Posted by Last week I took a look at Borderlands 4‘s new Takedown endgame mission. Since then, I finally went in and cleared the new “A Zane to Kill For” Bounty Pack, and the Circle of Slaughter that came with it. I think that it’s a decent little DLC, though I’ll have to touch on the pricing later.
SPOILERS FOLLOW
The story is pretty simple: Zane uses digital clones of himself to store his memories, and he keeps them safe inside an arcade game. One of the clones gets murdered, so he tasks you with going inside the game and tracking down the culprit. It turns out that one of Zane’s memory clones did it because this clone has all of Zane’s worst memories, so he’s grown to resent the man and the other clones.
The mission is fun. I enjoyed the story and the detective mystery. My favorite part about the story was how my Vault Hunter, Vex, was really getting into the noir voiceover and mannerisms. It was a fun example of the Vault Hunter’s personality shining through. I will say that I found the combat surprisingly difficult. Again, it’s worth noting that I play on the highest difficulty (Ultimate Vault Hunter 7). Some of the combat was honestly brutal, and I think a lot of it had to do with the new glitch enemies. They’re really tanky and like to switch places with other enemies, making them quite a nuisance.
The Bounty Pack adds in three bosses. I found it an interesting choice to put two of them fairly off the beaten path and entirely hidden, especially when the last Bounty Pack just made them optional parts of the mission. There are also a bunch of coins you can collect throughout the level that will allow you to open chests in Zane’s Arcade. I do like how you’re incentivized to really explore the map and level. As for the bosses, the two side bosses are fine. Aesthetically, they’re basically the same thing, which is a little boring. They do vary with their attacks, and one of them has a particularly obnoxious one where he becomes immune to damage until you shoot a bunch of orb things. The final boss is solid. He has a few phases and brings out some minibosses midway through, so I can definitely see him being a more annoying fight to reliably farm. I do like him and I think he has a good variety of attacks that don’t feel too frustrating or gimmicky. I also like how his second phase recalls classic arcade bullet hells.
Turning to the loot, there are six new legendaries and a pearlescent. The pearl is a Daedalus SMG called the Raiden that spawns powerups on a kill that increase the number of projectiles you shoot. Apparently it’s pretty effective, especially because its special ability can apply to other weapons too (or at least ordnance guns). The Artillery Sphere is a legendary Ripper grenade that spawns a turret buddy of sorts. I haven’t used it, but I love the idea of having more turret buddies. The Brickhouse is a Vladof SMG that can spawn bouncing projectiles. I foresee it being a solid mobbing tool, or absolutely useless. The Cooper Duper is Maliwan heavy weapon that spawns barrels. I have no idea how powerful the barrels are, but the mere fact that it spawns barrels when it shoots is really funny. Discy Business is a Maliwan shotgun that fires a disc projectile that can bounce between enemies. It’s fine. It could just be because I’m specced into kinetic damage so elemental weapons don’t do much for me, but the weapon seemed average when I used it. The Hard Dark is a Daedalus assault rifle with, you guessed it, more ricocheting projectiles. The version I used was not very good. It also chews through ammo so you lowkey spend more time reloading than shooting. I can’t deny that I’m a little bored of legendaries sharing all of these effects. Lastly, the Hugger is a Ripper repkit that lets you deal continuous shock damage and reflect bullets on use. It looks like an actually interesting legendary, so that’s cool. Overall, I think the loot is fine. I don’t know if any of these weapons completely redefine the meta, and that’s alright. There doesn’t need to be a new best weapon with every single update.
In addition to the mission, new map, bosses, and loot, there’s also a new Vault Card (Battle Pass). However, unlike with “The Legend of the Stone Demon,” this Vault Card is sold separately. It’s an interesting decision for sure, though one that doesn’t change anything for me because I bit the bullet and got the edition that came with everything. I do think that separating the mission and the Vault Card isn’t a terrible idea because it means that players can choose what they want to get, if anything. As for its loot, it comes with plenty of new cosmetics and four legendaries. Cosmetics are cosmetics. I’m not going to pretend that they’re anything special, but I will say that I’m a little bored of all the heads that just replace the Vault Hunter’s head with a random robot head. Some of the skins are pretty cool though, namely the ones with glitchy effects for your characters. Turning to the weapons, we have the Cormano Torgue shotgun that shoots bullets in a weird pattern. Why do they keep giving us Torgue shotguns that just shoot in a weird pattern? Again, it’s a little boring. Next up is the Light Gun Vladof sniper. It can’t be reloaded normally, but instead requires you to crouch for a second. It’s a unique gimmick that’s a fun callback to the old arcade game it’s referencing, but I don’t see it making the gun particularly good. The Over Swarm is Ripper shield that spawns kill drones when it breaks. I love me some kill drones, so I might try using this one. Lastly, there’s the Rhythm Order assault rifle that rewards you for charging it to a certain threshold before shooting. I like that idea. I think it’ll make the gun interesting and fun to use, and it looks fairly solid as a result. It is an Order gun, so it might not be the most popular, but I’m looking forward to trying it out.
Turning to the Circle of Slaughter mode, it’s an arena gauntlet where you have to survive three waves of enemies. You can call it after each set of three waves and get your loot, or keep pushing through another set to get more loot, capping out at five rounds total. It’s fine. Truth be told, I find a lot of those “just kill enemies” modes to become rather repetitive, but again, more content is always good. It does seem to be a good way to get high quality loot, though as things stand, I think the Takedown is still definitively the best source of loot at the moment.
SPOILERS END
Overall, “A Zane to Kill For” isn’t a bad piece of new content. The Bounty Pack itself comes out to $6, which I think is reasonable. Consequently, the Vault Card is also $6. I do not think that that price tag is reasonable. I think that the Vault Card is at most worth $4. But of course, the Bounty Pack combo has to total $12 to fit the pre-established prices established by Bounty Pack #2. I think that Bounty Pack #3 is fine. I’m glad I picked it up, and I’ve enjoyed my time with it. However, it’s nothing game changing. It’s going to be more of the same, so if you like that with Borderlands 4, you’ll enjoy the new Bounty Pack.
Broad Scope Entertainment 