Borderlands developer Gearbox Software has got a new IP in the works and surprise, suprise, it’s a MOBA. Shocking, I know. There’s hardly any of them about these days. It’s called Battleborn, and Gearbox describe it as a “hero shooter”.
Battleborn has the typical 5v5 arena battles you’d expect from the genre, but it’s also first-person and apparently contains a co-operative campaign, so maybe Gearbox will bring something a bit different to the MOBA party.
Interesting art style. That dude with the minigun probably has the strangest head-to-body ratio I’ve seen in quite some time. The heroes you see in the video are the titular battleborn, who team together in order to defeat a robot menace called the Varelsi.
Game Informer secured a preview of the game, and were quick to point out similarities between it and titles like DotA 2.
”We played hours of Incursion,” they write, ”an inventive 5 vs. 5 mode that combines fast-paced first-person gameplay with the strategic team-based elements of games like League of Legends and Dota 2. Rival battleborn hunt one another in lush jungles and arid deserts while robotic NPC minions wage an ongoing tug-of-war.”
It sounds like there will be some crossover between multiplayer and singleplayer modes, though exactly how this will work isn’t yet clear.
”Players start on a level playing field at the beginning of each match, progressing along a streamlined skill path up to level 20 filled with customizable abilities that unlock a variety of different play styles. Many of these gameplay elements will also bleed into Battleborn’s five-player cooperative campaign, which Gearbox isn’t saying much about yet.”
Battleborn is coming to PC, PS4 and Xbox One sometime in 2015. Sounds like it’s got some interesting ideas, but will that be enough to break into the tough, congested MOBA market? We’ll see.
