Zero Punctuation: Borderlands 2

[ThePuzzldPirate]

Yahtzee, I have always known you stretch the truth for comedic effect but it's not funny when you completely lie about it. I don't care if you liked a game or not but when you start knocking the game for things that don't exist, it comes off quite low.

I feel like I watched Mirror's Edge "review" all over again.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

I like those pauses after making fun of the games' name.

I used to play Borderlands 1, I only played it on the day I bought it. It was boring as hell. I think Yahtzee said a while back (likely misquoting here); "If your single player game requires you to bring a friend to be fun, then you've made the wrong game."

It went something like that, I think.

 

[Madmanonfire]

Why is there only one active skill?

The gunzerker has at least 3, including his action skill. The bottom of the red skill tree gives the Taunt skill and another skill in the red tree (I think) gives him a stronger melee attack with a cooldown during gunzerking. I'm not 100% sure the last one qualifies, but 2 > 1.
I'm only commenting on that because I'm skimming through posts and wasting valuable Borderlands 2 time.

Anywho, it sounds like a lot of people just don't know how to drive the vehicles in this game properly. I have no problems with the vehicles and I enjoy the driving controls.

 

[FallenMessiah88]

So it's basically the same as the first Borderlands, only now it takes place in a snow/ice environment? Yeah, that was also my conclusion after watching a friend play it. Still doesn't seem like a bad game though, especially the art style. I don't know why, but if a game's art style is good, then that's a huge plus in my book.

 

[JohnnyDelRay]

Holy shit, that 'bored to tears' line at the end nearly had me out of the chair.

Loved borderlands 1, loved the art style, boss fights, characters, powers, everything. Only annoyances being the stupidly easy final boss, and the ending. And marketing of "a bazillion guns" as a few types of guns in each category with different elemental damage, stats, and colors. And to a lesser extent, the mission system, but if you're smart you can get around those efficiently I found.

Can't wait for this, going to do my first playthrough as a gunzerker I think.

 

[Tippy]

What the hell was with those super-long pauses after the "sarcastic" attempts at jokes?

For some reason I just keep going back to watching all of Yahtzee's old stuff which was a million times funnier and vastly more entertaining.

In his ~10-20 latest reviews he seems to have slowed down his talking a lot...I had no issues understanding him even when he went at machine-gun rampage speed in his older videos, but now he's so much slower and not as funny.

At first I thought I was just getting desensitized to his jokes, but when I re-watch his old stuff for the 10th time I still find myself laughing my ass off at the joke and/or his delivery. Reviews like Witcher 1 & 2, FF13, Halo Reach, Sonic games, etc etc are nothing short of hilarious.

Yahtzee, atleast speed things up again!

 

[MercurySteam]

Good review Yahtzee, but Borderlands came out October 2009, close enough though.

 

[Arnoxthe1]

Yeah, this REALLY is a game you need to play with a friend. The first Borderlands (and I'm sure, the second) was boring when you played it by yourself, but for some reason, once you got a friend of yours playing it, the fun increased exponentially.

 

[Erttheking]

I can't be the only one that wants to see Yahtzee do an FTL review. After his DayZ review, I realized that Yahtzee is at his funniest when he's talking about his experiences with a game. Seriously, cant you hear him saying, "unfortunately my voyage was brought to a sudden halt by a random sun turning my ship into a saturday afternoon BBQ," or "then the game got bored and decided to organize an orgy between my crew and four giant mantises, and guess who was on bottom?"

Overall this review was kinda...lackluster though.

 

[Ledan]

Idk.... I found part 1 of Borderlands 1 great, then it petered out quickly. Borderlands 2 is like that beginning part that had character, extended throughout the game. BL1 felt so... dead after a while. BL2 is still alive, and they've improved on BL1. Not as much as I would like, but quite a bit anyways.
Why fix what wasn't broken? I mean, there are a few broken bits left BUT the overall gameplay mechanics should be and are the same. It is just: go to point A, kill dudes, get guns, get money, kill dudes. But it does it very well.

 

[Katya Topolkaraeva]

My boyfriend- "you can tell he liked it a little bit... you know he liked it. you can tell by his voice. he had a little too much fun with that review. he liked it"

 

[Saulkar]

Errrrrrrr. I just could not finish this review. It just felt that he was cherry picking things to hate within mechanics that are otherwise solid. The only real legitimate complaint I got from this was that you could only track one quest at a time but otherwise he does not mention anything the game gets right. The game makes genuine efforts to set itself apart from the run of the mill silent space marine or grizzled war veteran corridor shooter with bland colours by having quirky characters that try to balance style with substance, funny dialogue, interesting environments, strong art style, and greatly varying enemies with vastly different approaches to dispatching.

