I'm going to pop in my preview of the Battleborn beta for those interested, but the long and short of it is that I still can't quite put my finger on the game's pulse. The MOBA aspects were somewhat interesting, and I can see the draw for the crowd that truly enjoys that style. The Campaign felt entirely in Gearbox's wheel house (gearhouse?) with some witty writing and some genuine moments that made me do that little scoff laugh that Borderlands always did so well. I walked away feeling a little more convinced that my friends that spent hundreds of hours in the Borderlands franchise might actually find some fun in this game. But then after reflecting a bit more I think I've nailed down my concerns. Keep in mind these are just for me, but hopefully it'll help me air them out, and maybe someone out there can prove me wrong and sway me to the "yeah definitely" camp.

Some of the characters are great, some are ok, and some are just...they just are.

The Deutsches Robot Marquis is awesome. ISIC has some fun lines, Oscar Mike is a fun shooter character. But there are some characters that maybe I just don't know how to use, but I can't shake the feeling they're either out of place or going to be rarely utilized. Rath comes to mind, as a melee character in a MOBA shooter I felt like I was dying constantly.

Single player is a little boring

While it's fun to go through the story on your own to see the writing - the three campaign missions I played were well done and fun, but still felt awful lonely. It also felt again like you pretty much had to use an offensive/assault character as there wasn't any benefit to bringing a healer or defender along for the ride.

Identity Crisis

I don't know that Battleborn has a clear identity. Sure it might actually know what it is, and Gearbox might have done its best to clearly define it, but it still feels like that in-between of Overwatch and the likes of SMITE or League of Legends. The comparisons are inescapable, and if Overwatch can nail gameplay and story together, the case for picking up Battleborn becomes a little weaker.

Preview Writeup

Here's my previously-elsewhere-posted preview for those that didn't get in or want more of an opinion on what was actually found there. For me, the jury is most definitely still out, but I like what Gearbox has done in the past, and there are glints of greatness in Battleborn. Time will tell if they should've just made a pretty new Borderlands instead.

Battleborn is a bold step for developer Gearbox, fusing what put them on the map in a huge way in Borderlands, with what seems to be the new, hot thing. Battlebornlooks to take Gearbox’s mastery of the first person, loot-driven shooter into the more competitive, and increasingly crowded realm of MOBA. We were lucky enough to get our hands on a pre-release build of the frenetic first person fare, and are ready to give you our in-depth preview after a few hours with the game.

Characters

Battleborn kicks off with an art style that will nearly immediately seem familiar yet evolved. The cartoonish nature of the art and character design lends itself to some fantastical possibilities, with each character being wholly independent, unique, and memorable. With over 25 total characters unlockable through either story progression or Commander Rank (more on that later) the stable of total avatars is deep and makes the feat of earning each character seem easily doable. Characters like Kleese, Marquis, and Ghalt are all interesting and well voiced through the few story chapters played. Each also have their own unique attacks, taunts, and some skins that seem to be merely color pallet swaps, at least upon first glance (we didn’t unlock and variations that were notable in our fairly brief time with the preview build, totaling about 10 hours). The characters themselves seem as though they’re just that; characters. Marquis is a Germanic robot sniper gentleman. Ghalt is a cigar chomping, shotgun blasting, trenchcoat wearing assault character. Each of them is interesting and at least flirts with being worthy of investigating their backstory and lore, which is actually unlocked in a menu by playing with the character and completing certain tasks across multiple modes.

Leveling

Players level in a few different ways; character and commander. Character leveling happens by performing well with said character in their role, as some are assault, some healing, and some support. Most of the roles aren’t anything new but harkening back to the variety mentioned earlier in the preview, each of them do their individual roles in very different ways. Leveling up your character individually will allow for new taunts, skins, and even some lore and backstory to be fleshed out.

Commander Rank on the other hand carries across multiple characters and are a better reflection of your total game progression and ability. Commander rank allows players to grab more loadouts to activate during a given match, to unlock more titles and badges to showcase their prowess.

Multiplayer

Battleborn’s PvP modes focus on a few key modes;

Incursion Mode; escort minions to the enemy side to take out two spider-like sentry turrets while trying to stop the opposing team from doing the same.

Meltdown Mode; guide the minions to incinerators – essentially little gates they need to get to be gobbled up and get your team points. Stop the enemy from getting their minions eaten by either destroying the minions or the other team, or both.

Capture Mode; As it sounds, capture the designated areas and hold them to earn more points than the other team to win.

Each mode in the game (including single player) has shards as a sort of currency that is collected by destroying larger shards and spending them on turrets and other defenses. In our time with the preview build this proved nearly invaluable in attaining victory. Turrets come in varieties as well; defensive traps and offensive projectile focused. Strategically getting more and more shards as well as having teammates place the turrets is absolutely crucial to slowing down or completely halting an enemy advance.

While these modes were each individually fun for different reasons, they each seemed to be fairly similar in scope. Their end-game was different of course, but they all had the feeling that the best way to go about it was coordination and teamwork, but during preview it was a bit tougher to organize those very teammates, and the AI was near worthless from a support standpoint.

Campaign

The story of Battleborn is told through an almost Saturday-morning cartoon style, with a fun intro that showcases each of the human-controlled Battleborn in a quick cut fashion. Playing through the campaign is what made the apparent attitude, good writing, and fun atmosphere they’re going for with Battleborn really shine through. That token Gearbox sense of humor makes more than a few appearances through the course of each of the missions, providing moments of levity when it feels like things are a little too hot.

The setting of each story mission played during the preview, 3 in total, were each distinct and neat to look around. Each had interesting things going on in the background, and felt pretty big even if a bit directed, but that’s somewhat expected when you’re looking to play through a narrative story. Enemy variety was essentially drilled down to a few enemy types across only about 2-3 species. Granted this is just a preview build but it wasn’t far into the second mission before it became clear that once you identify the more challenging enemies to focus on, strategy becomes much easier.

For me, not necessarily the person drawn to a MOBA, the story showcased was interesting enough for me to want to see what else happens. It also allowed for the choice of any character unlocked thus far to be used, so if you’re an assault fan and want to power through the story solo, go right ahead. It’s a little more challenging to try to go through the game as a healer solo, as you’re not really dealing damage, but simply hitting the matchmaking is an option for the player hoping to just jump in.

The Pre-Bottom Line

Battleborn looks to do a lot of interesting thing and is seriously chock-full of content. So much so that it wouldn’t all fit in this preview. The MOBA aspects are fun and could hold a ton of competitive potential and might even serve as some great viewing material on services like YouTube Gaming or Twitch. The campaign also holds the iconic Gearbox style in many ways, and looks to hold a lot of fun and variation if the team delivers a fleshed out experience in length. Overall Battleborn deserves a look for the first-person fan of more than a few genres, and if it can deliver a well-rounded experience might just be one of the most unique and long-lasting games to hit in 2016.

Battleborn releases on May 3, 2016 for PC, Xbox One, and PlayStation 4.