Test: Borderlands 2 VR

To celebrate the six-year anniversary of the comic book Wild West shooter "Borderlands 2", Sony and Gearbox Software announced a complete VR port of the first-person shooter in October. This is now a reality: the VR remake was released on Friday, 14 December in the PlayStation Store. But is it worth paying around 60 francs for a VR port? The bad news first: the VR version of "Borderlands 2 VR" comes without the multiplayer mode. That's basically a shame, because the co-op gameplay in particular was very popular with many players. Whether the VR reincarnation is also interesting for gamers who only know the original in passing was something I was able to test out on myself because I played "Borderlands 2" a little longer just a few weeks ago. That's what I have to report now.

Technical limitations of the PSVR version

Those who normally play first-person shooters on the PC and are thus not a fan of tactical and zombie-heavy console shootouts without a mouse and keyboard may usually have more trouble with the analogue stick controls. Those who are used to the genre on a game console will certainly agree that the turning and dodging movements react very nimbly and finely or should at least allow the necessary adjustments via the options menu. In fact, "Borderlands 2" is one of those exceptions for me. Here, the looking and moving has already become a real challenge for me in the "Handsome Collection"-edition of the PS4 works smoothly with the two sticks. But now we have to talk about the VR port, and there are a few familiar hurdles with Sony's Move controllers. For one thing, we don't have any additional analogue sticks or touch surfaces on the Move controllers like you find on the Rift Touch and Windows Mixed Reality styluses or the trackpads on the Vive controllers. In addition, the simpler LED tracking of the PSVR system does not always behave as precisely as a room-scaling setup with the sensors of the PC glasses due to the hardware. This is where pleasurable VR gameplay differences such as "Skyrim VR" This is definitely noticeable when you go through the PSVR exclusive story again with room scaling and high-precision tracking. We also have to live with this cutback in the 180-degree capture range of the PS4 camera, but right away: it depends a lot, like you play "Borderlands 2 VR".

A wide range of comfort options

In the space western scenario, both control options have been implemented with many good intentions from my point of view, within the framework of the technical possibilities, whereby I am more comfortable with the movement scheme of the Dual Shock 4 controller and find the Move sticks a nice change so that I don't always have to sit. The Move controllers work similarly well as in "Skyrim VR". You press the middle button on the left glow stick and then move in the desired direction, while at the same time you can look in all directions. Two buttons on the right Move controller allow you to quickly change direction to the left and right. To prevent you from getting sick, the quick turns are preset as a comfortable 45-degree angle. There is a main choice between hopping and moving and teleporting and moving. I usually opt for teleport and motion because bouncing with the Move controllers can give me vertigo. The main problem with the Move controllers: enemies are always attacking you from all possible directions and you can occasionally hop into the void or unknowingly stick your butt in front of the flamethrower of the bigger enemies.

Commendable: The developers have thought of numerous comfort options. In addition to walking speed (fast/slow), you can adjust your body height, the weapon height, curb or switch off the nausea-inhibiting "tunnel vision" while walking and also adjust the snap-turn angle. With the Move controllers, it's as if you're aiming manually with a shotgun or magnum - the Aim Controller is not supported, by the way. And yet, for longer gaming sessions, I usually opt for the Dual Shock 4 controller and settle for rapid turning and walking movements, which might not suit all VR stomachs. The disadvantage: without the Move sticks, the immersion with the hands is unfortunately a little lost. Nevertheless, the action from the crouch is much more fun for me with the Dual Shock controller, because you aim with the line of sight and can react much faster with the analogue sticks. In addition, I can switch between the guns more quickly at the touch of a button. An additional VR weapon wheel in the arm has no place there, even if it looks nice.

