Borderlands is an action role-playing first-person looter shooter video game franchise set in a space Western science fantasy setting, created and produced by Gearbox Software and published by 2K for multiple platforms.

The series consists of seven games, each with multiple downloadable content packs: Borderlands (2009), Borderlands 2 (2012), Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel (2014) and Borderlands 3 (2019) by 2K Australia. Tiny Tina's Wonderlands (2022) is a spinoff based on Borderlands 2's Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep DLC. Tales from the Borderlands (2014–2015) is a spin-off episodic graphic adventure game by Telltale Games, and is followed up by New Tales from the Borderlands (2022) developed by Gearbox Software.

The series has received critical acclaim and commercial success for its loot-driven multiplayer co-op gameplay and its sense of humor. As of November 2022, more than 77 million copies of Borderlands games had been shipped, with 26 million from Borderlands 2.^[1] An additional five million copies of Borderlands 3 were sold within five days of release, bringing the total series' net revenues to over US$1 billion.^[2] This makes it one of the best-selling video game franchises of all time. A film adaptation of the series is in development by Lionsgate.

Gameplay

The Borderlands games are first-person loot shooters, set in an open world, with some role-playing video game (RPG) elements. Tales from the Borderlands and its sequel are episodic adventure games. The concept came from Matthew Armstrong's idea to combine the mechanics of first-person shooters like Doom with role-playing games with randomized loot such as Diablo.^[3] After developing the mechanics of a shooter-RPG hybrid, Gearbox established the idea of players seeking Vaults on the planet Pandora, comparing the discovery of new loot to opening a Pandora's box.^[4]

Players select one of the characters, representing Vault Hunters that have traveled to the planet Pandora to try to seek its fabled Vault. Each Vault Hunter has a different skill tree and one or more unique abilities. Players complete quests and explore Pandora while dealing with the violent Pandora wildlife, crazed scavengers that have been stranded on the planet, and various military groups that attempt to stop them. Completing quests and defeating foes earns in-game money and experience, which is used for expanding the player's skill tree. If the player loses their health or falls into bottomless chasms, they respawn at the most recent checkpoint and lose some of their money. The games are divided into several maps, and once players have reached a waypoint station on the map, they can teleport to any other previously visited map. Otherwise, players must reach certain points on the edges of the map to move into a different area. Some maps allow the player to spawn an armed vehicle to help traverse large maps or to deal with more powerful enemies.

A core feature of Borderlands is the loot system, which generates a variety of guns (such as pistols, shotguns, assault rifles, sniper rifles, and rocket launchers), shield generators, grenade modifications, and class modifications. This equipment is randomly dropped by foes, found in containers around Pandora, or obtained as rewards for completing quests. The statistics of the equipment, such as the amount of damage and accuracy for a gun and special elemental attacks, are procedurally generated, and use a loot color-coding system to indicate rarity, ranging from white (most common), to purple and orange (most rare and powerful). The first Borderlands is credited by the Guinness Book of World Records to have over 17 million different possible guns that could be generated, while the latter games expand further on this.^[5] Other facets of the game use a similar procedural system: foes may have unique attributes and more powerful variants, such as creatures that can spit corrosive acid or flame, or scavengers with higher amounts of health and armor. Weapons and other equipment can be sold and bought at various vending machines scattered about the maps; nearly all vending machines include a rare piece of loot that is only available for a limited amount of in-game time, after which the machine's inventory is rotated for a new set of equipment. Borderlands 2, 3, and The Pre-Sequel! include the use of "SHIFT codes", which the player can obtain through social media or other promotions, and give players "golden keys" that can be used once to obtain an item of exceptional quality appropriate for the player's level; this feature was added to the remaster of Borderlands.^[6]

As the player levels, the loot drops will become more powerful; at the same time, the enemies that the player faces on the map will increase in level as well. All three games feature a New Game Plus-type replay mode, where they can start with the same character at the same level they completed the game with, and continue to level up the character through the replay up to a fixed level, making the game more difficult. All three games support co-operative play for up to four people; the difficulty of the enemies as well as the quality of the loot drops scales with the number of players.

