Gearbox gave players a simple mission with the 2009 release of Borderlands: Find the Vault. You're a Vault Hunter, you love guns, and the Vault is chock-full of all things explosive and deadly. Truly a match made in heaven. Unfortunately, Pandora couldn't cash that particular check. After trudging across the hostile planet, fending off all manner of baddies and beasties and bosses, players finally reach the fabled Vault. And for what? A disappointingly easy boss fight and a distinct lack of reward. Promises of Caustic Quadruple-Barreled Explod-o-Guns were not met. It's an ending so terrible that Gearbox themselves mock it in Borderlands 2; narrator and arms dealer Marcus Kincaid calls the Vault "a container of tentacles and disappointment," echoing the collective "What!?" of players who completed the original.
A freelance games writer, you say? Typically battling his current RPG addiction and ceaseless perfectionism? A fan of horror but too big a sissy to play for more than a couple of hours? Spends far too much time on JRPGs and gets way too angry with card games?
Well that doesn't sound anything like me.
