Battleborn Review (PVE)

I was initially going to pass on Battleborn as mentioned here, but stumbled upon a cheap copy of the game and decided to pick it up. Battleborn, created by Gearbox the makers of Borderlands hopes to create a ‘MOBA’ (use this term loosely), FPS, Arena style game. The game is divided into two distinct pieces, the ‘story’ and ‘competitive’ multiplayer. As I have yet to jump into any of the competitive multiplayer, I will be reviewing both parts separately. The following is my review of Battleborn’s story (PVE) mode.

Opening cinematic

When I first logged on to Battleborn, I was prompted to play-through the games prologue. Immediately I was shown an incredible opening cinematic which has an awesome art style to it.  “Alright” I thought, things are getting off to a good start. After watching the opening I was then put into the game. PVE in Battleborn is very linear. Much like Borderlands (I’ll be making this comparison a lot), areas funnel the player forward until ultimately fighting the end boss. For a dungeon crawler, this style of gameplay is acceptable, however unlike Borderlands there seems to be little reason to deviate from the ‘path’ as there is little loot outside of fighting enemies that felt worthwhile (we will come back to loot later).

I shoot things and then grab loot

Story wise Battleborn lacks anything really compelling. If you asked me what I was doing for most of the game, I would be unable to tell you as the narrative is scattered and largely told through voice over. Each character has their own lore which is uncovered as you progress with the character, but I found most of the characters to be flat and uninteresting. Gearbox also attempts to infuse comedy into the story, but most of the jokes just fell flat for me. Each mission is broken up into ‘episodes’ and opens with an animated title sequence which is interesting. The campaign is relatively short at only 8 episodes, but boasts multiple difficulties and can be replayed to you hearts content. One thing I found strange was that public lobbies cannot queue for specific episodes, but instead vote on a selection of four. This makes playing through the episodes chronologically in public lobbies difficult.

Mission complete!

The core mechanic of Battleborn’s PVE is fighting varying difficulties of enemies through story missions involving escorts and base defense. The biggest issue with the story is that there is little variance in the missions themselves. Once you’ve played one, you have played all of them. Missions also feel incredibly long and take a decent time commitment. I ran the first mission, The Algorithm solo and it took me about 50 minutes to complete. I then attempted the same mission with a full party and it took half the time. So although the game can be soloed, there is definitely an emphasis on party play. Missions also contain fail states, which is a terrible design decision. Getting into a game is about a 3-5 minute process, running the mission about 30 – 35 minutes and all this time investment can be wiped out if an objective is failed. This is a seriously flawed mechanic and makes the game frustrating at times.

If he dies, we fail

The risk of mundane fighting is alleviated by Battleborn’s impressive champion roster. Boasting 25 playable champions, players have a bevy of options on how they want to fight. Every classic MMO archetype is represented, giving most players the opportunity of finding a character that fits their play style. Each character boasts an auto attack, two actives and an ultimate ability. The abilities of many of the champs feel good, and as you level up, each ability becomes more powerful. For example playing as Oscar Mike, gave me the ability to increase my grenade or cloaking skill. I like the champion pool quite a bit, but unfortunately the love that was put into champions is not felt in the enemy design. I am pretty sure I fought Thralls on every level I played, and I definitely would have liked Gearbox to put a little more effort into this aspect of the game.

Skills to pay the… Bills?

Unlike Borderlands, players level up during the mission and only carry over loot and credits when the mission ends. This mechanic is both a good and bad thing. On the good side, players can experiment with builds and not feel married to a certain play style. On the bad side, progression feels strange. Within a forty minute mission the player goes from weak, to uber powerful, then back to weak in the next game. Ultimately though, given the limited two column system, I imagine most people will find a build that works and spec the same way every game.

Loot. Coming from the makers of one of the most beloved loot games in existence, I was expecting them to bring some serious power to the loot system. The games loot system is similar in nature to Borderlands with various levels of loot, which can be acquired from fighting bosses, leveling up and completing challenges. I like this mechanic and feel it works well. Unfortunately, the depth of the loot system is pretty shallow. Much of the loot I collected was very unmemorable, and coupling this with the fact that loot is put into a limited three piece loadout and requires shards to activate, basically made me write the system off. I love a game where you grind for gear, but Battleborn makes loot so passive and auxiliary that I could care less about it.

Loot got me sleeping

The game handles nicely and controls very similar to Borderlands, with the aiming and movement feeling good and skills being simple to get off. I definitely liked the userface, with the menus and UI looking good and being easy to navigate for the most part. I am happy to report that Battleborn runs pretty smooth on PC. I experienced some screen tearing and frame rate issues, but overall the game runs well and looks good. One issue I ran into though, was game audio. I experienced a few instances of voice overs repeating themselves and had the audio completely cut out when I was playing. Aside from that the game is solid and plays solid.

Overall the game is okay. While playing, nothing really stood out or wowed me. The controls are tight, champion pool is large and diverse and the game worked well at launch for me. Unfortunately things like a bland story, repetitive missions, bad game mechanic decisions and a disappointing loot system kept me from fully enjoying the game.

 What I Like

• Cartoon cut scenes and episode openings (wish they did more with this)
• Controls feel tight and handle well
• Champion pool and diversity
• Combat

What I Don’t Like

• Enemy lackluster design
• Fail state
• Loot
• Storyline
• Stat progression system (could be me)

Arbitrary Rating:  6.0/10 (meh)

Review of PVP here.