding all the old previous vault hunters in a dlc like don’t even care about the lore about it just a fun update since I think this is the last borderlands game. If not, then they should wait for the last game but I think that would be fun Playing old characters again in a new game that would be awesome.

[@alexpricefield6969]

They look like the kind of enemies we shoot in game 😂

[@hungdo-kl6up]

The girl to the right... her design reminds me of Mama from Death Stranding. Don't know why her "chest" armor doesn't cover her chest though. But she looks like a tech girl with heaps of deadly tech toys. The big guy is clearly a Viking/tank/heavy. Don't know why he has to show is nipple though. The Siren girl looks good to me. Only the guy to the left is kind of ... flat.

[@thewanderingartists]

Death stranding mentioned 😱

[@josefstalin9678]

It isn't chest armor, its more of a harness for her jetpack lookin thing on her back. The biggest problem with her design is that you can't even tell she has that thing if you're facing her head on

[@SuzuHotaruVt]

My biggest problem is that I don't connect with them. I don't feel like I want to play with them

[@RumblyGL]

What happened? Paid skin dlcs. I hope I'm wrong. The vault hunters aren't inspired, they aren't designed to be good characters they look like they're made to fit their quotas. I thought we were over that.

[@FelisImpurrator]

"fit quotas" lmao go back to whatever right-wing circlejerk you get the DEI hysteria from, or something.

[@Huffle_0]

The problem isn't the characters skin colors. Don't pretend like that's a real issue They're just kinda boring in comparison to what we've got in the past

[@FelisImpurrator]

@Huffle_0 The anti-wokes have to shove their politics down our throats and make everything about their crusade against wokeism.

[@RumblyGL]

@@Huffle_0 Never said the skin colors were an issue. I have no problem with a character made from passion. These characters are not made with passion, they are made to either hit certain check boxes, or to simply NOT have certain skin colors. I don't hate woke JUST because it's woke, it take all creativity out of things because it has to check off the boxes.

[@Tagiau]

So you've never played a mainline borderlands, or even wonderlands game. What happened was they realised people don't care about the base skin because 99% of players stop using it within 15 minutes.

[@alexpricefield6969]

I still miss the Borderlands 3 trailer with Seven sea of rhye playing

[@beanosthepengus]

It would’ve been nice to have a “slay the spire” type character like maybe a guardian that somehow defected from the war with the time keeper and the bandit faction, Theres so much you could do with that too but instead we got a guy with a septum piercing, a decent siren all things considered, a macho “look at me I’m Mr big” tough guy, and a frail scientist with anemia lol

[@EverythingsAhammer]

The "guy of the left"'s head looks so much like Troy Calypso

[@Volti-Vagra]

and the siren looks like his sister (least to me) something bout the huge hair, equally huge head yet weirdly small face just makes that connection *pop*

[@EverythingsAhammer]

@Volti-Vagra the resemblance is there for sure.

[@senpaikush6602]

I mean, i personally like the siren. sure it's a bit modern with the trenchcoat, but she looks great (the more critical me inside wants Sasha or Fiona as vault hunters but thats unrealistic)

[@ZexyAdventures]

The middle two are decent, it's obvious what classes they're gonna be. But what is even the two on the outer ends? They look like they'd be NPCs, what is even their class?

[@dereckpadilla9352]

Look i get the hole new vault hunter for the new game, i would give anything to play as zane again especially given these designs. On another note, i think they should have given the siren pink or white hair, I'm saying if they've already made most of her outfit with pink accents why not go all in, it's borderlands sort of what they go for.

[@Govrin.]

I just want to see the new weapon style and reloads for them But from the trailer it looks very disappointing because it looks the same as bl3

[@juliusbossman7280]

The ones on the left are okay, the giant with the cyborg arm is my fav so far, and the right one clearly ask for the Octavio style but bigger.

[@creamygoodness4440]

I'll be honest, when I first saw the trailer I didn't even recognize that one of them is a siren. Usually they make it well known who the siren is

[@TranscendedSubject]

It's collegelands. If you say the real reason they look bad, KZbin will silence our comments.

