When Borderlands 2 ended we probably all gave a “whoa” of some type when we saw that galaxy map. However, I think there were two different responses.
The Tannis response was “So many possibilities, so many choices. We can send surveyors and explorers to each planet, and this will let the Borderlands series run for decades! We can pull multiple games from this! First…” zzzz
Second is the Torgue Response “HOLY SHT LOOK AT ALL THOSE VAULTS!! BORDERLANDS 3 IS GOING TO BE FCKING HUGE!!!”
I happen to hope that Mr. Torgue is correct, myself.
This series has amazing gameplay. I love the combat so much. And my first run through each game is mostly awesome. However, as with many of us I have played through each game over a dozen times. There are areas I am truly sick of and there are areas that I have memorized. There are guides on where to find the best loot midgets and the fastest way to each boss.
I don’t like this part of the game. I want it to stay fresh because I can play the combat forever. So many people have thousands of hours into these games, but those hours are recycled play.
The Borderlands series promised so many combinations of guns to players. Until you get to max level and only a limited pool of equipment matters, that is a pretty successful promise.
No Man’s Sky promised nearly limitless (to our abilities) planets. However, many players criticize them as being too similar, empty, or boring. Also, no one would compare its combat to the level of this series.
Imagine a Borderlands game with near limitless map content, just like with the equipment. I think this developer could pull it off.
A game in which everyone is “Gold Rushing” to get to the vaults, since someone hacked and released the discovered map (or whatever plot point gets it out there)
You’d have a ship, a company sponsor (Torgue wants to weaponize the vault monsters for awesome arenas and BLOW SH*T UP, Dhal Ascended wants them protected or destroyed, so on)
Land on a random planet, your ship becomes a New-U. You clear bandit camps, claim their resources for your sponsor, destroy Anti-Air so that you can fly to more locations, and so on.
Sometimes, even, you’d be flying around and discover a Badass Planet. Ultra hard, guaranteed Raid boss somewhere, and awesome loot. Every planet can scale, meaning content is always fresh and challenging.
Wow, did you just find a planet entirely populated by Claptraps? Where did they come from, and how do you deal with them? Automatic random side quest generated!
Another planet has so much Eridium that the surfaces slags everything it touches. That’d be a real challenge to deal with. Is it worth it? Maybe not. Good thing you can just go elsewhere. The choice is yours.
The vault planets would be entirely or partially designed, and heavily protected by Eridian forces. They’d need to be dealt with to finish the story, but then you can ignore them after if you so wish.
So many possibilities, and none of them require you to go through the same quests over and over again in the hunt for the best loot and the max level. I’d play that forever.