Borderlands 2

1. Summary

Reviewers describe Borderlands 2 as a looter shooter that still plays well years after release. They come back for Handsome Jack and the writing around him, for randomly rolled guns, for six Vault Hunters with very different skill trees, and for co-op with friends. Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep leads the DLC praise, and the cel-shaded art and low sale prices get regular mentions too. When players compare it with the rest of the series, they mostly pick this entry, although a smaller group says Borderlands 3 and 4 play better while this one has the better story. The humour divides people: plenty still laugh, others find it dated, and Claptrap wears some of them down.

Most of the complaints are about getting into the game and keeping it running, not about the campaign. Players report a new licence agreement they must accept on install or launch, and reviews about it bunched up in June and July 2025. Online co-op, one of the most praised parts of the game, loops on "creating online session" or drops partners every few minutes. Crashes and memory errors, backtracking and fetch quests, and an endgame where enemies soak up damage unless you bring slag fill out the list. Reviewers who like the game itself still disagree on whether these access and stability problems spoil it.

2. What keeps coming up

What players praise

Handsome Jack and the writing carry the storyHigh

Praise for Jack and the writing around him appears in 13% of the longer reviews, more than any other praise theme counted. Players describe a villain who is funny and cruel at once and who keeps taunting them over the radio, so the final fight feels personal: "he talks trash to you through a walkie talkie for 40 hours straight and you love him for it". Reviewers also credit the returning cast from the first game, Tiny Tina, Mr. Torgue and the side quests for giving the world character, and several say the late story beats hit harder than they expected from a comedy shooter. Some think Jack carries a story that is otherwise thin or clichéd, and a few find his chatter tiresome.

Six Vault Hunters, deep skill trees and many replaysHigh

About 10% of the longer reviews praise the classes and builds, and talk of replaying is close behind. Salvador, Zer0, Maya, Axton and the DLC pair Gaige and Krieg each change how fights play, and the three playthrough modes, raid bosses and long farming lists give players reasons to start over with a new character. Some long-time players count dozens of runs across consoles and PC. They also note that the late game narrows the field: some classes need specific gear to stay viable, and Gaige draws mixed comments.

Loot, guns and the chase for a better dropHigh

Loot gets praise in 9% of the longer reviews. Players talk about guns that shoot swords, reload by being thrown, or explode into more guns, and about the rush of an orange legendary drop. One reviewer calls it "The only game where opening boxes is more exciting than finishing the mission." Even fans of the loot say most drops are vendor trash, legendary rates feel low, and a gun farmed from a boss is soon outlevelled.

Co-op with friendsHigh

For nearly 9% of the longer reviews, co-op is where the game shines, often played with a sibling, partner, parent or old friend. One writes: "Playing with friends turns a good game into a great one." Reviewers enjoy the chaos, the duels and even the arguments over who grabbed the legendary. Other reviewers report that online co-op no longer connects reliably (see the frustrations below), and some note that shared loot causes friction.

Still the yardstick for the seriesHigh

Close to 8% of the longer reviews call this the best Borderlands, and 18% compare it with another entry. Some reviewers who tried Borderlands 4 say they went back to this game instead ("Play this instead of Borderlands 4. Trust."), and a few advise newcomers to start here or with the first game. Not every comparison favours it. Some players say later games fixed movement and quality of life: "Borderlands 3 + 4 are better gunplay + gameplay, but this one has THE BEST STORY out of the series". A few prefer the bleaker atmosphere of the first game or the gunplay of Borderlands 3 outright.

Cheap on sale and light on hardwareMedium

About 7% of the longer reviews bring up price, usually to say the game and its DLC bundles go on deep sale often and are worth it then: "you spend about 10 quid and get months of gameplay". Players also report it running on old laptops, small handhelds and the Steam Deck, and one calls it "One of a very few games I go back to without remortgaging the house for a new graphics card". Some add that full price is too much for a game this old and that the DLC is pricey outside a sale.

Cel-shaded art that has aged wellMedium

Around 6% of the longer reviews praise the look, and several say it is why the game does not feel dated: "The cel-shaded art style has aged beautifully." Players like the comic-book outlines and the variety of zones compared with the browner first game. The few dissenters find the style busy or dated, or say some textures look muddy up close.

