Borderlands Legends iOS Review

Real Talk By: EC

When I first heard that Borderlands was hitting the iOS, I thought it would be another cover and shoot game where you tap on the enemies and it would just go on like that on every level. Then I heard more about it and saw a trailer. My second thought was that it would be a tactical role-playing game, where you receive several characters from the Borderlands universe like Clap Trap as pawns or weak infantry, and Dr. Zed as healer, and the main characters as power players with skills specific to their actual skills in the first game, for example Mordecai would be like a long-range player, and Brick the heavy-duty fighter and so on. I imagined these characters on a field where you move them all strategically to wipe out the other team, much like Fire Emblem, Disgaea, and Final Fantasy War of the Lions. Obviously I let my imagination get the best of me. Once I bought the game, I realized my assumptions of how this game would be played, were off by a few margins.

How and why is there a vending machine inside of a bus!?

Starting off you get a bit of back story that implies that this game takes place directly after the events of number one. Naturally, Claptrap guides you through a simple tutorial and then you start to play. You take control of all 4 famed vault hunters from the first game, so your tough decision of whom to play as first is eliminated, all the game play is a top-down view of a small area where all the fighting and killing happens. Your squad fights through waves of well-known Pandora baddies, such as Skags, Bandits, Spiderants and so on. Enemies only drop cash when you kill them, and no randomized weapon caches in this game. Weapons can only be bought at the vending machines which are only accessible between levels or at the mid-level break; Weapons can also be won as rewards at the end of some levels.

Mid-Level Break usually right before a boss or the last Round of waves.

The graphics look exactly like a Borderlands game should look; they really shrunk Pandora down to scale perfectly on the little screen. Weapons equipped to the characters are shown in-game play, these nice little details and polished pieces just show that this wasn’t just a thrown together game for cash. After about an Hour or so, all my characters seemed to overpower every enemy easily. I was on the 3rd wave of one of the levels, and I paused to check something on my computer real quick, when I look down about a minute later I freaked out because apparently the game didn’t pause, but I was then impressed that my team had actually finished the level already, mind you they all stay perfectly still unless you move them, so they all just held their ground and did two waves without me having to heal them or activate their skills. Kind of takes the challenge out of it.

Easiest Boss Battle Ever.

Sometimes the controls are non responsive, or the characters refuse to go to where you ordered them to go, obstacles in the way shouldn’t be a problem, they should walk around it, but they get confused and stand still, or walk back and forth rubbing against the obstacle until you redirect them.

Shoot the crates for more money is sometimes an optional mission within your current mission.

Overall it’s a decent game, but there’s nothing really spectacular about it, and the challenge of it all wears off after your characters reach the mid teens. The graphics and sound were well polished and gave me the feel of fighting in Pandora again, but most of the levels look the same and are all static, there is no zooming in or panning to see more of the level.

Why are the rewards for Main missions and Side Missions the same? There’s no incentive.

Borderlands Legends Gets


Out of five

What’s Legit?

+Graphics perfectly resembled it’s console predecessor

+Game play was entertaining and addictive at first

+Clap Trap

+Made me start playing Disgaea again

What’s Perpetrating?

-Levels are repetitive and static

-No real story

-No Challenge real challenge after Lvl 15 ish

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