Rock, Paper, Shotgun

The latest Borderlands 2 video reveals the sad plight of Krieg, the playable psycho character whose troubled mind you can enter for $9.99. Disconcertingly, Krieg’s inner monologue reveals him to be a thoughtful and frustrated individual. The words that come out of his mouth – words like ‘poop train’ and ‘meat bicycle’ – do not reflect his thoughts, suggesting there has been a breakdown between brain and mouth. Or between brain and other parts of brain. It’s a bit like the time I approached a bar and inadvertently ordered a pint of Carling even though I wanted a beer. You’ll undoubtedly recognise some parallel to your own life when you press play, below.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tomorrow will see the release of another Borderlands 2 playable character, this time hailing from the howling cast of its deranged bandit antagonists. Krieg The Psycho – whose scenery-gnawing behaviours can be seen below in a video I borrowed from VG247 – is a character who is supposed to emulate all of the absurdly dangerous attack actions the bandits perform in Borderlands 2. So expect to run screaming toward your enemy with a big rusty sharp thing, while on fire. Being on fire, of course, is central to his skill tree. Not sure if that will be worth $10, but I will probably take a look tomorrow and see.
Read the rest of this entry »

Did Sega and Gearbox create a false impression of the final quality of Aliens: Colonial Marines? That’s now a legal matter, for lawyers to battlerap about and judges to scorecard (lawsuits are much more entertaining in my head). Multi-faceted games site Polygon has obtained a lawsuit that was filed yesterday, claiming that both companies falsely advertised their troubled Alien troubler, showing off demos to the public that were unrepresentative of the released game.
Read the rest of this entry »

Seems unlikely, but it is apparently true. The rumour that the announcement would be today turned out to be actuality! The Borderlands developer said: “Brian Martel, Gearbox Software’s Chief Creative Officer, has great love and respect for Relic’s brilliant, fun and innovative game and personally spearheaded the acquisition. Brian intends as first priority to direct Gearbox’s interest to preserve and assemble the purest form of the original acclaimed and beloved games, Homeworld and Homeworld 2, with the intent of making them accessible on today’s leading digital platforms.”

So that’s a remake or re-release. But what about that sequel? Gearbox have opened discussion on their forums.

IGN carry the news that Gearbox are raising the level cap in Borderlands 2, and adding a new difficulty mode and item tier. There is also a short video showing the latest Vault Hunter murdering bandits – he’s a psycho by the name of Krieg. The level cap will be raised to 61, the new mode scales monsters to the highest level in your party and the item tier provides ultra-rare pearlescent gear. That all makes sense, but the prices and distribution are slightly more confusing. The new difficulty mode is free to all but the level cap rise costs $4.99, unless you’re a season pass holder in which case it’s free. Kriege isn’t included in the season pass though and will cost around $10. You can see him below.

Read the rest of this entry »

Seeing that Gearbox have put out a 3.8GB patch for their rather woeful Aliens: Colonial Marines makes me feel like a nurse in a hospital drama, the one who sadly, calmly puts an hand on the shoulder of a crying, screaming doctor who’s desperately trying to resucitate an expired patient he thought he could save. “It’s no good,” I would say. “It’s over.” Then we’d have a hug and a cry, and maybe a slice of cake. Only I don’t think it’s possible to hug an entire game development studio, and I don’t know whether Randy Pitchford likes cake or not.
Read the rest of this entry »

OK, everyone’s probably bored of this by now, but if you’re still wondering just how the makers of Borderlands 2 could get Aliens: Colonial Marines so very wrong, more has emerged.
Read the rest of this entry »

Aliens: Colonial Marines got 99 problems, and looking like it’s from 2005 is one of them. Which is mystifying, given that recent in-game footage clearly showed that a more attractive version of the game did/does exist somewhere. God only knows why they’d put so much effort into a game whose lone memorable achievement is taking as long to develop as Half-Life 2 did, but modders have been busily trying to make Gearbox/Timegate’s mess look a little more as though it was released this decade.
Read the rest of this entry »

Edit – Sega Senior Producer Matthew J. Powers has said of this allegation that “Absolutely not, the game has been developed by Gearbox Software. Other studios [like Timegate] helped Gearbox on the production of single and multiplayer.” Which doesn’t really clear anything up, but there you go.

By almost all accounts, Aliens: Colonial Marines, released this week, is a trainwreck. And not one of those cool trainwrecks with explosions, collapsing bridges and men in awesome hats leaping to safety at the last second. Instead it sounds like a sad, slow, drift off the edge of the track, toppling gracelessly onto its side and making a limp ‘pffffffffffffffffff’ noise. Mister John Walker will be along either later today or tomorrow to confirm or deny this, but in the meantime let’s have a confusing look at the Gearbox shooter’s odd gestation. I say ‘Gearbox shooter’, but it rather sounds as though other studios did the heavy lifting.
Read the rest of this entry »