Borderlands 4 includes a seamless open world, however your journey appears to culminate in an assault on the Timekeeper’s stronghold metropolis, Dominion. Although not a lot is thought concerning the densest setting in Borderlands’ historical past, Gearbox gave me a guided tour of the town. Whereas I am unable to share the whole lot I noticed and heard, right here is the whole lot I can say about this late-game zone.
In distinction to a lot of the remainder of Borderlands 4’s open world, you do not get entry to Dominion till later within the sport when you’re in your march to confront the Timekeeper. Utilizing an occasion that happens on Pandora’s moon, Elpis, which is now within the orbit of Kairos, the Vault Hunters can enter Dominion with the hopes of dealing with off towards the Timekeeper.
As soon as contained in the partitions of Dominion, issues aren’t as orderly because the Timekeeper’s obsession would lead you to consider. The assorted Borderlands 4 factions are at one another’s throats inside the metropolis limits, and, with out spoiling something, the town is not fairly what I anticipated coming in; the Timekeeper values order at any value, however the metropolis by which he bases his operations feels oddly chaotic. As I watch artistic director Graeme Timmins give me a tour, the Timekeeper taunts his Vault Hunter of their ear.
And regardless of the Vault Hunters knocking on the door, he is holding his composure. “Though we’re breaking in, actually making an attempt to get to the Timekeeper, he is nonetheless in his factor,” senior venture producer Anthony Nicholson says. “He is nonetheless very calm and positive of his plan and what he has in retailer.”
However even when enjoying solo, the Vault Hunter storming Dominion will not be alone. “Clearly, you make lots of pals alongside your manner, and so they’re all going to assist and contribute to your time right here within the metropolis,” Timmins says.
All through the sport, gamers can see Dominion within the distance, just like how Hyrule Citadel is at all times seen to gamers in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. It is deliberately positioned in order that gamers are conscious of the objective, and it stays front-of-mind. “As you are beginning your journey in Fadefields, you may see that tower within the distance,” international artistic government and former Sport Informer editor-in-chief Andrew Reiner says. “That is really there. That is not a skybox. It is not within the background. [You] can fly out of right here, again to the place to begin of the sport. That content material is at all times there.”
Dominion serves as the house of Borderlands 4’s principal antagonist, the Timekeeper
The design of Dominion appropriately feels just like the fruits of the sport, as every zone you visited in the remainder of the sport has a devoted biome inside the metropolis limits. Moreover, the town is extraordinarily dense and vertically oriented, with quite a few locations to climb and discover. “As you progress all through the missions and undergo every of those totally different districts, you get extra of the story that is evolving and unfolding,” Nicholson says.
Timmins and Nicholson share further particulars, each about Dominion and the Timekeeper, which I will not disclose within the curiosity of sustaining surprises. Nevertheless, Timmins is happy for gamers to discover this space. “There are lots of vital story moments that occur right here within the metropolis,” he says. “It’s a entire ‘nother zone’s price of content material. It is also probably the most content-packed. Being the town, we prioritized actually making it really feel like an city sprawl. We slammed collectively a number of places which are stacked on high of one another.”
The primary story offers you a tour of the varied districts inside Dominion, which, like Borderlands 4’s open world, could be explored seamlessly. However gamers can go off the overwhelmed path to expertise further content material. “There’s tons extra side-missions which are positioned right here as effectively,” Timmins says. “Truly, a few of my private favourite side-missions occur to be within the metropolis. And so they’re fairly prolonged, too. Among the side-missions in Dominion, specifically, have lots of chained missions that you find yourself spending lots of time with a few of these NPCs, and a few of the relationships you really make within the side-missions within the metropolis, specifically – or at the least for me – stand out as a few of the extra attention-grabbing ones.”
There have been loads of extra particulars to cowl surrounding Dominion, however I withheld them from this story for the sake of avoiding spoilers. Suffice it to say, the environmental storytelling will shatter a few of your preconceived notions you will have had coming into Dominion for the primary time. For those who’re itching to storm Dominion and take down the Timekeeper, you do not have for much longer to attend, as Borderlands 4 arrives on September 12.
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