I’ve three cups. Under certainly one of these cups is Irrational Games. When I spin them round and round, will you already know the place the studio is? Can you ensure?
It’s simple sufficient to maintain observe within the early part – Irrational stays in place till it’s acquired by Take-Two, turning into 2K Boston for the making of BioShock. Afterwards it swaps again, turning into Irrational once more till Ken Levine publicizes the studio’s closure in 2014.
Right? Wrong. Look once more. Watch my palms.
After System Shock 2, Irrational turns into two studios, one in Massachusetts, one other in Canberra. They transfer collectively in tandem, even when the primary turns into 2K Boston and the second 2K Australia. Then one thing unusual occurs: whereas Ken Levine’s studio regains the Irrational title, 2K Australia doesn’t. Instead it vanishes beneath one other cup, that of BioShock 2 developer 2K Marin. When the world mourns the closing of Irrational Games in 2014, the Australian division nonetheless exists. It continues to take action for greater than a 12 months afterwards – however only a few individuals discover, their consideration directed elsewhere.
The trick has two essential takeaways. First, that writer sleight of hand can see even probably the most acclaimed builders slide into obscurity, their passing unacknowledged. And second, that BioShock Infinite wasn’t Irrational’s final game. Instead, it was Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel.
You can see why Take-Two thought-about it match. Borderlands 2 had been stunningly successful, and would go on to promote 22 million copies. But collection developer Gearbox wanted a break, and 2K Australia was a seasoned shooter studio out there in-house – one which had labored on all three BioShocks, no much less.
It’s solely on reflection {that a} stopgap spin-off looks as if a wierd swansong for Irrational Games. This was a undertaking with restricted alternative for the excessive ideas or deep ambiance that had made the developer a family title. And but in case you’re trying carefully, Irrational’s stamp is there, regardless that it’s not on the field.
The Pre-Sequel is a game that couldn’t be extra Australian if its weapons fired the corks from hats offered to vacationers. It opens to the grungy tones of The Vines, Sydney’s most well-known purveyors of screamed harmonies. Quest givers bellow about billabongs, and jumbucks discovered beneath coolibah timber. The respiratory equipment that permits outsiders to outlive on Pandora’s moon is named the Oz Kit. And the locals want you a “bonza day” on the Up Over Bar – named as if these down beneath had, when confronted with infinite house, picked a brand new dwelling as far out and excessive in surroundings because the one they’d simply left. It’s the form of relentless lampooning that’s solely acceptable when self-inflicted – in itself a attribute of Australian comedy.
Beyond the oxygen they supply, the Oz Kits are the best supply of Irrational spirit in Borderlands. By burning off their oxygen, you may give your vault hunter slightly enhance – letting you slip the chains of this moon’s already low gravity. There’s a tactical consideration: expend an excessive amount of of that candy O2 and also you’ll face deteriorating well being, forcing you to place apart your present goal and discover extra.
Certain expertise grant injury boosts for preventing in mid-air, however you’d do it anyway: one-shotting a skav’s oxygen bubble with a sniper rifle whereas sliding sideways via the syrupy ambiance is its personal reward. In that sense, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is an surprising successor to Tribes: Vengeance, the acclaimed jetpack FPS Irrational made in 2004. That, too, was about bobbing via science fiction services, solely connecting with the bottom in order that you may hurl your weight in a brand new path.
In The Pre-Sequel, missions place a brand new give attention to platforming, whereas ranges emphasise verticality and exploration. It’s not as if Borderlands has abruptly, with the addition of a brand new mechanic, remodeled into an immersive sim – however there’s something of System Shock’s tactility in the way in which you’re requested to deal with the moon’s frontier equipment. Often computer systems and mechanisms don’t work as they need to till you give them thump.
If Irrational despatched Borderlands’ capturing airborne, the studio efficiently grounded its story, which advantages from having Gearbox at arm’s size. Although Borderlands 2 lead author Anthony Burch did contribute to the script, 2K Australia’s writers seem to have reigned within the collection’ tendency in direction of gatling gun dialogue. Story sequences now not resemble a supercut of the wackiest NPCs in Far Cry.
It doesn’t damage that Claptrap is made a playable character – which sarcastically makes his marmite shtick far simpler to keep away from – or that Handsome Jack is given an honest-to-god character arc, monitoring his growth from hapless Hyperion firm man to gleeful gorer of excellent guys. 2K Australia well makes use of aspect quests as an excuse to deepen its characters, like junk supplier Janey Springs, whose floor sweetness belies a tragic backstory. It solely took an out of doors studio to change the degrees of Borderlands’ brash comedy and discover one thing resembling allure.
It’s only a disgrace that studio by no means started working on the rest, folding as Take-Two tried to cut back its spending in an costly a part of the world. For all The Pre-Sequel’s positives, it’s not a becoming ship off for 2K Australia – inevitably diluted by the enterprise of slotting into another person’s universe. The developer as soon as referred to as Irrational deserved an opportunity to reestablish its status as an originator of daring concepts, however ran out of air earlier than it may.
Source
