Borderlands Legendary Collection - Review
Prior to the release of the original Borderlands, shooters were very much a linear focused thing, there were a few that tested the waters, but none that dove right in. Nintendo owners have never had a massive open world shooter before, but now with three of the games in the series hitting Switch at once, the question must be asked, is this too much of a good thing?
As this is a collection of three, exceptionally large games, I won’t dive deep into any of the stories here, simply because they have been covered before and I want the review to be read under an hour. While Borderlands 1 is ostensibly the weakest, that is in part to its age, rather than its content, and while The Pre-Sequel is not going to be a story for everyone, that will be due to the unique attributes that were included by the developers at the former 2K Australia. Regardless of the shortcomings of each story, they still do the job, of propelling you into the action, over and over again, which is what they need to do. In addition, that, being able to see the characters growing over time, from the original Vault Hunters, to leaders of the resistance, or well-meaning corporate stooge to psychotic maniac with a hair trigger, is fun. The only catch, you can’t play them in the order they appear to be required in, as playing the Pre-Sequel, before you play Borderlands 2, will have people talk to characters, that they have not dealt with a lot, which throws things a little out of whack, a minor thing, just something to be aware of.
The core of the games though, is collecting a lot of guns, shooting all of the guns you do collect and eventually opening up an incredible vault, possibly full of treasure, or tentacles. As you begin, in each game, you will go through the tutorials, unlock new modes of transportation, discover cities and eventually more spaces to explore, it is a repetitive formula, but it does work. I only wish, that the games had some sort of system in place, to remove tutorials by default, if it detected a save file for a previous game or something, as being told how guns work, or how to make use of a shield or a grenade mode, got pretty annoying by the third time around. Each of the games features a great selection of guns, which in turn can be fun to test, just to see what they do and of course, if you run through with a friend, the games can be even more fun and slightly more chaotic. No matter what you aim is, from the hip included, there is plenty to enjoy in all three games, as the gameplay is just as fun now as it was when they all released.
With these elements in mind, I do wish the developers had taken time to align some things, fix a few things and generally improved the overall experience, especially as you are getting three remarkably similar games at once. The oddest thing I discovered, was related to motion controls, not they didn’t have them, but just that the location in the settings for them is not the same, with Pre-Sequel holding them in an entirely different sub-menu. While we are talking about this, I would have liked to have seen Borderlands 1 get a new menu screen, to better align with the other games, while not an issue, unless for some reason you are jumping back and forth between the games, it is weird to have it in a collection and it not be the same. With regards to the last issue, I would have liked to have seen some of the DLC being locked away, at least until certain levels were hit, getting to explore the DLC is not a problem, as most of it is really well done, but, being able to jump into any DLC from almost the outset is just weird.
Of course, as ports to the Switch we have to talk about the success of the efforts, there are two sides of course, presentation and gameplay and we will touch on the former down further. As far as gameplay goes, there is little wrong with it, as the performance is solid across the board, on all three games. When there are dozen of enemies on screen, running at you, barrels exploding around you and you with your machine gun, unloading copious amounts of bullets into their general direction, you might expect a dip in performance and thankfully, that does not happen. No matter how chaotic the action gets, the Switch is able to handle things with minimal fuss, something that other ports have failed to achieve in the past. That being said, there are some long load times, but they are still inline with the long load times that other console versions have had, but it is something to be aware of. There is a concern though, with the performance of the Pre-Sequel, there are times, especially in some of the more wide-open spaces, that the game can hiccup, but the times it does happen, thankfully don’t last for long.
The other side of the port process is the presentation, which are made up of visual and audial and both have made the jump to Switch, with little in the way of loss. One of the developers that worked on bringing the collection to Switch, made the comment that they didn’t have to touch the assets at all, which, when you consider that some of the platforms that the games have appeared on, are a little more powerful than Switch, it was a bold claim. However, thanks to the art style that Gearbox came up, you can see why, as the style is really emphasised over the thick black lines, that help give the series the distinct look. That style, regardless of which game you are playing, shines through and even on the Switch’s screen when in portable play, looks a treat, something that some games have struggled with, due to the screen not showing darker elements that well.
While the visuals for the original game are pretty basic at this point, they still hold up when comparing them to Borderlands 2, again partly due to the art style, but also because the version included was the remastered release, so all the assets got a touch up recently. The same visual issue that happens randomly at load, from the original game, all the way through to last years Borderland 3, is still happening and that is that textures take a while to load, normally, this will resolve itself by the time your character is ready for moving. Occasionally though, usually after a death, the textures will take a moment longer to load, but giving it a small amount of time will let it play catch up.
The other side to the games presentation is of course the audio and here it is just as I can remember it being, with Borderlands 1 having lots of empty spaces and nature sounds, Borderlands 2 is more character driven and full of chatter and then Pre-Sequel, being full of the Australian accent. The latter of them though, still throws me, each time that I hear it, not because it is bad, just because I keep forgetting about it. Still the audio has been brought across without issue and is wonderfully fun to hear again and while the Switch has been known to not provide the best audio on its internal speakers, there is no issue here.
If you have never played Borderlands before and you own a Switch, then you owe it to yourself to experience this amazing series. While there are other platforms you can play the games on as well, Switch gives you the option to play at home with friends, or on the go with them, something that is a really welcome addition, the only way that could be improved would be if it supported save files form other platforms. While not the most technically demanding games, they still run a treat and look just as good, and whether you pick them up in the collection, or one at a time, you will enjoy the full experience.
The Score
9.5
Review code provided by 2K
The Pros
+The presentation across all three games is excellent
+The gameplay has been preserved and is still just as fun
The Cons
-The same silly texture load issues are still happening
-The games not being conformed with menus and such
