Borderlands Preview

Hooked Gamers is offering up a short preview of Gearbox’s co-op friendly FPS/RPG crossbreed, Borderlands.

One of Borderlands often discussed features is its ability to self-generate large numbers of unique weapons. Gearbox estimates that each time the game starts, it has the potential to generate over half a million unique weapons and a similar amount of different items and armor. Fortunately it will be fairly straightforward to figure out if a weapon is worth keeping or not. The various different attributes of each weapon are shown as stats as soon as you approach a weapon so you can quickly determine to pick it up, or leave it where it is.

Borderlands maps will also be randomly generated. While towns and the general paths connecting them will remain the same, rural areas and wildlife are created on the fly each time you start a new game. Bunkers, towers, caves, enemies, and exploding cacti will all be placed randomly on the newly created map as well. This is a great way to keep the game un-predictable and interesting.