The Christian Rationalist: Game Review--Borderlands 2 (PS Vita)

Friday, February 15, 2019

Game Review--Borderlands 2 (PS Vita)

"I see our fearless leader Jack is looking for you. Charming fellow, isn't he? Spouts drivel about "bringing peace to the frontier," then shoots unarmed men, women, and children like it was going out of style. Bah--I'm spouting exposition again, aren't I? Apologies!"
--Sir Hammerlock, Borderlands 2

"Minion, what have you done? These were human beings, with lives, and families, and--ah, totally kidding! Screw those guys!"
--Claptrap, Borderlands 2

--"I RESENT YOU FOR DISLIKING A GAME I SPENT MONEY ON! TIME TO DIE!"
--Mister Torgue, Borderlands 2: Mr. Torgue's Campaign of Carnage

Crafted with a level of thematic and philosophical sophistication that some might find highly surprising, Borderlands 2 is a masterpiece of cleverness and originality. The PS Vita version is marred by some visual and audio problems, but the fact that the entire main game and six DLC add-ons were ported to the Vita is still an admirable achievement in itself. While the primary campaign sees the player's Vault Hunter assist the Resistance with its fight against the hyper-sadistic corporatist villain Handsome Jack, the two DLC campaigns provide more great writing and worldbuilding that can be experienced alongside or after the main story. The replayability, gameplay depth, comedy, intellectual themes, and atmosphere of Borderlands 2 are each outstanding accomplishments on their own, but the combination of these elements easily makes the game one of the greatest to be released up to this point.

Production Values

At its best, Borderlands 2, despite being an early PS Vita game, shows that the system is entirely capable of running enormous console games. The colors are vibrant, the open world is vast, and the voice acting is excellent. At its worst, the game might anger a lot of players: glitches will sporadically cause the game to freeze or crash which can be especially frustrating when you never had the opportunity to save new collectibles you've acquired. Minor glitches like textures that take a while to appear don't impact the actual gameplay, but the presence of multiple enemies can be accompanied by dramatic slowdown for about 30-90 seconds at a time. When it does run smoothly, it can be a gorgeous game, though!

Gameplay

The gameplay is an effective mixture of first-person shooter and RPG elements, showcasing just how well the two genre categories can fuse together. While shooting is a major aspect of the gameplay, there are numerous opportunities to complete side quests to gain experience points, obtain new weaponry, and explore the demented world of Pandora. There are several character classes to choose from when starting a new campaign, all of which have their own particular strengths. The Mechromancer, which I have spent the majority of my time playing as, can summon a powerful robot named Deathtrap, whose level increases, thus increasing its health and damage, when the Mechromancer levels up. I found this class to be one of the most useful. After all, Deathtrap can save the Mechromancer from death by helping the player obtain a Second Wind, which is a last stand mechanic that allows players to revive themselves after losing all health by quickly killing an enemy.

Other classes are useful as well, though! The Siren can use telekinesis to hold an enemy's body in the air, the Gunzerker can dual wield any two weapons, and the Commando can place a turret on the battlefield, to list just three examples. In fact, Borderlands 2 provides incentives for players to create multiple characters through the Badass Token system. Players earn Badass Tokens by completing certain objectives like killing a specific number of enemies of a certain type, buying items from particular sellers, using various weapons, and discovering hidden emblems. Badass Tokens can be spent on upgrades of a miniscule scale that apply to all characters, which can be toggled on and off. While every save file shares the same pool of tokens and thus new files always allow for the acquisition of more tokens, it becomes more difficult to earn subsequent tokens, as the rewards are subject to diminishing returns.

New areas are populated with enemies that approximately match one's current level, but the enemies do not normally increase their level when the player backtracks. Bosses often provide a generous amount of XP, but quests rapidly become the only way to consistently level up. The good news is that there are many quests. In my most recent file, I completed more than 100 story and side missions, with at least around others active or findable, and I have not even completed the primary campaign yet. Despite being so long, the game is very replayable due to the quality of the gameplay, characterization, and Badass Token system.

Story

Spoilers!

