In Part 4 of the Awards/Shopping Guide, Leveling Down will be tackling some of the more controversial categories: Best Story, Best Value, and Most Overrated. Admittedly, these categories are VERY subjective and are only our opinions, and on some counts even espion4ge and I don’t see *exactly* eye to eye. Nonetheless, controversy is a lot of fun, so might as well give it a shot!
One of the Xbox 360′s strongest features compared to other consoles is its multiplayer gameplay, which can probably be attributed to the Live infrastructure. It is thus not surprisingly to see strong multiplayer games on this system. For today’s awards, I will be discussing the best multiplayer games released this year, and the one better than the rest.
I will also be discussing the best new IP and best sequel of the year. It’s good to see that in 2009, there were nearly an equal number of good new IPs and sequels. The moment we begin seeing only sequels releasing and new IPs no longer developed is the moment the game industry stops advancing. It’s easy to support sequels since you know what you’re getting yourself into, but this year was perhaps the year with the largest number of development studios shutting down. Continue to take a chance by supporting new IPs – the developers need this type of support to stay in business and come up with new and exciting games to push our industry forward!
It’s that time of the year again…as 2009 draws to a close and the holiday season is upon us, cmfl3x and I decided that we wanted to do our own “Leveling Down” gaming awards for 2009 where we choose winners in several categories for Xbox 360 games that have been released in 2009. At the same time, we also wanted to preserve the holiday shopping guide that Leveling Down produced last year but felt that the awards and the shopping guide were too similar.
Instead of separate 2009 awards and holiday shopping guide posts, we’ve decided to combine them this year into one. Every game we’ve nominated within our awards are games worth considering for the holidays, but at the same time, we’re also declaring the winner. Consider the awards as, if you can only buy one game from the nominees of the category, buy the winner. But if you are further interested in other games from the category, you should definitely pick them up as well as they have aspects that all make them worth considering. Game boxes have been provided for all nominees, and all of them link to Amazon, our gaming retailer of the year due to not only their ridiculous gaming deals, but their constant vigilance in price matching practically all competitors.
Our 2009 awards/shopping guide will span all week, with cmfl3x and me alternating posts and writing about a few categories each day. This will culminate on Friday when we both share our own nominations for Game of the Year, and our picks for Game of the Year. I will kick things off today with three categories: 2009′s Best Fighting Game, Best Role Playing Game, and Best First Person Shooter for the Xbox 360.
While this review may seem to have arrived somewhat late, cmfl3x and I recently agreed on an article writing system here at Leveling Down that differentiates between impressions and reviews. Going forward, please keep in mind that when we write “impressions” articles, it means we’ve played a bit into the game, and are therefore writing what our initial impressions are. Reviews, meanwhile, will only be named as such when we want to write about a game that we’ve completed already so we’ve fully realized what the game has to offer. Often times if we come out with impressions for a game first and do not put out a review later, it implies that our initial impressions carried through the rest of the game and it wasn’t necessary to “set the record straight” by writing a review of the game after completing it. Borderlands doesn’t quite fall into the category of being exactly the super awesome game I professed it to be in my initial impressions, and so I want to follow up on it with this review now that I’ve collected the 1000 Achievement points.
Playing as a Siren is a lot of fun since her phasewalk ability is a great super!
I’ve never played an MMO. I don’t know what it means to “Ding!” a level. I’ve never been too into getting “loot”. So when espion4ge starting peer pressuring me to get Borderlands, I wasn’t really buying. But with all the positive press out there, and my friends all going nuts about the game, I decided to give it a shot, and figured I’d might as well write about it. So – was it worth it?
Well, to keep this short: the jury’s out. Borderlands is a great game, but it definitely hasn’t gripped me like it has the rest of my friends list. I keep thinking about Modern Warfare 2, and even played a game of Halo Wars the other day. I definitely see how the game is addicting: it’s fun to turn in quests, to level up and to trick out my character (I’m playing as a Siren) in a way that suits my playstyle. It is very satisfying to phasewalk and burn a bunch of bandits up in the process.
At the same time, I find Borderlands a lot less fun to play by myself. I spend most of my solo time just getting to a point where I can play with others. The game isn’t really fun to me unless everyone is at around the same level, so I’ve spent time on my own to level up to a point where I can play with my friends. That being said, going on missions with friends is a lot of fun, and the enemies definitely drop more interesting loot. I really dig playing this game with friends, and if some of your friends are playing it you should definitely consider picking it up. I’m just not sure I’ll still be playing it when (Ding!) Modern Warfare 2 comes out, but I guess I’ll find out next week!
