Tag: Toil and Trouble

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Conflict in Sawtooth – Borderlands 2 S03E06 – True Vault Hunter Mode

“Just go collect some explosives”, says Brick. What could be more easy?

This turned into a pitched battle through the Main Street Reservoir and Cramfist’s foundry, before annoying Mortar enough to allow us to ascend the elevator and steal some explosives.

The difficulty is really starting to ramp up now, and this video contains a number of deaths for both of us! I’m finding that sometimes my weapon load-out leaves a little to be desired, so it may be time to return to Sanctuary to spend some of the Gold Keys I’ve accumulated.

The battles in this episode were often very busy, with lots of high level bad guys to take on. Some of my deaths were a little frustrating personally, as it always seemed like I would be attacked and almost killed by the sole enemy, leaving me with next to nobody to kill in order to revive myself.

Borderlands 2’s rather comedy driving physics also made another entrance right at the end of the video, where both JBG and I sped over a seemingly flat bridge, only for both our cars to end up almost taking off as if we’d driven up a 45° ramp and end up performing some sort of bizarre mating ritual for a few seconds!

Next video should see us heading to the Hyperion Info Stockade to find the location of the Warrior. Should be fun!

Considering we’re only in Sawtooth to find splosives there’s a whole lot of fightin’ happenin’ to get to them splosives. ‘Specially given the amount of ordinance laying about in B2, you’d think it’d be a little easier.

However, Sawtooth is one of the best levels of gameplay with varied environments both indoors and outdoors, wide-open spaces and street-level fighting. It is enormous fun. Not to mention this gold pistol is still kicking ass.

We both died in Sawtooth too, which I don’t particularly care to do. It was one of those situations where a stray shot takes you down, and the only co-located bad guy is a super-powered midget who’s hairline you can barely see over the top of the platform. You’d prefer not to die, but it happens, I guess.
We’d already spent a while here in the last session and spent the best part of an hour here getting out.

Sawtooth is always good fun and this time was no different, save for the dying that is.

 

 

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The Darkest Hour – Borderlands 2 S03E05 – True Vault Hunter Mode

We’d fought our way up to the Bunker in the last video, so now it was time to infiltrate it and meet Angel.

We had a good battle with a horde of robots while trying to take out the autocannons, before finding out that the Bunker wasn’t actually a place, but actually BNK3R, the defence mechanism Jack had put in place around the core containing Angel.

Battling lots of robots is always great fun, and when you add in a high-level, well-armed, flying droid into the mix, things get better and better! After dispatching BNK3R, I found a rather nice view off the edge of a waterfall, only to find the current of the water I was standing in pushed me off the edge to a rather embarrassing death!

Further robot battles were the order of the day as we infiltrated the Core, with Roland and Lillith turning up to help us. Angel was duly dispatched, only for Jack to appear, kill Roland and take Lillith hostage.

Our next mission was to infiltrate the Hyperion Info Stockade to find out where the Warrior was. As ever things were never as simple as they seemed, as the bridge to the Arid Nexus was drawn up in front of us, meaning we had to to find sufficient explosives to effect entry.

After our synchronised deaths at the hands of some high-level Bullymongs, we found some more enjoyable combat as we fought our way through Sawtooth Cauldron and Smoking Guano Grotto. The next video should see us fighting to get the explosives, bring it on!

There is a moment in a good story where you hit your lowest point, usually as you approach Act Three. Probably someone important dies or almost dies. Above all the moment tells you the bad guys are in total control. This moment in storytelling is called The Darkest Hour.

Borderlands 2 has endured for so long because it is propped up by a good story. The attack on the Bunker is the false high at the back of Act Two, as we reach and then kill Angel which turns into the darkest hour when Jack appears and kills Roland. With Jack in total control of the story, we have no choice but to fight back, starting with our quest to hack the Hyperion computer systems by gaining access to the Arid Nexus.

As per the last few sessions, my golden pistol was deadly, its use by me is described in some detail in previous blogs if you’re interested.

Although Roland’s death is shocking the proceeding attack on Angel’s bunker is a grind occasionally bordering on fun, see knee-high laser beams as an example of making gameplay difficult over challenging. The same applies to Angel’s crypt too. I always love killing robots but the obstacles often make it a slog.

Sawtooth Canyon is a lot more fun and has always been a section I look forward to, mostly because of the varied environments and bad guys, requiring different tactics and gunplay approaches. The section is so long we resolve it in the next video.

So, see you in the next one as we trawl deep into the major conflict of Act Three 🙂