[@TehSeksyManz]

What's the real reason?

[@Volti-Vagra]

>shifty look around >clears throat *Skin.* *Color.* Its the internet, the fact the devs dont have a blue eyes -white dragon- white boy as the heroic protagonist grew some weird cult-like hatred (in a very vocal yet extremely niche part of the internet) and instead of just ignoring the thing they dont like, they swarm anything related and smear shit all over it like toddlers left alone with full diapers

[@crazy_apepperoni5222]

Imagine if these designs will be the ones we start out with, but as we progress, the designs get an upgrade/get more and more wild. With every story progression or skill tree progression

[@aidanfushimi5749]

I think they look awesome but I am sad that there’s no cool mysterious robot this time 😢

[@lamarlopezgonzalez6621]

I honestly think the vault haunters look bland couse their supposed to be customizable like in TTW

[@naytny5819]

That would be so garbage, the character sucks and almost all characters just end up looking ugly and bland.

[@BigHeelJohnson]

They look exactly like every other vault hunter lol i sware "fans" have a karen quota they need to fill out for every new game that comes out.

[@FM_DOS_GURI]

aint gonna lie, at this point i would like something like character creation like the wonderland game

[@ProjectHades999]

That would suck tbh we'd end up with more silent protagonist games and we have enough of those you guys are upset over the characters because you're oblivious to the other games completely characters always looked kinda bland at first until you put cosmetics on them another thing people are missing entirely is that in 3 especially you can change your abilities entirely We know nothing about 4 honestly and people are already complaining and it's clearly because you all will cry about anything you don't like even the tiniest bit there's so much undeserved slander going on towards games these days if you all are going to hate on every single game just stop gaming

[@jarednorris9559]

Something I've always wanted in this game series that they "may" include would be different armor pieces for torso arms waists legs and head, if that is the case it would make sense why they are so bland to start off with. How cool would it be to have armor with heavy medium and light values that affect the vault hunters mechanically? Heavy armor making them slower and lighter armor faster, also obviously affecting their sponginess and shield capabilities. There's a bunch more stuff you could play with if they did this of course, jump height, elemental resistances, ext. But man it would be so cool. Been wishing for this for the longest time, we already know that they're into cosmetics to some degree, this would be the next step logically

[@christianboi7690]

Yeah, from the start I’ve been saying that the cosmetic skins would probably fix the problems people are seeing, because I can imagine some awesome designs based off of the characters base figures.

[@gringomoderfoquer8287]

The Siren's coat fits her IMO. Makes her look even more of a baddie than her stare

[@mysticalmonkey1041]

The guy on the left looks like his design is there for him hiding his knife things you can see it later in the trailer when you see his ult

[@spiritbear6674]

After all these failures, they made the worst decision possible. They played it safe

[@gwenofair628]

The problem it’s that the colors don’t pop. Everything blends in to the background. There’s nothing colorful that makes them stand out. I m not too worried though because most of the time nobody uses the default colors or heads. Once we get some custom skins the problem with fix itself.

[@DetectiveElmo]

its not only because they have similar looks and color, the past borderlands character designs are supposed to tell you what kind of role/playstyle they are, even if it has to be exaggeratedly bland like Axton and Moze which tells you theyre the soldier type. you cant really tell what role of the guy on the left and the girl on right is. the guy on the left casual outfit doesnt even fit the assassin blade he has. the girl on the right big gloves, pants, and chest is not even that unique to tell you what she does

[@JanGoh-jb5ge]

I think people are too concerned about the clothes of characters that you almost never see while you're playing through, and that have new skins and heads and wardrobes from the very first moment you start playing.

[@gmandude7930]

To me, the only new vault hunter that looks intriguing is the siren cause 1. She's a siren and 2. Her siren tattoos are purple, a color we've never seen for them. The closest was Amara from bl3 cause she was infusing her siren powers with the elements she was given, and if that's the same here, then I'm terrified cause that means slag may be returning

[@135mikerules23]

I’m saving partial judgement until we learn more about the Vault Hunters. Particularly the Siren. Full judgement will come along once I play the game from start to finish.