So you picked up Borderlands and want to play with other people but don’t know where to start? Unlike other FPS games on the 360 with co-op, Borderlands requires you to pick a class type and sticking with it through to the end. Therefore, picking the one that best suits your playstyle is vital.
In many ways, Borderlands shares similarities to MMORPGs I’ve played in the past, and I will bring some of those tips here to those of you new to Borderlands with little experience playing MMORPGs. Look here for some tips on how to play nicely with strangers or even friends.
One caveat: I have yet to really get to the endgame for this, so many of my tips here are from my MMORPG experience as well as consolidating all of the relevant Borderlands information I found online. Some of it may apply and some may not, but this is what is going through my head as I prep for Borderlands with buddies.
In my last entry about Borderlands, I made the decision to cancel my pre-order due to the fact that the item management system in the game turned out to be terrible. However, the game did have aspects that I was interested in, and with Best Buy running a Buy 2 Get 1 free sale on all console games $59.99 or less, I bit. (For those wondering, my 3 games ended up being Borderlands, Fallout: GotY Edition, and Brutal Legend.)
Anyway, on to Borderlands. Barring the issues with the item system that made me cancel my pre-order in the first place (no trading window, a lack of unique developer designed items, no loot rules, etc.), the game is fantastic in every other aspect and definitely recommended. I came to terms with accepting that I would play this game more for the action/RPG experience, and not to be a lootwhore. After all, people have already figured out a way to easily dupe items on the 360 version, so no real sense in coveting gear because it can all be shared anyway. My new goal in the game is to reach 50 with each of the 4 classes, but with Modern Warfare 2 and Left 4 Dead 2 on the horizon, reaching 50 with one class is probably more practical.
So what is Borderlands and why am I really digging it? The main reason I’m enjoying it is because it combines aspects of several top tier games. When I first started playing it I thought to myself, “Wow, Borderlands is like the current generation’s Phantasy Star Online.” Phantasy Star Online was an addictive online action-RPG that was released originally on the Dreamcast, but also found success on the Gamecube and Xbox due to its online play. People had to pay monthly fees to play it, but you joined up with several other players online and went through dungeons and quests together killing enemies to level up and find cool loot.
Borderlands preserves the most enjoyable aspects of Phantasy Star Online: the social aspect of the game – allowing for up to four players to play together with enemy difficulty scaling and better treasures dropping. At the same time, Borderlands implements a well-designed quest system that is not unlike soloing in World of Warcraft or practically any online MMORPG these days. I for one loved to solo in World of Warcraft, doing quest chain after quest chain since you were always rewarded with loot and experience. Borderlands implements the quest chain system superbly as well, and I can’t help but reminisce about WoW questing when I play Borderlands.
Tying the package together is the sound FPS system of the game. Surprisingly, the FPS mechanics in the game work very well. Fallout 3′s FPS mechanics were kind of hokey, but Borderlands is very intuitive because not only are there understandable statistics on weapons like accuracy and kickback on a weapon, but the control system is basically the Call of Duty 4 system. Fans of Call of Duty 4 will be right at home in playing this game and aiming for headshots. It can very much be played as a FPS game so it should appeal to action gamers as well.
For those of you that have yet to experience such addictive online RPG games such as World of Warcraft and Phantasy Star Online, surely you must have experienced the addictive nature of Call of Duty 4′s leveling up and challenges. Borderlands is like that (it has its own set of challenges that provide extra exp) but now throw in 4-player online co-op and tons of new weapons to find and share and you have a game that you can play with friends for many, many hours.
In summary, I can forgive Borderlands’ poor item system because all the other aspects of the game are just so well done and enjoyable. I even forgot to mention the amount of humor present in the game, as it doesn’t quite take itself so seriously and makes the game even more amiable. I recommend the game to anyone that was a fan of any of the action-RPG games that I’ve mentioned above, or even FPS fans that want to play a game where the emphasis is on co-op and not adversarial. Pick it up today for yourself and 2 friends, with Best Buy running the Buy 2 Get 1 free sale and let me know if you want to play co-op. I’m soloing for now, but would love to find some people to play it with – after all, I’m going to have to since people don’t really share loot in public games…
I’m somewhat sad to say this, but I have decided to cancel my Borderlands pre-order. After learning more about the game, I’m disappointed to discover that it is not going to be a day 1 purchase for me. I thought that this game was going to be Diablo + Fallout 3 with co-op, but it falls very short on the most important end: the Diablo part.
