No bile-belching zombies, no Ned, no loot box, no problem. The third "Bordlerlands" add-on, "The Secret Armory of General Knoxx" doesn't build on the two previous pieces of content. Rather, it focuses on what makes "Borderlands" great: the items, the grind, and remarkable locations and foes. So, yeah, I liked it.
The Basics
"General Knoxx" is a continuation of the core game. Beginning in a post-Vault Pandora, you'll learn that the Atlas Corporation and their Crimson Lances plan to return to the loot-rich planet en masse. The goal is to stop them, and thanks to the guidance offered from a red-armored broad named Athena, it's possible to obliterate their fresh and evil foothold.
In short, "General Knoxx" is about killing people across several environments connected via a series of high and snaking highways. The size of each locale makes driving a necessity, but the numerous opportunities to abandon car and enter into bullet-spewing sections rife with the promise of drops and potential gore are the real driving force behind a package that ultimately feels and plays like the extension of the RPG it was meant to be.
The Highs
One More Time With Feeling
EXP matters again. "General Knoxx" expands the level cap to 61, and thus keeps its new foes, locales, and loot interesting. The larger cap also makes you much more prone to partake in the piles and piles of filler fetch quests that line the DLC to such an extent that you'll spend over ten hours doing them all.
Different Places, New and Old Faces
Starting from a hotbed of Pandora, T-Bone Junction, you'll blast through numerous scorched landscapes and industrial constructs, each with the slightest yet appealing twists -- a touch of graffiti or damage here or there, or even surprise oases of doom, despair, Lancers, and loot. Combined with set pieces like "The World's Largest Bullet," these touches on the locales make for a unique experience.
New and familiar faces are scattered throughout. Each has its own quirks, building off the sporadic, downplayed humor in the core game. Some characters are too over-the-top, but some, like Scooter and General Knoxx, will elicit a chuckle or two while you're blowing off the heads of more than a dozen fresh, DLC-specific villains.
More "Borderlands"
A flawed gem, "Borderlands" managed to incite loot-grind fever. This brings back that wicked feeling, getting you interested in the game and its elements all over again. You'll even want to bring friends, too. The addition of a four-person car, and the relative difficulty of the level 50 and above content, encourages cooperative action, which is still the game's best feature.
The Lows
Enough to Make Newton Cry
Using one of the three DLC vehicles can be as hazardous as crossing one of the massive, circuitous landscapes on foot. The vehicle physics are busted, while the controls remain fickle and unrefined. You'll spin your cars in circles, flip them over, miss ramps, clip through rocks, and even get stuck in them. The car is often a danger rather than convenient transportation. You might often find them scarier than the occasional gigantic soul-sucking monster.
Why Do I Do These Things?
The overarching mission is made clear, but other facets of this new Crimson Lance invasion are clouded in poor explanation. Events aren't bridged well, and characters lack layers of depth, too. But I suppose this is "Borderlands," after all.
Killing Can Be Too Easy or Hard
Level scaling has always been a problem with "Borderlands" DLC, and "General Knoxx" doesn't surprise. Foes' levels stay at whatever you started with and sometimes don't readjust if a higher or lower level user joins the match. This could be a bug on my end, but after several trials, I'm forced to believe the scaling is broken.
The Verdict
"General Knoxx" feels like "More Borderlands: The Sequel to Borderlands," which is just fine. The new missions, characters, foes and landscapes bolster a piece of content that recaptures the vibe and core grind of "Borderlands." Grab it if you want to fall in love again or need to ignore your cats for a few hours.