In Borderlands 2 and in the Pre-Sequel, a "Badass Rank" system was added. By completing certain challenges, such as killing a number of enemies with a specific weapon type, the player would be awarded Badass points; for every 100 points, they can then redeem these for one of several small buffs to the player's attributes such as gun damage or shield capacity. Selecting the same buff repeatedly on redemption while using a given character would provide less beneficial rewards. However, these Badass buffs are shared by all characters that the player has so that if the player starts a new character, they will retain all the existing buffs, and new buffs when the points are redeemed will be more beneficial; the "Badass Rank" system has been replaced in Borderlands 3 by the "guardian" system.

All the games in the series use a comic book-like rendering approach, frequently mistaken as a cel-shaded technique. Instead, the games use fully realized hand-drawn textures and within the game engine, add noticeable outlines to create the appearance of a comic book setting.^[7]

Plot

Setting

The games in Borderlands primarily take place on the planet Pandora. Pandora is believed to be rich with mineral wealth leading several interstellar megacorporations to send colony ships there to capitalize on it, but once they arrive, they find little of value outside of undecipherable alien artifacts from a long-extinct race known as the Eridians, and numerous native lifeforms make it too dangerous to colonize. Many of the corporations abandon the planet, leaving behind their workforce, former prisoners coerced into employment, who take over much of the planet as bandits and raiders. However, a study of the alien artifacts leads to the discovery of mythical Eridian Vaults filled with untold treasure and wealth, which are guarded by extremely powerful and ancient monsters. Corporations and military forces return to the planet, along with a number of Vault Hunters who seek to find the Vaults themselves. The settings are expanded to include the moon of Pandora in Borderlands: The Pre-sequel, and other planets in Borderlands 3 where further Eridian Vaults have been found.

Characters

Several characters appear in multiple Borderlands games. The small yellow robot Claptrap (voiced by David Eddings, with Jim Foronda in Borderlands 3) has appeared in all games as a non-player character (NPC) and in the Pre-Sequel as a playable character. The megalomaniacal CEO of the Hyperion Corporation, Handsome Jack (Dameon Clarke), is first encountered as the principal antagonist of Borderlands 2, while the Pre-Sequel features him as an NPC whose rise to power is assisted by the player. After his death at the end of Borderlands 2, Jack reappears in Tales from the Borderlands as an AI personality and in flashbacks in Borderlands 3. The enigmatic "Angel" (voiced by Jennifer Green, portrayed in the video by Brittani Johnson) who guides the players through Borderlands is, in the sequel, revealed to be Jack's daughter.

Also appearing across multiple games are several NPCs who act as vendors and quest-givers for the player. They include the erratic researcher Patricia Tannis (Colleen Clinkenbeard), the garage owner and mechanic Scooter (Michael Neumann), Scooter's younger sister and mechanic Ellie (Jamie Marchi), the bartender Mad Moxxi (Brina Palencia), the 13-year-old demolitions expert Tiny Tina (Ashly Burch),^[a] the gun company founder Mr. Torgue (Chris Rager), the gentleman hunter Sir Alistair Hammerlock (J. Michael Tatum), the junk dealer Janey Springs (Catherine Moore), the shady surgeon Dr. Zed (Ric Spiegel) and the gun merchant Marcus Kincaid (Bruce DuBose), who also narrates the opening cinematics.

In each main game, the player chooses one of several player characters – "Vault Hunters" drawn to Pandora by the prospect of the alien riches contained within the Vaults – but as the games support up to four-player co-op gameplay, their continuity presents these characters as having witnessed the events of each game together. Several of these player-characters subsequently appear as non-player characters in future games.

