It’s just a few days now until Borderlands 2 VR graces PSVR headsets everywhere, bringing pretty much the entire original game into VR. As developer Gearbox has said from the start, though, there is one crucial feature missing in this version: co-op. Borderlands 2 VR is a single-player only experience, which has come as disappointing news to some, but Gearbox has finally explained its thinking behind this decision.
In a recent gameplay commentary video with IGN (which you can see below), Borderlands 2 VR lead designer Jacob Lavender talked a bit about why the team took co-op out of the game. “What we do want, is that when you pick up BL2VR, it’s still the same story, but it’s completely different gameplay,” he explained. “And we wanted to give you that experience that’s like “Hey, I’ve played through this but now it’s different, it’s new, it’s fresh.””
That’s why the game is fitted with new features, like the BAMF system that slows down time to allow you to get in extra shots at your enemies. “And with single-player, that was one of those things that gave us that opportunity to put in things like BAMF time and teleportation and to really pump those up 11 and make it as strong as you possibly could be,” Lavender added. “To make you a complete, total badass, moreso than you’ve ever been before because we didn’t have to worry about it messing up the balance of the game.”
Will these new additions make up for the lack of co-op play that has previously defined the Borderlands experience? The jury’s still out on that, but we’ll have our full verdict later this week when the game goes live.