[@jwells291]

I think the main reason is that it's just 4 humans. There's no mystery behind their looks like with Zero with him not showing a face and with him being non-human, and all the other games had a Robot to play as (Cl4p-TP and Fl4k). They look fine to me, hell, we didn't even get a Character trailer that shows off what they can do. All we saw was 1 ability in action, and that might have just been a "cinematic" portion of the trailer that won't be in game. The only other thing that looked like an ability was the Ice and Fire axes and that could honestly be a Legendary Grenade or a melee skill where you throw an elemental axe. Their color scheme doesn't matter in a game with skins and heads. The only thing I hope they add are Character specific quests. For instance, in BL3, Zane could have had a quest where you visit where one of his brothers had died and get a Unique weapon(That can be found with other characters, just no quest marker) or something and the quest reward is a special Skin/Head.

[@christopherzajonskowski7123]

One thing I recognize for at least a few years now - not just in relation to game-trailers, but also most new Hollywood movie trailers - is that nearly all of them are straight-up garbage. In the sense of 'craftmanship' especially - it really feels like most of them are rushed and done by some intern on the side instead of people who know a thing or two how to craft proper advertisements and marketing material. There are a few exceptions here and there - mostly in regards to indie games though (Stuff like Klei Entertainment's own marketing material) and the exception are really just in between a large sea of boring, bland trailers. I haven't analysed the BL4 trailer in detail - I guess I saw more details from the snippets shown in this video than anything else - but the first thing that comes to mind are some absolute beginner-mistake-level colour-choices for the main cast. That's not how you do it - and everyone who ever learned about design and colour-theory for at least 5h should KNOW what's wrong with them. Sure... give those characters with brown/dark skin tone brown-ish, dark clothes - and those with more 'pink' skin tone can wear... you guessed it... pink-ish tones... You have to be a deadbeat level designer to NOT see the issue there. And there is SO MUCH more wrong only just looking at colour-compositions, contrast, lack of rim-/highlight-colours, etc. pp. I was tempted to turn my screen to black & white while watching those scenes, to check for contrast - but it's so bad, it's not even necessary to see the issues. Not sure what went wrong with BL4 - and I don't even try to think up some theories - just the plain objective state of the designs shown in the trailer shows that SOMEONE fucked up or doesn't understand their job. :shrug:

[@captainzebra2516]

I was worried about the siren character but apparently it's not Ava thank God

[@damagedears5725]

People stressing about how a character looks in an FPS is baffling. I’ll reserve my judgement for their abilities because that is what really matters.

[@PringleHQ]

watch everyone just use the siren... again

[@inkedvillan80]

Always my first character since day 1 on bl1 lol

[@underrated3143]

You can either mod in to make the vault hunters look better by changing the mesh Or Gearbox hardcoding the game where it's impossible to do this.

[@ViCT0RiA6]

why does the mech girl look like an unlocked character they should brighten up her clothes

[@CelticAdobo]

Wasn’t able to catch the Game Awards and didn’t hear any buzz for BL4 so when I saw the the Big Guy the next day it didn’t register we had a new game until a couple days after when I saw the Siren in the full line up. I think on top of the casual attire it’s the use of muted colors in the designs that don’t really make them stand out. For the most part the Vault Hunters have colors that popped even if it wasn’t the crux of their palette. Like even though Sal just wore a t-shirt the safety orange coloring made him stand out. Looking at Moze and her generic soldier, she has Vladof Red incorporated into her look along with the off yellow on her pants. But yeah, the VHs of 4 really need a better use of color on top of their outfits needing function mixed with indicators of the characters history.

[@glitchygamer4666]

tbh as a long time borderlands fan the character's themes don't bother me that much, I'm definitely excited to see what the big guy and siren do alongside the lore of the world i pray we see fiona again along with everyone else oh and of course wanna see how the psychos clans adapted after tyreen death

[@jgriff-uc2xe]

I want to see some of the customization we'll get. Itd be neat to get skins that did more than change colors around and that can make me look past a boring default design.