• The player characters of the first Borderlands appear as NPCs in the later games. They are: Roland (voiced by Oliver Tull in Borderlands and Markus Lloyd in Borderlands 2) a stoic soldier; Lilith (Colleen Clinkenbeard), a "Siren" with magical powers and the series overall main protagonist; Mordecai (voiced by Julio Cedillo in Borderlands and Jason Liebrecht in subsequent games), a hunter and sniper with a pet bird-of-prey; and Brick (Marcus Mauldin), a strongman brawler.
• The main protagonists of Borderlands 2 are Axton (Robert McCollum), a renegade soldier; Maya (Martha Harms), another Siren; Salvador (John Swasey), a short-statured and short-tempered "gunzerker"; and Zer0 (Michael Turner), an enigmatic masked assassin. Through DLC, two additional characters were added: Gaige (Cherami Leigh), the "Mechromancer", a young girl with a flying killer robot, and Krieg (Jason Douglas), a deranged wanderer with a split personality.
• All but two of the player characters of the Pre-Sequel appeared in earlier games as NPCs. Athena (Lydia Mackay) is a renegade assassin encountered in a DLC campaign in Borderlands. Nisha Kadam (Stephanie Young), a bounty hunter and eventually Jack's girlfriend, goes on to be killed by the players in Borderlands 2 – as does Wilhelm (Bryan Massey), a cyborg mercenary obsessed with transhumanism. The other two player characters of the Pre-Sequel, available through DLC, are Timothy (Dameon Clarke), a body double of Handsome Jack, and Lady Aurelia Hammerlock (Kenneisha Thompson), Alistair's sister and big game hunter.
• Tales from the Borderlands, set just after Borderlands 2, introduces two protagonists: the Hyperion company man Rhys (Troy Baker), and the con artist Fiona (Laura Bailey). Other characters introduced in Tales from the Borderlands include Vaughn (Chris Hardwick), Rhys's best friend and a Hyperion accountant; Sasha (Erin Yvette), Fiona's sister and fellow con artist; Gortys (Ashley Johnson), an Atlas robot; and Felix (Norman Hall), Fiona and Sasha's father figure.
• Borderlands 3, set years after Tales from the Borderlands, features four new Vault Hunter protagonists: Amara (Zehra Fazal), a Siren; Moze (Marissa Lenti), a rogue Vladof soldier who pilots the mecha Iron Bear; Zane (Cian Berry), a black ops operative with a variety of gadgets; and FL4K (Sung-Won Cho), a robot beastmaster. The antagonists are the Calypso Twins, Tyreen and Troy Calypso (Elisa Melendez and Max Mittelman), who are both Sirens.

Synopsis

Shortly after the Dahl corporation leaves the planet Pandora at the start of Borderlands, four Vault Hunters arrive to seek out the Vault – Roland, Lilith, Mordecai, and Brick. They are guided by a mysterious entity, the Guardian Angel, that lives within the planet's communication EchoNet system, to collect pieces of the Vault Key, but warned that the Vault can only be accessed every 200 years, and that time is approaching, urging them onward. They complete the Key, but come into conflict with the Atlas corporation coming back to claim Pandora and the Vault. The Vault Hunters fight Atlas back and locate the Vault, but upon opening, it releases a giant monster, named the "Destroyer". They fight off the monster and push it back into the Vault, which closes, leaving Pandora safe.

In the Pre-Sequel, Jack, a low-level programmer for Hyperion, discovers another Vault on Pandora's moon, Elpis, and hires six more Vault Hunters – Wilhelm, Athena, Claptrap, Nisha, Timothy, and Aurelia – to seek it in the wake of the First Vault's closure. With the Vault Hunters' help, Jack is able to seize control of Helios, the Hyperion space station in orbit between Pandora and Elpis, and uses its resources to secure the Vault with the help of the Hunters. Inside, there is only a strange artifact in the shape of the Vault symbol, but when Jack touches it, he experiences visions of the imminent release of the "Warrior". Jack starts to go mad with power, and Lilith punches the artifact into his face, disfiguring him forever. Jack assumes his mask, becoming Handsome Jack, and takes over Hyperion as he swears vengeance on the Vault Hunters.

In Borderlands 2, six new Hunters have arrived to find a new Vault that has been discovered on Pandora, but Handsome Jack uses his vast array of Hyperion resources to try to stop them. The new Hunters – Axton, Maya, Salvador, Zer0, Gaige, and Krieg – are aided by Roland and his former Vault Hunters, now leading a resistance known as the Crimson Raiders, secured in their base Sanctuary, and further guided by the Guardian Angel, who is revealed to be Jack's Siren daughter, dying from excessive usage of her powers. Jack had used Angel to trick the former Vault Hunters into opening the Vault on Pandora to gain access to Eridium, a special alien mineral with untold properties. After The Vault Hunters kill Angel in an act of mercy and to disrupt Jack's plan, Jack appears in Angel's chamber and proceeds to kill Roland. Lilith teleports The Vault Hunters to safety before being captured by Jack and used to finish charging the Vault Key. While they find the Vault, Jack arrives and joins them as they open it, and he summons forth the gigantic Warrior, which he wants to use to control Pandora and beyond. The Vault Hunters defeat the Warrior and leave Jack to his death before discovering that the Vault Key contains a map leading to Vaults across the galaxy.

