Borderlands 4 review the chaotic, colourful shooter has finally grown up a little

"Once a games franchise hits its fourth outing, it is certainly mature yet maturity is not a word generally associated with Borderlands, the colourful and performatively edgy looter-shooter from Texas. This series is characterised by a pervasive and polarising streak of distinctly adolescent humour. But in Borderlands 4, developer Gearbox has addressed that issue: it features plenty of returning characters in its storyline, but this time around they are more world-weary and less annoyingly manic. Borderlands has finally matured, to an extent."

"It retains the distinctive cel-shaded graphical style and gun and ordnance-heavy gameplay that people have always loved. Indeed, it throws even more guns at you than any of its predecessors, and with a little work at filtering out the best ones, you will find plenty of absolute gems with which to take on hordes of straightforward enemies and more interesting bosses. A decent storyline emerges after the formulaic first few hours, eventually sending you off on some unexpected, fun and sometimes gratifyingly surreal tangents."

Borderlands 4 adopts a more world-weary tone while retaining rapid-fire jokes and the series' cel-shaded visual style. The game increases weapon variety, encouraging players to filter for exceptional guns to tackle hordes and varied bosses. The campaign takes place on Kairos, a more coherent planet governed by the totalitarian Timekeeper, prompting a resistance narrative of liberating tribes, defeating lieutenants, and removing surveillance implants. Progress unlocks vault-like dungeons, environmental puzzles, and surreal sidetracks. Characters return but display tempered manic energy. Players choose from four vault-hunters, including a Siren with summoning powers, an Exosoldier super-soldier, and a Forgeknight tank.

Read at www.theguardian.com