I can understand someone not liking it very easily but this review felt more like "I do not like this game mechanic and thus it is objectively bad".

I played and enjoyed the first Borderlands and while I feel the unflippable vehicle mechanic really needs to be euthanised alongside obvious invisible walls I FUCKING LOVE BORDERLANDS 2! It is flawed of course but it made major improvements to the mechanics of the first one without taking anything out. I feel that given a little more polish it is a strong contender for GOTY. It is funny, it has an affable asshole villian, good voice acting, solid gunplay, and relatively fun vehicles (needs more). Most importantly of all I feel a strong compulsion to explore!

 

[UnmotivatedSlacker]

He makes it quite apparent that he doesn't play the game he 'reviews' very long. Case in point, his Monster Hunter Tri and Demon's Souls videos. Why would I use a guy like that as a source to choose what games I buy?

Unless the person in question manages to point out all the things in a game you won't like up to a point where you'll regret the purchase, no you don't have to listen to him.

But like with every reviewer and his style, you need to find someone who fits your tastes. Yahtzee might not be your fit but stop spewing that his tastes can't resonate with anyone else. There are people out there who don't need a long, detailed review, they want a short list of things that they might not like in a game.

I won't bother with a game if the first 2h are shit. I don't expect a reviewer who has the similiar taste as me to bother with it longer than that.

I expect a guy getting paid to do this to finish the games

 

[Something Amyss]

it's pretty lame that the original 4 Vault Hunters have to talk about how you're "our only hope" when they (especially Lilith) should be able to turn you inside out with minimum effort.

Lilith has been in hiding. Not to mention her extra powers come from Eridium, ostensibly the unrefined stuff. This limits her usefulness. Roland's been running a war. Mordecai is drunk off his ass. I don't think I've seen Brick yet, but these guys are not in the best position to roll Jack.

 

[Something Amyss]

I expect a guy getting paid to do this to finish the games

And that doesn't seem at all unreasonable, especially with the amount of time a game can last?

 

[djs.specs]

Will someone stop giving Yahtzee games that are supposed to be played in multiplayer? I mean, he usually plays single-player only, so he's not gonna enjoy them... we get that by now. Just let him review single player games.

Yeah... no. If a game is advertised as having a single-player mode then it should be just as interesting and fun then as it is with other people. That has been Yahtzee's gripe for a long time now and I agree with him. Some of us don't want to HAVE to play co-op in order to get the best out of a game.

 

[mysecondlife]

1st review: OK FINE I'LL REVIEW BORDERLANDS SHEESH!

Now he's just willing. What changed?

I'll buy it eventually. Backlog of games to finish and all..

Good.

Another reason not to buy it.

Another reason besides...?

 

[PunkRex]

I definatly agree with the Wilhelm thing though...
Roland: 'OH NOES ITS WILHELM, RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUN!'
*5 seconds later*
Roland: 'Oh... okay then, never mind...'

It's almost like Wilhelm was intentionally easy to beat. Like beating him would actually serve some scheme on behalf of the bad guy. But if that were the case then some subversive agent secretly acting on Handsome Jack's behalf would have had to point you in the direction of the trap, beating Wilhelm would have had to give you a plausible reason to trust the trap you were walking into, it would probably have had to of been foreshadowed, and the consequences would have to be pretty dire.

...wait...

Also, I really don't see the original 4 as weakened. Lilith gets worshiped as a god, murders countless bad guys in the mission you work on with her, and she eventually teleports an entire city. Roland beats a couple of giant robots unarmed, and then doesn't get involved directly because he is leading an entire army. Mordecai...is drunk all the time. But hey, he also is the spymaster extraordinaire, and kills plenty of guys. They arn't in the thick of battle as often, but they are hardly slouches.

Alright, easy Mr. Sarcasty-pants you might pop a vessal. The point I was making is that coincidering the set up of the character and indeed the arena sized area you fight him in it was still kind of a let down, you can argue that it was a joke, in which case, yeah it was funny but seeing how this was the thing that supposedly leveled Opportunity I was expecting a little more of an epic take down. I just laid into him whilst Gunzerking for about 10 seconds and that was it.

Funny how the other characters didn't mention it though... still, I actually agree with you about the original 4 still being badass. Lilith (as you said) is a literal demi-god while in game wise Mordecai was a life saver during the Tiny Tina missions, he sniped those Goliaths on their way in during the tea party mission making the whole thing a hell of alot easier.

I wept man tears during the main animal reserve mission...

 

[Jester076]

Seems as good a time as any to say, I have watched Zeropunctuation since day 1. Thank you Yahtzee.

 

[Atmos Duality]

So it's basically the same as the first Borderlands, only now it takes place in a snow/ice environment? Yeah, that was also my conclusion after watching a friend play it.

That's maybe the first 5% of the game.