DLC, led by Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon KeepMedium

Positive DLC comments appear in about 5% of the longer reviews, and Dragon Keep is the pack players name most, for its fantasy setting and its emotional ending: "the tiny tina dlc is my favourite dlc of all the games ive played". Torgue's campaign and Captain Scarlett get warmer words than Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt, which a few call a slog. Commander Lilith and the Fight for Sanctuary draws mixed comments, mainly about its effect on endgame balance and its separate price.

Mods and community patches extend itMedium

Roughly 5% of the longer reviews mention mods, mostly as a reason to play on PC: quality-of-life fixes, BL2Fix, the Unofficial Community Patch and overhauls such as Reborn. Players say these smooth out the grind, rebalance late-game skills and fix annoyances like ammo pickup. Some worry that the new terms make modding a bannable offence, and other reviewers reply that this does not apply to this game.

Where players are split

The humour: still funny or stuck in 2012Medium

In the longer reviews, players who praise the jokes outnumber those who complain about them by about two to one (7% against 3%). Fans quote lines from Jack, Torgue and Tiny Tina, and one writes "This has to be the funniest shooter game out there." Critics call the writing cringe, juvenile or "millennial humor", and one says "The humor is very much stuck in the Ironic 2010s with heaps of moldy old memes." Claptrap draws comments from both sides: some love him, while others want a volume slider for him or to be able to shoot him. Some reviewers land in between, finding the jokes hit or miss but the game's personality strong enough to carry them.

Gunplay and movement next to newer gamesMedium

About 7% of the longer reviews say the game still holds up, and close to 6% call parts of it dated. Those in the second group point to stiff movement, no mantling or sliding, weapon sway and spread, a clunky inventory, and shooting that feels weak next to Borderlands 3 and 4: "The shooting mechanics, movements, feels so dull compared to newer games." Players who think it holds up say the core loop makes the missing modern features barely matter, and that mods add the rest.

Solo playLow

In the longer reviews, about as many players say the game works alone as say it doesn't. One of the first group writes "Playing solo or with friends is a blast". The second group says it is built for groups, with raid bosses tuned for four and long stretches that drag without company: "Playing this game alone is a little boring unless you really enjoy the Borderlands series."

Difficulty and levellingLow

A small group, mostly newer players, hits a wall when they fall behind the mission level: "Because if you fall behind only 1 or 2 levels, you will die so often that you will rage quit." They say side quests are effectively mandatory to keep up and that enemies a few levels higher become hard to damage. Others call the normal campaign easy and say the real challenge only starts in the later playthroughs.

What frustrates players

New terms to accept before playingHigh

The new licence agreement comes up in 12% of the longer reviews, and these reviews peaked in June and July 2025. Players describe a prompt to accept it on install or launch for a game they bought years ago: "You also cannot download or start the game via steam without agreeing to the new EULA." Reviewers also argue about whether the terms make mods, exploits or VPN use grounds for a ban. A smaller group pushes back, saying the game's files did not change and that "people overreacted to a EULA change that didn't changed anything on the game's code". A few reviewers changed their reviews back and forth as the debate went on.

Backtracking, fetch quests and save-quit restartsMedium

About 6% of the longer reviews complain that the game wastes their time, with long runs back across large maps, few fast-travel stations, missions that send them to the same area several times, and enemies that respawn behind them. Quitting mid-mission is a sore point: "if you save and quit, you restart from the start of the mission." Some add the unskippable intro on every new character and the slow first hours before skills and good guns arrive.

Online co-op that drops or never connectsMedium

Reports of broken online play appear in close to 6% of the longer reviews and keep arriving through 2026. Players describe the game looping on "creating online session", partners being kicked every few minutes, invites that never appear, SHiFT display-name errors, and being sent back to the main menu when the connection blips, even in single player. Several reviewers date the trouble to a 2020 update that moved online play onto SHiFT for crossplay. One player who tried to show the game to a friend wrote: "We have spent more time trying to make the game work than actually playing it." The workarounds they share are running a virtual LAN through tools such as Radmin or Hamachi, or rolling back to an older build: "Downdating BL2 to 1.8.5. was able to correct almost all of the issues." Mac and Linux players add that their versions lag behind Windows, so mixed groups "have to downgrade their copy to match yours."