[@Spore_Spawn]

My main criticism of the new vault hunters is the lack of distinction between them. The aesthetic of all 4 designs is cyberpunk so it makes them look uninteresting. Now look at the 4 previous main series games, each vault hunter has their own distinct aesthetic within their own roster. BL1 Roland-Military Mordecai-Mexican Wrestling Lilith-(as much as I hate to say it)-Hot Chick Brick-Buff BL2 Maya-Dancer Salvador-Redneck Axton-Military Gaige-Punk Rock Zer0-Assassin Krieg-Psycho BLtPS Athena-Military Claptrap-Himself Wilhelm-cyborg Aurelia-Refined Elegance Nisha-Cowboy Timothy-Hansom Jack BL3 Moze-Military Amara-Steet Punk Zane-Spy FL4K-Robot/Mountain Man In each of the previous games the Vault Hunters were visually distinct from one another within their own respective rosters, with BL4 however there aren't. They all look like they could be NPCs from Cyberpunk 2077.

[@twinodoom]

Borderlands seems to put more effort into designing NPCs than playable characters.

[@gringomoderfoquer8287]

Come to think of it, the lack of an alien/robot character skewed our view a lot. Imagine if the guy on the left or the girl on the right where replaced by a robot, no one would even complain. Tho the theory or the girl on the right being a Traunt makes me excited to find out, and I'm starting to like the seemingly chill vibe of the left dude

[@connorboyle3746]

I think you nailed it with the fact that the trailer really told us next to nothing about these characters. I will say when comparing to BL1, that game deserves some slack for just how late in the development the art style was changed and it being the first in the franchise still trying to workout what the franchise even is. I do hope I warm up to these characters when we find out more information but yes the trailer left them feeling boring

[@raimeihakke6552]

Okay so you clearly don't actually understand or want to understand the problem? It's not just that the character designs are boring. Which they definitely are Don't get me wrong. But it's also the fact that they look like NPCs in their own game. In borderlands 1 Everyone kinda looked like that lol. Borderlands 2 and 3 and the presequel did not have this problem. Outside of Rolan and Ashton potentially we never looked at Any of the main characters and question if they were actually main characters. Yet that is the resounding sentiment for this game.

[@SmoreDragon]

Person on the Far Right of the Shot....Looks like Discount Lucio

[@naytny5819]

The problem with the BL1 comparison is that BL4 is the 4th game in the series and our standards for the designs after the great ones we got in 2 through 3. Borderlands 1 is also a more dark and gritty game compared to vibrance of the sequels so there designs fit the deserted wasteland.

[@CtrlAltCreate92]

Also (fingers crossed) if they go hard on the customization then that problem will fix it

[@raymondbermudez555]

I wonder if the siren will have Tyreen's powers?🤔🤔🤔

[@mrquackadoodlemoo]

Here's what I noticed in the character reveal. Only two of them looks like a character, at that's the big, jacked dude and the girl with tattoos, but you don't see any powers. The rest look like designs thrown from an NPC randomiser. Big, jacked dude is obviously the strong, melee guy. Evident from being 8' tall and looking like he could fist fight Bane. The Siren looks like a Siren because of the Tattoos, but we see nothing Siren-y about her. All she does is fire a gun. but the rest just look like people. Looking at Borderlands 2's vault hunters, you can get a sense of what they were: Zer0 was sleek, thin, and carried a blade: therefore he is a ninja-y stealth guy. Most likely melee oriented. Maya was a woman with freaky powers: therefore, she is the Siren. Salvador is a short dude who dual wielded guns: therefore, he must be the guy more dialed into using guns than the rest. And Axton looked like a soldier (no shit): therefore, he must be good with AR's and explosives. Going back to the Siren. If she didn't have the tattoos, she would be like the other two, who we barely saw anything of. Even the Octavio lookalike had SOMETHING, with the tech and blades. We aren't wondering "dude what! What was that! I wanna play that!" because we didn't see anything worth playing. If I ever bought 4, right now all I would play is the big, jacked dude because it's obvious what he is; a big, jacked dude who will beat the shit out of people.

