Barely two weeks have passed since the release of 2K Games's Borderlands Legends. Things travel fast in the world of iOS gaming, however, and we checked in with James Lopez, associate producer at Gearbox, to see how he felt about Legends, as well as any plans for the future.

"We never really imagined [Borderlands Legends] being a FPS. It’s clearly possible, but we’re very happy with the FPS experience in Borderlands 1 and 2," explained James. "The goal of Legends was to try something different, something that explored other facets of Borderlands, untapped potential."

As anyone who's played Borderlands Legends can attest to, it's quite a change of pace to its older siblings, but it turns out that there are some significant similarities in its 4 player based squad combat. "Although you can play Borderlands 1 and 2 alone, we always intended the true experience to include all 4 characters at once. We wanted this to be the same for Legends." James Lopez elaborated to explain that, "...clearly, we can do missions with fewer characters (the tutorial starts off that way), so it might be something we revisit later."

Somewhat unusually for a game closely connected to a console or PC title, Borderlands Legends lacks any functionality directly tied into its bigger brothers. James told us that this was "never really considered...an option", citing that the team wants the fans "to be able to enjoy the full experience for whatever they buy."

What challenges were faced trying to convert a typically FPS title to the iOS screen, and implementing strategic elements, however? James explained, "We kept asking ourselves what the core ingredients of Borderlands are. Some things were obvious, but some were elusive and some were difficult to accomplish because of time constraints (like randomizing gear, UI tweaks, adding gameplay features)."

Despite such issues, James has been pleased with the response to Borderlands Legends. "We tried to put as much of the core formula of Borderlands in as we could, and we’re glad people are feeling like we accomplished that. That doesn’t mean we won’t try to squeeze in more, though!" It's worth noting that, at the time of writing, sales figures as well as critical reaction to its release, aren't as positive as Lopez and the team hoped. App Annie's listing demonstrates the progress sales wise, while an average Metacritic rating of 51 demonstrates that not everyone found it to their liking.

Improvement seems to be a common theme with 2K and Gearbox's future plans for Borderlands Legends, however. As James explained, 2K China's developers believe that "...there are some things we’d still like to revisit, and I believe they’ll knock it out of the park." and while he couldn't discuss any immediate plans for DLC or extra content, he did tell us that "...given the great response so far, I think we'd be crazy to stop here".

As 2K China finds its feet in the iOS world, it'll be interesting to see what they come up with next. As James explains, "Legends hasn't been out long, and this is somewhat of a new frontier for us". Discussing the recent announcement by Subatomic to include in-app purchases within Fieldrunners 2, he expanded upon that by explaining '...I think we’d like to explore any option that allows to create content of value for our fans."

While James Lopez and the team might be clutching their cards close to their hands for now in terms of DLC support, we'll be keeping a keen eye on any further developments for Borderlands Legends. For now, check out our review to learn more.

Borderlands Legends HD

iPad App - Designed for iPad
Released: 2012-10-31 :: Category: Game

$6.99

iPad Screenshots

(click to enlarge)

Borderlands Legends HD screenshot 1 Borderlands Legends HD screenshot 2 Borderlands Legends HD screenshot 3 Borderlands Legends HD screenshot 4 Borderlands Legends HD screenshot 5
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