On the planet Pandora, the exceptionally cruel and selfish Handsome Jack, leader of the Hyperion Corporation, continually makes progress towards discovering a Vault--something that turns out to be a living creature that will obey whoever awakens it. Vault Hunters have independently attempted to discover the Vault, not realizing that it is an organism, not a weapons cache. One of them is left out in the snowy landscape after seemingly being killed by Handsome Jack's forces, but a robot named Claptrap finds and educates the Vault Hunter.

A rebel group has gathered in the city of Sanctuary to hide from Jack's tyranny, and Claptrap helps lead the Vault Hunter to the headquarters of the Resistance. The player's character both helps protect the Resistance from Hyperion and carries out offensive tasks that culminate in the death of Handsome Jack after he finds the Vault. In the two DLCs included with the Vita edition, the player's Vault Hunter travels to the town of Oasis and launches a search for a grand treasure guarded by a massive Leviathan, in addition to fighting his/her way through gladiatoral matches in the Badass Crater of Badassitude. The add-ons provide hours more of storytelling and worldbuilding!

Intellectual Content

Persistent jokes about serious ethical, epistemological, and metaphysical issues only highlight the actual seriousness of the subjects referenced in Borderlands 2. This is one of the only games I know of that weaves pop culture references (for instance, a Badass Token challenge called "Game of Thorns" clearly alludes to Game of Thrones and a mission description involving a box references the "What's in the box?" scene from Se7en) together with an absurdist atmosphere while still taking the care to not completely trivialize any of it.

One mission sees a character argue that epistemological solipsism exempts him from being guilty of theft, since he has no memory of the event and he claims that nothing can be known for sure other than the contents of one's mind. Both epistemological and metaphysical solipsism are false and can be refuted with absolute certainty, since a variety of things--the laws of logic, space, time, one's body, and the external world--can be proven to exist [1]. In fact, two of the aforementioned things exist by pure necessity in the absence of all other things [2], a fact overlooked or denied by every historically renowned philosopher I know of.

In another set of side missions, the player investigates a cult that worships one of the non-playable characters as a goddess, calling her the Firehawk. The humor is derived from the fact that the Firehawk is the one who sends you to learn about the cult, but the cult leader continues to claim that she appeared to him in a dream and that he can feel her satisfaction. While you are never able to definitively disprove his claims, it is made clear that the evidence is completely against the veracity of this religion. Religious epistemology is handled with the same clever writing as conservative morality, which is parodied in a series of DLC side quests given by "Censorbot."

The player conducts murders in order to appease Censorbot, whose conservative moral beliefs motivate him to have you kill another robot for possessing sexually explicit materials, kill a group of pirates for software piracy, and kill a DJ for using profanity on the air. Ironically, none of these things are sinful by Biblical standards on their own (Deuteronomy 4:2), but many conservative theologians might regard them as heinous! Censorbot even acknowledges that Pandora is filled with murder, theft, and cannibalism before saying that the children of Pandora are safe from profanity--which parodies the asinine tendency for conservatives to villify amoral or innocent practices while ignoring grave moral issues. Moments like this exemplify just how real Borderlands 2's humor can be!

Conclusion

Despite being plagued by several fairly major glitches, the Vita edition of Borderlands 2 is one of the best handheld games available, which is no surprise, considering that it is a port of one of the greatest games of all time. It would be easy for some players to invest more than 50 hours into the game, not only because the gameplay and characterization are excellent, but because some features carry over from one save file to another. These features serve as incentives that make subsequent playthroughs far easier. Even if someone only plays through Borderlands 2's main story one time, they will still be able to experience the exceptionally unique humor, characters, and weapons the planet Pandora offers.

Content:
1. Violence: Enemy deaths can involve a lot of blood. In addition to the physical violence, many characters make ironic or unironic jokes about various violent activities.
2. Profanity: Though some of the "profanity" used by certain characters is either beeped out or comprised of words that are only (as far as I know) profanity in the Borderlands universe, words like "shit" and "damn" are used.
3. Sexuality: There are various sexual innuendos made throughout the game, particularly by a character named Moxxi.