Everything You Need To Know Before Playing Borderlands 3

With the release of Borderlands 3 today, players will soon be able to jump into the action and get looting on Pandora once again. The game, which was only announced at the start of the year, has been eagerly anticipated by fans since the release of the last main game in the series some five years ago.

Over the last few months, Gearbox has been inundating everybody with all kinds of announcements and trailers, so you might be a little confused about what exactly has changed in Borderlands 3 and what to expect once the game loads up. That’s why we’ve created this handy guide that should run through every important piece of information that you need to know before you go vault hunting.

 

1. There Are A Lot More Weapons To Loot

If there is one thing that Borderlands is known for, it’s the fact that there are just so many different weapons available to loot. Using a procedural generation system, Gearbox was able to include millions of guns in their previous instalments. The end result was a huge amount of variation in terms of the attributes for each shotgun, handgun, and SMG in the games. Many even had special effects, such as causing an explosion when they were reloaded or firing bullets that will ricochet off any surface.

The developer is going one step further in Borderlands 3 as there will now be more than a billion different guns for players to get their hands on. As well as the standard manufacturers that have been present in previous titles, the new game will introduce guns made by the Children of the Vault, and Atlas will also return with smart bullets, allowing you to stick trackers on enemies and then fire bullets that will seek them out. Manufacturer perks have seen a change so that perks are not as standard, as Tediore weapons will sometimes sprout legs and shoot enemies when reloaded.

 

2. New Vault Hunters Are Available

Every entry in the Borderlands series so far has introduced four new playable characters. These vault hunters usually have varied playstyles, meaning that they differ from each other significantly in the way they work in combat. Each also has unique action skills that they can use to get the upper hand over enemies. This time around, each class can use three different action skills rather than just one, making them more versatile fighters. With Borderlands 3, the four new vault hunters are FL4K, Zane, Amara, and Moze.

Described as a wandering robot, FL4K is a Beastmaster. This allows him to control one of three pets to help boost his stats and attack any nearby opponents. This class can also use skills that send out creatures as well as being able to turn invisible for a short amount of time.

Amara is the Siren class character, and like other Sirens from earlier games, she has powerful magical-like abilities. Amara is very much a close combat specialist and her special abilities reflect that. They involve slamming into the ground for an area-of-effect attack as well as summoning phantom fists and projections that damage bad guys.

As an Operative, Zane is a cross between a hitman and an infiltrator. He prefers to keep a distance between him and his opponents by using ranged skills. These include a drone that will zip around in the air shooting at enemies, a deployable shield, and a Digi-Clone that distracts enemies and can teleport the player.

Finally, the last vault hunter is Moze. This character is a Gunner and uses a large mech in combat. Once she is inside the Iron Bear tank, she can use a variety of skills that manifest in the form of powerful weapons. Along with a railgun and minigun, she can use flamethrowers, rocket launchers, and giant mech fists.

 

3. You’ll Be Leaving Pandora

Previously, the Borderlands games have taken place on the planet of Pandora. There have been some exceptions to this, but even when the action did shift to another location it was only a brief journey that soon ended up back in the familiar desert dunes. All of that is set to change in Borderlands 3, though, thanks to the fact that you will be able to travel to a variety of new planets on your search for new vaults.

These additional areas include Promethea, a bustling urban planet that is home to the Atlas corporation, and the swamp infested Eden-6. Athenas is another example that boasts a cult of monks. There will still be plenty of missions taking place on Pandora so long time fans can expect to see a few familiar areas. To get to these planets, players will use the Sanctuary III ship as a hub from which they can choose their destination and shoot down to the surface.

 

4. Extra Endgame Content To Get More Powerful Loot

Borderlands 3 is set to have more endgame content than any other entry in the franchise. While raids that involve players taking down huge monsters are common, the new game will give players more opportunities to find extra rare loot than ever before.

Firstly, True Vault Hunter Mode is set to return. This is a New Game Plus feature that lets you restart the campaign with your character, keeping all weapons and abilities, on a harder difficulty. It’s a great way to level up and get access to better loot. This can also be combined with Mayhem Mode, which switches up the difficulty even more by changing the behaviours of enemies. They might become immune to certain types of damage or receive speed boosts but this will also cause them to drop the best types of weapons and items.

Badass Ranks have been replaced with Guardian Ranks. These are more unique challenges that will test players out with unusual objectives. However, completing them will give them the chance to unlock special gear or skins to use within the game, as well as a collection of additional abilities.

The final piece of new endgame content comes in the form of Proving Grounds. Like the Circle of Slaughter from previous games, it sees players having to take out hordes of enemies within a set time limit. There’s an arena on each planet for you to discover and players will be rewarded according to how fast they can fight their way through the enemies.

 

5. The Story Includes Characters From All Previous Borderlands Games

With Borderlands 3 being a direct sequel, the story follows on very shortly after the conclusion of the previous entries. Although the plot in the first game was not a central element, successive games have added a more cohesive narrative that has been expanded upon with the spin-off Tales from the Borderlands.

Characters from all previous games, including Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel and Tales from the Borderlands, will be present. This includes the likes of Rhys, Vaughn, Tiny Tina, Lilith, Maya, Brick, Mordecai and other NPCs that were present in Sanctuary before its destruction. If you want to get fully caught up on the overall story and understand how all the characters interact, you might want to play through the spin-off and the recently released Borderlands 2 DLC, Commander Lilith & the Fight for Sanctuary.