Sometime after these events, in Tales of the Borderlands, the absence of Jack's control leaves a power void on both Pandora and Hyperion. A Hyperion lackey, Rhys, and a con artist Fiona get caught up in events over the sale of a fake Vault Key to Rhys' superior for ten million dollars. They discover that there is another vault, the Vault of the Traveler, controlled by an Atlas prototype robot named Gortys. As they collect the scattered parts of Gortys, Rhys inadvertently downloads an AI copy of Handsome Jack's personality into his cybernetic mind. Rhys and Fiona's group makes to Helios in a makeshift spacecraft, and Scooter sacrifices himself to assure they get there. Once back on Helios, Jack takes over the entire station. Rhys and Fiona stop Jack and cause the station to crash into Pandora, wiping out Jack's personality for good. After going their separate ways for a while, They reunite to help defeat the Traveler, another giant Vault monster, freeing Gortys and leaving the Vault to be explored.

Borderlands 3 follows 7 years after the events of Borderlands 2 and Tales. After being forced to destroy Sanctuary to protect Pandora from a doomsday plot by former Dahl commander, Colonel Hector, Lilith and the Crimson Raiders recover the Vault Key/Map to discover the many Vaults that exist across the galaxy, and travel among planets via their new spacecraft Sanctuary III. However, the Calypso Twins, Tyreen and Troy, have claimed themselves the rightful owners of the Vaults, creating a cult of personality, the Children of the Vault, from the remnant bandit factions of Pandora to secure these Vaults themselves, and making a strategic partnership with megacorporation Maliwan for military support. Lilith recruits new Vault Hunters – Zane, Amara, FL4K, and Moze – to help secure these Vaults before Tyreen and Troy can. They learn that the pair are Sirens themselves, seeking to absorb the power of the Vault monsters for their own to open the "Great Vault", revealed to be the planet Pandora itself, unaware that it still contains the "Destroyer", which is further explained to be a being intent on destroying the universe. With the help of former and new allies, the Crimson Raiders managed to stop the Calypso Twins and kill the Destroyer but at the cost of Maya and Lilith's lives, although the latter's fate is ambiguous.

Main series

Borderlands

Borderlands was released in 2009, and combines traditional first-person shooter gameplay with character-building elements found in role-playing games, leading Gearbox to call the game a "role-playing shooter". Players choose to play as one of four characters: Lilith the Siren, Mordecai the Hunter, Brick the Berserker, and Roland the Soldier. The game awards experience points for enemies killed and objectives completed, as well as encouraging skillful gameplay by granting bonuses to more difficult actions such as headshots. Earned experience builds toward the threshold of the next level. Leveling up provides the player with additional "skill points", which are used to select various skills that allow character specialization.

In addition to various melee weaponry, the character can wield an array of firearms, grenades, and specialized weaponry, which are procedurally generated to provide a rich variety of loot. The game supports solo play as well as a cooperative mode for up to four players. A New Game Plus mode allows players to replay the game with the same character at a higher difficulty level.

The game is set on the planet Pandora, contested by bandits, mercenaries of interstellar corporations, dangerous wildlife and, eventually, eldritch alien abominations. As a "Vault Hunter", guided by the mysterious "Guardian Angel", the player is searching for a fabled vault full of alien loot. Borderlands is characterized by its offbeat humor and a cartoonish, cel-shaded art style.

About 4.5 million copies of the game had been sold worldwide by 2011, an unexpected success for Gearbox. Borderlands received positive reviews, with an aggregate Metacritic score of 81 to 86, depending on the platform. It was complemented by four DLC packs: The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned, Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot, The Secret Armory of General Knoxx, and Claptrap's New Robot Revolution.

A remastered version for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One – Borderlands: Game of the Year Edition – was released on April 3, 2019.^[9] It was released for Nintendo Switch version, which released on May 29, 2020.^[10]