We all know how it is in a looter-shooter game. While the idea is that every single item has something unique and special about it, in practice, the majority of items are utterly useless and are either never picked up or are instantly sold at in-game stores. The folk over at Gearbox understand this too, and for Borderlands 4 they are introducing a system that aims to make weapons better and to make the idea of looting a weapon and then shooting that weapon straight away all the more entertaining.
Speaking with senior project producer Anthony Nicholson at Gamescom, we were informed as to why the Licensed Parts feature is being introduced, with this being Gearbox’s grand idea for making all weapons quirkier and more unique.
“Yeah, so we wanted to take a lot of the things that worked really well, that people thought were really, really cool, and our gun team has done an amazing job on the design side, the art side, animation, everything has been really, really well done. And so we wanted to see, what are those pieces that people love? Like the Hyperion part of Hyperion, people love the shield whenever it’s up. So we take that licensed part, we don’t have the full manufacturer, but we take that part and now you can have it on your Maliwan gun with Jacob’s Crit and TD or Reload or whatever crazy thing that it may be. So it really is about making sure that the player feels like they’re awesome every time they pick up a gun and that they can continue to shoot and loot and keep that going on all through the entire campaign.”
As it stands, the majority of weapon manufacturers are present in Borderlands 4 as core brands, with only a handful missing. The ones that are lacking will remain to some degree thanks to the Licensed Parts feature, but how does Gearbox decide which manufacturers to feature and which ones to miss for a game? Lead level designer Jason Reiss explained this process.
“Oh, it’s impossible. It’s a give and take. We love them all. And so we kind of find our different niches, the different play styles, and we make sure we cater to those. But it’s actually extremely hard to pick. And so it’s great with the Licensed Parts, because we still can bring some of those feelings to there. Hyperion is still there, Atlas, you bring that Licensed Part here and you can still have their behaviour, but you get to combine it with all these other ones, which I love because it makes our loot chase that much more relevant. It makes purples or epics that much more enticing and that much more exciting when those drop. And so there’s even more reward out there for the player to get.”
Check out the full interview below for a teaser of how post-game will look for Borderlands 4, on top of how the new seamless world allows Gearbox to flex their creative skills.