Crashes, memory errors and old-engine snagsMedium

Technical trouble shows up in about 5% of the longer reviews. Some players describe an out-of-memory crash on modern PCs: "Will occasionally throw a ran out of video memory exception and crash". Others report stutter, freezes on alt-tab, PhysX problems on new graphics cards, broken resolution options, lost characters and progress, and quest-blocking bugs. Movement snags are a running joke: "you get stuck in everything, in the smallest even invisible thing". The fixes players pass on include removing the HD texture pack, lowering PhysX, capping the frame rate at 60, and newer Nvidia drivers.

Endgame scaling, slag and raid bossesMedium

Players deep into the game write the late-game criticism, which appears in close to 5% of the longer reviews. They say Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode and the Overpower levels turn regular enemies into bullet sponges, gear goes obsolete quickly, and only a few builds hold up. Slag comes up by name: "slag elemental damage becomes an annoying mandatory chore in Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode". Raid bosses such as Master Gee and Voracidous draw complaints for being tuned for four players, and a few reviewers admit using glitches to beat them. Some advise stopping after True Vault Hunter Mode, and others fix the balance with community patches.

Borderlands 4 adverts on the main menuLow

About 2% of the longer reviews object to a Borderlands 4 banner that players say appeared on the main menu, and one reviewer also found a DLC link placed among the fast-travel points. A player stuck on the online loop noted: "2 ads for Borderlands 4 loaded just fine though!" A few share how to remove the banner file, and some say the Linux version shows no adverts.

DLC editions that miss contentLow

A small number of reviews say bundles did not deliver what buyers expected. Reviewers point out that the Commander Lilith DLC is missing from the Game of the Year edition and the Handsome Collection even though it raises the level cap to 80, and some Handsome Collection owners say a level-cap pack never registered until they bought the season pass. One player warns that "the DLCs are not guaranteed to work as intended". Others find the number of separate packs confusing.

No split-screen on PCLow

A handful of players, often coming from console, are disappointed that the PC version has no split-screen or couch co-op, which some bought the game for.

3. The player conversation

The tone is warm and often nostalgic. Some reviewers first played on Xbox 360 or PS3, often with a parent or sibling, and bought it again on PC, and short positive reviews calling it peak or the best in the series are common. Negative reviews fall into two groups: players who never connected with the humour or the loot loop, and long-time fans who still love the game but were pushed away by the new terms, the broken online sessions or crashes.

Endgame scaling, slag and raid bosses come up from players with long histories in the game, and the DLC praise comes from the same group. Complaints about co-op connections, the SHiFT account and the terms come from every kind of player, including people who refunded within an hour after failing to join a friend. Players newer to the series are the ones who describe level walls and the slow opening.

Within this slice, the weeks around the licence-agreement wave were the most negative: reviews written in the week of 23 June 2025 were 55% positive. By August 2025 most weeks were above 80% positive, and the 2026 weeks ranged from 81% to 96%. The terms debate faded in 2026 reviews, while reports of broken online co-op kept coming.

4. What the developers could do

1. Fix online sessions and add a reliable fallback. The "creating online session" loop, partner disconnects and SHiFT display-name errors cut players off from co-op, and the workarounds they share (virtual LANs, rolling back to an old build) suggest a working direct or LAN connection would help.
2. Let solo and offline play skip the account and connection checks. Players report being returned to the main menu when their connection drops in single player and being prompted for SHiFT on every start, and several only play solo.
3. Explain in plain words what the new terms change for this game. Reviewers disagree about whether the terms put modded play at risk of a ban, and a clear statement would answer the question that ran through the June and July 2025 reviews.
4. Fix the out-of-memory crashes and modern-hardware problems. Players report video-memory crashes, stutter and PhysX trouble, and the fixes they share, such as dropping the HD texture pack and capping the frame rate, could be built in.
5. Bring the Mac and Linux builds up to the Windows version. Mixed-platform groups say they must downgrade Windows copies to play together, and reviewers say the Linux build lacks the Commander Lilith DLC.
6. Make the DLC editions deliver their full content. Buyers report level-cap packs that never register and the Commander Lilith DLC missing from bundles that look complete, and one buyer describes wasted time with both Steam and publisher support.
7. Remove the Borderlands 4 banner or let players hide it. Players who paid for the game object to an advert on its main menu.
8. Ease the endgame and modern friction. Long-time players ask for less dependence on slag and Overpower scaling and for raid bosses that scale for solo play, and newer players want save-quit to keep mid-mission progress and the intro to be skippable on repeat runs.