The fact that "Borderlands 2 VR" plays less well with the Move controllers may also be due to the fact that the classic has always been designed for quick dodging and aiming, which of course works better with analogue sticks. Nevertheless, the gameplay could have been a tad better while standing: One blockade is the somewhat sluggish teleportation, which should be executable at a higher speed, especially with the Move controllers. Beaming up to higher floors proves to be an additional obstacle, because some levels are captured inaccurately or not at all. Perhaps Gearbox can help out here with an update. But would that change much? It will be interesting to see how the whole thing will play with full room scaling on PC glasses at a later date.

BadAss Mega Fun Time

An extremely cool addition is the berserk slow-motion VR enhancement "BadAss Mega Fun Time" (BAMF), which balances out the hectic action a little in both control schemes and is available secondarily. By pressing the circle button, a slow-motion mode is triggered and you can rush at your opponents for a moment like "Max Payne" or "Matrix" Neo and dodge slowed down for a few seconds. However, you will have to do without any major innovations for virtual reality. The only new feature is the holographic weapon menu for the right hand, which is only available with the Move controllers. And yes: there are also a few amusing VR hints from your constantly annoying tin robot Claptrap, who tells you at the beginning which movements might make you feel sick. This confirms to us just how much the developers have put into the whole overhaul.

Looting is the motto

In "Borderlands 2 VR" you are one of the last "disinfectors" of the planet, so to speak. Because chaos has reigned on "Pandora" for a long time. There was a creep called Handsome Jack. He has always been a notorious tyrant throughout Pandora and has been known to kill exterminators of your ilk. You've even survived that so far - and that's a good thing. Because Handsome Jack is after the raw material Eridium in order to use it to secure his rule over the planet. But that's not all. A huge space station is already in front of the planet. So let's get to work and clean it up.

Keyword "Loot": The mown-down zombies leave behind a lot of usable objects that can either be converted into money or into various weapon upgrades. The sheer selection of shooting irons with alternative functions alone leaves nothing to be desired. The action begins with a double-barreled shotgun, with which you can quickly turn weaker zombies in particular into explosive visceral spaghetti. The first fire pistol soon proves to be very helpful with mutants who are far away, as its explosive rounds immediately set your adversaries on fire and sap a lot of energy from them. In addition, there are a lot of armour upgrades that you can also buy by exchanging materials. And you have to become stronger in order to advance to other regions with more powerful enemies. And, and, and. Various drivable vehicles also help - "Rage" be greeted!

Graphics of the PSVR version of Borderlands 2 VR

Pandora looks very pretty from the console's VR glasses from the first-person perspective. This is also due to the fact that the somewhat older title does not demand excessively high graphics performance from modern hardware. So you can overlook a little edge flicker. The image looks very calm, especially on the more powerful PS4 Pro, and the immersion in VR "got through" to me from the first moment. Nevertheless, I noticed a few shortcomings: As in "Skyrim VR", there are occasional clipping errors where figures suddenly push themselves into an inventory menu. However, this usually only happens at a very close distance to the menu dialogues. And sometimes individual adversaries suddenly hang in the air, having just run towards you from a rocky elevation.

With the Move control, I am also a little taken out of the immersion in another respect: Regardless of all VR settings, I feel like a giant with unnatural size proportions when facing opponents in the standing game mode. This obviously cannot be due to the PS4 camera, as I have recalibrated it several times and, for example, with the Dual Shock controllers, there is less of this "Goliath" feeling.

Due to the lack of a multiplayer mode, the VR staging on the console did not leave me with too monotonous an impression. I found the longer marches in the large worlds rather balancing, because the hustle and bustle in VR is otherwise very hectic. But I can imagine that some players will miss this mode. Gearbox hasn't announced anything yet, but as we all know, hope dies last. It's possible that fans of cooperative multiplayer action will be catered for in the PC versions in a few months' time. In that case, it's probably worth waiting a little longer.

One piece of good news at the end: depending on whether you also want to pursue all the side quests in "Borderlands 2 VR", you can enjoy yourself from 60 to 100 hours in the entire adventure. That's quite a long story.