Borderlands 4 review for PC, PS5, Xbox Series X

Years have gone by since the release of Borderlands 3 and it seems that the community’s opinions on it are less than stellar. The writing was notably the largest offender. Borderlands 3 suffered from horrid “how do you do, fellow kids” adjacent writing with villains so hilariously terrible it would almost make you think it’s a bad parody. Borderlands and Borderlands 2 seem to be regarded as the best in the series, so fans, including myself, were eager for Borderlands 4 to tone down the stupidity and improve the writing.

Thankfully, it seems like Borderlands 4 has mostly improved on 3’s failures while introducing a whole new bunch of problems that may or may not get addressed in future patches or game releases.

Since I’ve mentioned the writing first, that’s what we’ll tackle first. Borderlands 4 takes a more serious approach to the story. It introduces a powerful cult leader called the “Timekeeper” who effectively mind controls the populace to follow his ideals and goals. This antagonist isn’t making terrible jokes, constantly referencing things from streamer culture, and actually feels like a threat. He seemingly already has control of most of the planet, so we’ll be meeting people revolting against his rule and trying to break free of their chains. Instead of the constant harassment with dumb titles like “Superfan” and other internet slang, the Timekeeper is more annoyed that you keep sabotaging him and his plans.

Now, that’s not to say the game doesn’t have any humor or jokes or anything of the sort. You’ll still have plenty of humor, because it’s Borderlands, but it’s better written and more delegated to side content and passive dialogue from characters while you’re doing the actual story content. We’re also seemingly free from the prison of Borderlands 3’s characters. There are returners, but it’s very, very few and far between. It’s incredibly refreshing to play Borderlands 4 and engage with its writing compared to the dumpster fire that was 3.

Borderlands 4’s gameplay compliments having better writing as well. Granted, if you read anything from a certain head of the studio, you might not think it was all that great or enticing. Luckily, you can ignore that and know that the game feels great and the new Vault Hunters are all fantastic. Amon the Forgeknight, Vex the Witch, Rafi the Exo-Soldier, and Harlowe the Gravitar are all excellent characters. Naturally, they’re fun to listen to when they banter as well. The build variety isn’t too different from Borderlands 3’s multiple action skills, with each tree within each skill having its own modifiers you can equip to further change how your abilities behave. I for one rather appreciate Amon summoning floating axes.

The guns of Borderlands 4 are simultaneously really cool and fun, but they also lack the charm and randomization of the guns from the first two titles. Each manufacturer has such a specific gimmick that you’re basically locked to specific guns if you want certain elemental affinities or bonuses. I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s a negative, as you can pick up a new piece of equipment that has extra bonuses for using certain weapon manufacturers. Do you have Vladof weapons in your backpack? Well now they have larger magazines, shoot faster, and reload faster, just to give an example of the kinds of things you can expect. In a weird way, it sorta makes up for some shortcomings of some of the weapon types you’ll come across.

I think the largest confusion I have with Borderlands 4 is the change to a fully open world. Now, don’t get me wrong, it is really neat, but it really feels like the world is bland and lacking uniqueness. When we had separate loading zones at the time, mostly due to hardware limitations I would imagine, each area felt relatively unique and well crafted. Borderlands 4’s open world isn’t lacking in content per se, but it really does feel like a generic world without that Borderlands feel to it. Combine that with a UI that looks super generic and without the art style, I’d wonder if someone that isn’t familiar with the franchise could tell you it was Borderlands. I’d like to hope that future content or future games will take a bit more care in crafting areas so it doesn’t wind up feeling like a world from any other open world game.

Loot drops are also toned back at the desire of the community, so legendary-tier weapons really do feel special. Borderlands 4 returns to the farming methodology from Borderlands 2, giving players a reason to revisit bosses and blitz them down again and again. Every third enemy you turn into meatballs won’t explode with orange rarity drops. There’s even a sidequest to give you a taste of what kinds of legendaries you might be interested in for those that are willing to find and complete it.

It would be dishonest of me not to mention the massive elephant in the room with Borderlands 4, however. I reviewed this game on the PC version via Steam. We’ve all seen the comments online since launch, and unfortunately I can’t say they’re incorrect. The performance of this game is abysmal on PC, even if you’re rocking top of the line hardware. For reference, my computer boasts a 9070XT, a 7800x3D, and 32GB of DDR5 memory. Despite this, even medium settings require frame generation to be enabled to get a framerate above 60 on a 1440p resolution/display. As of this writing, there have been two patches released to target improving performance, which is at least a decent positive.

Despite subpar performance, a strange lack of identity, and the PR disaster Borderlands 4 has been garnering online, it really is a fun game with an engaging story full of fun and interesting characters. The negatives around the game really do weigh on it, of course, but when you can really sink your teeth into the meat and potatoes, Borderlands 4 is genuinely one of the most fun, if not the most fun, entry in the series so far. The guns feel amazing, the game hasn’t compromised its art style (just the world feel), the Vault Hunters feel fantastic, and the writing is great, but I’ll be damned if those issues don’t weigh down on it. It’s definitely a great game, but with everything else surrounding it, it’s a tough sell for a lot of people to be sure. If you’re just looking for a good looter shooter to play though, Borderlands 4 is a great one, assuming it runs as intended.

Note: Gearbox Software provided us with a Borderlands 4 PC code for review purposes.