[@camronfox6636]

Only the soldier class and assassin class look similar, the rest i could pick out the same as any other borderlands. Also a more generic look could fit with a multi-class skill system, which I'm guessing is what we're gonna get. Matches a jack of all trades vibe.

[@Akuma12366]

While the trailer didn’t build hype for the playable characters I’m hoping devs for the game are seeing this reaction and will hopefully hit us with some of the most stand out personalities or even customization ever seen, I’ll be huffin the copium til then but I’m hopin we get some character trailers for them within 2025

[@emanuelemanuel7038]

Did we all just conveniently forget all the alternate bodies and heads we get on top of the hundreds of skins, this is obviously how they look at white rarity tier 1. This isn't how they'll look always. As you play, you'll get more and more ways to change up the look, even a totally different character model. Beyond that, they'll grow on everyone just as every muted character always has, imo these are the most stand out vaulthunters in terms of design, they just need a pallet shift and a proper character trailer. Let's be real they've always been meh and we've always loved them for more than how they appear.

[@sobitoa5761]

i agree i dont know what people want from those new vault hunters, they do look as good/bad as the other ones, if we wanted them to look flashy we always could do that by customization. I dont think this will be different in b4

[@dangdudedan8756]

the character on the far right is by far the best design for a member of a squad of characters personally. i think she is supposed to come off as the most normal character, but since everyone else is so normal, she just fits in with everyone. i think they're trying to get her to contrast as a nerd or geek. maybe a gun nut. everyone else looks like an npc i would find standing around sanctuary 3 doing nothing, maybe leaning against a wall. the woman on the right looks like she would be a great alternative for ellie or maybe markus in sanctuary 3. she doesn't look like a vault hunter but she looks the most important and distinct than the rest of the hunters.

[@Twitser666]

Yo just a speculation, but based on their looks and what you said about how the scientist wears lab coats like the one the siren has on, it makes me wonder if all 4 of them are actually vault hunters and scientist or engineers, it would match up with how each of them look rather high tech even the big guy. Like i could totes see the siren being like a goth hacker type chick with her style. Ex engineer for the one on the far right makes sense as well beyond the Maliwan looking outfit, she gives off mechanic type vibes maybe she will have turrets or summon robots to aid in combat. The one on the far left is obviously some sort of tech expert as well maybe he deals more in holograms or something similar to that for his face shield and blades i could see also him being the cocky ninja type. The big muscle guy i could see being either the smartest scientist of the bunch with some high level degrees maybe military related stuff, or i could also see him being the low tech one that is like a one man mining crew.

[@tatocancelled7186]

It’s a mute criticism considering you’ll be able to customize them.

[@thewanderingartists]

And has this "customisation" been confirmed?? It is in Tiny tina because the theme is like fairytale or something so character customisation makes sense

[@tatocancelled7186]

Well it’s been in every game so I don’t see why not? Even the first game was given an update to do so, while limited to a few head types.

[@monkeydetonation]

ehhh I think it's less about knowing your character looks cool when you're playing them, and more about whether or not you're enticed play those characters, and if they have enough of an identity to be memorable

[@arithedragon6198]

Hotest of takes: I think the characters actually look really good. I was a little disappointed at first, but I think people are dragging it out WAY too much, and making it a bigger deal than it should be. I actually really like the characters as they are right now, and think they deserve more of a chance to show their stuff, before people shit on them.

[@Untolddead]

Honestly, I think most people are getting burned out on the cyberpunk esthetic. It feels like most AAA game recently has been some dystopian/utopian future world. It kind of reminds me of when every game was zombie and people got tired of it.

[@OG-SAN56]

Because of the current state of gaming rn (if ykyk), people are more apprehensive than ever. The gaming industry lacks transparency, and this trailer is just making people more hesitant than they already are.

[@predatron4197]

Don't know if you caught this but the siren might be artificial. In some shots, she's missing her tattoos and the little canisters/ vials on her left wrist. Those vials probably give her powers.