I think BL3 had the potential to be the best in the series, since there are several aspects where Gearbox are firing on max, but it’s marred by so many other problems where either things were worse, or expectedly mid. For the most part, gunplay is really good, the environments are not only complete eye-candy but have a ton of variety in comparison to previous titles, and the music is excellent. There’s also a whole boatload of QoL updates to the previous formula that stands as a huge fastpass to what was previously filler downtime in games before, and there’s a lot of really cool customization options that bring more ways to spend earnings. The game also has an exceedingly cool hub area that not only serves as a cozy place of respite but lets you indulge in the finer points of life (gambling). Where I find the game really trips up is when the gameplay loop can’t be carried by these aforementioned aspects, and you start to realize you’re running down the same corridor again and again, specifically in the back half of the game. New class mechanics and level ups to keep things fresh are introduced at a decent rate, but so many of them boil down to bringing the game closer to being played on autopilot, or are so granular that they’re barely noticeable. While the Beastmaster class is fun and well portrayed, there’s so many instances where his offensive output is defined by the animals he summons that are not completely in your control.

I’ve never been one who felt averse to Borderlands’ more edgy and savvy presentation, but I think at this point, story and vibes-wise, the crassness is all they’re relying on. There was this long standing joke I remember where people would say Borderlands 3 kept getting put off and put back due to the lack of “new memes”, but this never really put me off from my maiden voyage with the series in Borderlands 2. That game isn’t a narrative masterpiece or anything but its story and writing was carried by things beyond its humor, which was still good for the most part. Handsome Jack is still a grippingly portrayed antagonist that both makes sense and plays into the game’s zany and unhinged sensibility, and the streamer twins don’t even come close to living up to him nor being able to stand on their own as engaging antagonists at all. They just do bad things and the game relies on you to hate them for it. Exploring recent topics like social media in this manner I don’t find to be inherently bad, but I think it’s tricky to do it in a nuanced way where the main reductive point isn’t just “man, aren’t internet celebrities (streamers, in this context) just sociopathic egomaniacs” like usual. Furthermore, the way the game handles its old and new characters is extremely mixed, where old characters almost feel like returning sitcom characters that showrunners were demanded to reintroduce without much thought about their narrative function. As for new characters, some are a lot of fun, but others are just incredibly dull or irritating, and these are the ones that the game decides to fixate on for reasons beyond my understanding. However, the game doesn’t always fail to deliver engaging stories or lore, there’s lot of smaller quests included within the MQ that serve as fun shorter stories that still fit into the story. Although, this is something that the game kinda suffers from as well, where the main story feels like this art gallery of vignettes rather than a cohesive narrative.

I can’t consider myself well-embedded or well-understanding of the series, to be completely honest, since my only previous outing was BL2 and its DLCs. I do plan to check out the original game soon as well as Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands, as I’d like a better understanding of the series’ trajectory.