The reasons for its downfall?
1. Millions of randomly generated guns
Marketing and advertising are pushing this as a selling feature, but the biggest drawback that comes out of this is that there is a very minimal amount of unique, non randomly-generated items. For Diablo players, we loved finding Set Items and Unique Items – I did boss runs and planned my characters over specific item drops and loot tables. And the best thing about unique “non-generated” items is that when someone else sees you with it, they know right away you have an awesome weapon. Millions of randomly generated guns means everyone is running around with some random gun so there’s no real sense in a better item – just what you prefer. I couldn’t care less for the yellow items in Diablo with all the random modifiers. Give me something that everyone can respect and actually want!
2. FFA looting
Diablo II was released nearly 10 years ago, and the looting was free-for-all. That meant when a boss died, all the items it dropped just appeared in a pile near its corpse so everyone would inch close as it got close to dying and click whatever they could get like kids going after candy from a broken pinata. It didn’t matter if you couldn’t use the item – you knew someone who could, or you could use it for an alt, or you could trade it for an item you could use, etc. It was barbaric and there was a lot of arguments that ensued over item drops.
Since then, multiplayer action RPGs and even MMORPG’s, have dealt with FFA looting in two ways: rolling for loot in some way or another, or having the item drops from a boss only show up for each particular player. The second option meant that whatever you saw drop was yours – and no one else could see it (Diablo 3 will implement this system). Unfortunately, the developers of Borderlands are still back in the stone-ages and actually take some sadistic delight in seeing Borderlands players fight over loot. Their argument is not to play with loot-stealers, and not to worry about it at all because there are plenty of drops to go around (yeah, right…I’m sure there’s plenty of epic drops to go around -_-). What if you play as the sniper class in Borderlands though? It means you’re further away than anyone else, so the only way you’ll actually be able to get item drops is if the people you play with let you get the items. In any case, this practically closes off public online games since no one needs to really care about anyone other than themself in public matches.
3. No Trading Window
I don’t understand what Gearbox was thinking when they made this game. A number of people considering buying this game are Diablo fans who want to play a FPS-based loot game. Loot is the center of this game! So it boggles my mind why Gearbox decided to not put in a trading window in the game. This means two separate players will have to each drop an item, and then run to the other item to perform a trade. And what happens if one player tries to cheat the other by dropping something stupid? It’s a train wreck all around. In their defense, the developers stated that if it was a heavily requested feature, they would put it into the game via a patch. That’s great, but what does it mean to be heavily requested? Anyone that even is interested in a game like this would want a trade window…
What’s hard to believe that is that while Too Human was critically panned, from a functional standpoint it worked. The actual gameplay could have been better, and there could have been more unique drops instead of randomly generated crap, but at least in Too Human you could set loot distribution rules and there was a trade window. I hate to say it, but Gearbox should have actually taken notes from the way Too Human handled loot. In any case, I’m saying goodbye to my pre-order for Borderlands. Diablo III can’t come soon enough…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDSRdp6Ar3M]
This game has been on my radar for a while now, but with new footage coming out lately, I’m more excited than before. I’ve always been a big Diablo fan, and after playing games like Sacred, Titan’s Quest, and even Hellgate: London, I’ve never played another loot-based game that’s nearly as good. Phantasy Star Online comes close, but it was ruined by hacking and had a monthly fee.
Borderlands is apparently inventing a new genre the development team is dubbing “RPS”, mashing FPS mechanics with action/rpg lootwhoring. Throw in 4-player online co-op, and it has the potential to play like a combination of Fallout 3 + Left 4 Dead (without the zombies) - two of the biggest games of last year. If this game is as good as I hope it turns out, I will end up nagging my buddies to all get it like I always do.
One of the potential issues I have with the game right now is that Gearbox is claiming that Borderlands can randomly generate thousands of different weapon drops. While that may sound interesting for some, what I care about most (and what will give the game “Diablo” like longevity) is for there to be a healthy amount of unique and set weapons that are not randomly generated along with a marketplace for trading them. For the Diablo players out there, I want the gold and green items to exist in this game and not just thousands of yellow ones! The second potential issue I see is how will multiplayer be handled? Will all of our characters and their info be kept on the server, and if so, how will that be done without incurring a monthly fee? I don’t want to have to play off of some guy’s savefile like Marvel Ultimate Alliance. Gearbox will have an exciting game on their hands if everything is done right. Please don’t mess up!