The second DLC pack for "Borderlands" (one of my favorite games of 2009) has arrived, offering a pretty unique twist to the original game's experience. But is it worth $10? Let's take a look!
The Basics
Inspired by "Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome," "Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot" consists of 3 large arena maps and a small lobby map. Hoping into one of the arenas via the lobby kicks off a tournament which plays out a lot like "Smash TV" or, more recently, Firefight Mode in "Halo 3: ODST." Waves of different enemies will spawn in and you basically have to survive. Last long enough and the game will be reward you with delightful guns.
The layout of each tournament is as follows:
Small Tournament - 5 waves of enemies per round with five rounds in total. (Estimated length: 45 minutes)
Big Tournament - 5 waves of enemies per round with 20 rounds in total. (Estimated length: 4 hours)
The Highs
Refreshing Rule Sets
The five waves in each round feature different enemy types. For example, the second wave is always the "Gun Wave," where enemies all carry firearms. The fifth wave is always the Boss Wave, where you'll face one of the main game's main baddies.
This keeps things sorta fresh, but rules (known in the dev team as Moxxi Maxims) really help to mix things up. Once you get to the fifth round, a new rule will be added at the beginning of a wave. Rules range from "Beef Cake" (increased enemy health) and "Close Combat" (lower player accuracy but increased damage) to "Low Gravity" (super jumps!) and "Naked" (player has no shield). You basically need to come prepared with a nice array of weapons to be able to handle whatever rules the game throws at you, as your play style will change dramatically depending on the current rules. Here's a full list of them, if you're interested.
More Co-Op Friendly
While the main game of "Borderlands" was always improved by having friends along for the ride, it was never required. "Mad Moxxi" doesn't require co-op, either, but it's almost mandatory if you want to stand a chance against the harder rounds. It encourages teamwork and allows players to coordinate their layouts to compliment strengths and weaknesses. This was never something people did in the main game, preferring to simply have the best personal loot. It's definitely a nice change of pace.
The Bank
"Mad Moxxi" introduces a much-needed item bank feature to "Borderlands," allowing you to store up to 42 of your favorite weapons. This is capped by your level, and you unlock more slots by purchasing upgrades in the nearby weapon store. Finally I have a place for all those fancy oranges that are basically worthless but fire bullets in a happy face pattern!
The Lows
Big Tournament Length
The small tournament is a perfect 45 minutes, which seems like a pretty common length of time for gamers with other priorities. The big tournament, however, takes at least three and a half hours, which is probably twice as long as it should be. There are spots to take breaks in the midst of that, but if you leave or, god forbid, the host's console shuts down, all your progress will be lost.
Considering the reward for completing all three achievements is a bonus skill point (an extremely valuable asset at level 50), having to start a 3.5 hour journey from scratch would drive me up a wall. At the very least there should've been a checkpoint at Round 10 that allows you to continue on from that point with subsequent play throughs. I realize that the idea was to make this DLC pack more hardcore, but I think Gearbox may have gone a little overboard.
Needs More Maps
Given that you're spending upwards of 15 hours in these maps, it would've been nice to have seen one or two more thrown in there. The three arena maps, while interesting, are likely to get a little stale.
Loot Rewarding
I guess it remains true to tenants of "Borderlands," but I wish there was another way to reward loot at the end of the round. Currently, when you finish a round, random loot rains down from the center of the arena. This is fine if you're playing with friends, but with random folks it just turns into a cash grab and people end up camping at the center point to ensure they get the best stuff.
The game actually keeps track of how many kills each player gets, so it would've been nice if loot was rewarded based on group contribution rather than greed, but in the end I guess it's your own fault for not having real friends to play with. Or for having friends that are jerks.
Final Word
If you found "Borderlands" too easy, "Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot" is refreshingly challenging and well worth your time. I strongly recommend playing it with friends and, if you're going for one of the big tournaments, blocking out a big chunk of a Saturday afternoon to get through it. The gameplay variety and overall aesthetic fits extremely well for the franchise and I wouldn't mind seeing this idea expanded with more maps, modifiers and enemy types.