Posted by Shortly after Borderlands 4 got its third Bounty Pack, the fourth one, “Murders and Acquisitions,” dropped as well. I’ve been sitting on this update for a little while now, but I recently played through it, and I have a few thoughts.
SPOILERS FOLLOW
In the wake of Callis and the Timekeeper’s deaths, there’s a growing power vacuum on Kairos. Corporations are beginning to show up on the planet, and Levaine wants to do something about it. She needs Order tech to do so, but the tech is in the hands of the Rippers, who have since fractured into two factions. One of the factions is actually peaceful, while the other very much isn’t. We’re tasked with getting the Order tech, and to do that we have to break into an ordonite facility that the hotel Rippers are using as a base. But if we want to do that, we need to construct a bomb that can blow open the door, so we get help from a Ripper to do so. Inside the facility, we defeat the new Ripper leader Maxxx Supreme, and get the Order tech from him and his “secret weapon.” Now in possession of the tech, Levaine begins to organize a large-scale alliance between the different factions inhabiting Kairos, including the peaceful Rippers.
The story is fine. I found Maxxx Supreme to be very similar to the Calypso twins in Borderlands 3, and not necessarily in a good way. Now, I honestly didn’t mind the Calypsos nearly as much as everyone else did, and I thought that they were fine as villains. Maxxx is just really annoying and kinda doesn’t do anything, which is probably the point. He’s clearly making fun of hyper-masculine “maxxing” culture, which does end up being pretty humorous. I just feel like it kind of falls a little flat sometimes because Maxxx does next to nothing. He taunts you when you first try to get inside the ordonite facility, then talks to you maybe one or two more times over the course of the mission until you finally fight him. On the one hand, if he was more present, it might have made him a more interesting or impactful obstacle aside from just kind of being there. On the other hand, if he was more present, he might have just become even more annoying.
The other new character worth talking about is Trippy. She’s the leader of the pacifist Rippers. I like how she explores the idea of Rippers who don’t want to fight people. The bolt-ripping experience is traumatic, so trying to cope with that trauma through substances and alternative lifestyles is an interesting idea to tackle. However, a lot of Trippy’s personality is undercut by her constant flirting with the Vault Hunter. At first I didn’t mind it, but by the end of the mission, I found it kind of one-dimensional. So yeah, definitely not my favorite character either.
Aside from the new characters, I think that the mission is fine. The middle bit can kind of drag and feel contrived. It falls into the whole, “oh no, we’ve run into an obstacle. Let’s go talk to this random NPC who can solve the problem,” trope that is honestly starting to annoy me more and more whenever I see it. A lot of the mission also just feels like “run to this point and kill enemies along the way if you want.” One complaint I have with Borderlands 4 is that you usually aren’t doing anything super interesting mechanically. The majority of missions boil down to “run to this point and kill enemies along the way if you want” with a little bit of “grab this item” or “talk to this NPC” thrown in. And sure, this is a gross oversimplification that can retroactively be applied to a lot of the Borderlands franchise, but I feel like there’s a crucial difference between these moments and Borderlands 4: in the other games, it feels like natural level progression whereas in Borderlands 4 it feels like padding. If you cut out a good third of the traversal section in “Murders and Acquisitions,” nothing would be lost, especially because you can fast travel past this traversal to reach the bosses. As a result, the mission’s structure feels needlessly bloated.
Turning to the enemies and loot, there are four new bosses. You’re guaranteed to fight two of them. The other two, however, are tied to choices you make during the mission. In fact, there’s an achievement that requires you play the mission twice and choose every available option. I’m not sure how I feel about these choices. At the end of the day, they accomplish the same things and just kind of create the illusion of choice, which makes me wonder why to include them at all. Borderlands 4 is not the kind of RPG that promises impactful decisions in the way that something like Baldur’s Gate 3 or Cyperpunk 2077 do. So why include it?
The first boss you can fight is Skank Eyes. He drops the Plumb Bob Ripper shotgun that fires projectiles that ricochet. I have not used this gun. Hearing “ricocheting projectiles” does not fill me with much interest though because that’s a central mechanic of weapons with Jakobs’ parts, so it feels like a pointless inclusion or distinction on a legendary weapon. Infamous Dave is the other optional boss, and he drops the legendary Loiter Sploiter Torgue rocket launcher that fires cluster rockets. This weapon actually sounds super fun and interesting to use. Maxxx Supreme, the first required boss, drops the Hydrowerks Torgue shield and the Overconsumption Tediore pistol. Hydrowerks looks fun because it shoots missiles when sliding; I can see that being really interesting and fun to use. Overconsumption looks like it could be interesting because it has something to do with homing rockets, but it is Tediore, and I find Tediore to be pretty bad in this game. Betamaxxx, the final boss, drops the most gear: the PRISM pearlescent Jakobs sniper, the Oxidation legendary Vladof repkit, and the Silver Sliver legendary Daedalus pistol. I actually have gotten a Silver Sliver to drop, and it seems ok. It debuffs enemies and makes them take more damage, but I’m not sure how effective it actually is. Oxidation gives you some ammo regeneration, but I genuinely don’t know how useful that’s going to be. Running out of ammo is not an issue I have very often in this game. PRISM shoots ricocheting projectiles with random elements. I think that this is more interesting than something like Plumb Bob because of the elemental feature, and how the number of ricocheting projectiles increases as you land more critical hits. It’s far from the most unique gun I’ve ever seen, but I think it has the potential to be one of the more usable ones.
Turning to the Vault Card, it includes a bunch of cosmetics, and four more legendaries: Divided Glow Order assault rifle, Eradication Vladof assault rifle, Pressure Kettle Daedalus grenade, and Stealth & Seek Maliwan sniper rifle. Divided Glow is about debuffing enemies to take increased radiation damage, but doing so looks to be kind of annoying and impractical. Eradication uses an underbarrel attachment to deal more damage to enemies. This one actually looks really fun, and potentially quite strong for enemy mobbing. Pressure Kettle explodes into shrapnel, or you can cook it for more damage but less shrapnel. It sounds neat, but if it can dethrone things like the crit knife will remain to be seen. Stealth and Seek shoots sticky projectiles that shoot additional projectiles when attached. I hope it ends up being as powerful as it sounds. As for the cosmetics, they’re cosmetics. I don’t have much to say there.
I have not used a lot of the new weapons released with this small DLC. I am looking forward to messing around with them, but I don’t foresee that happening until I reach level 70 and play through the other new content the game has just gotten.
SPOILERS END
I feel like I’ve been a lot more negative in this review than I actually am towards the Bounty Pack. I think that “Murders and Acquisitions” is a fine addition to the game. I don’t think that it’s the best piece of content ever released for it, but I don’t think I’d say it’s the worst either. I think that it adds enough to the game to be interesting and worth checking out. There’s rarely a point to complaint about a game receiving more stuff to do. That being said, like with all of the other paid Bounty Packs, it might be worth snagging when it’s on a sale and discounted. I believe it’s priced the same way that Bounty Pack #3 is, so keep that in mind. I have enjoyed my time with this small DLC, and while not a lot of the new loot particularly grabbed my attention, I am excited to grind our more of it in the future.
