“Hey, You Hear When the Water’s Gonna Come Back On?”

I’m what you would call a casual gamer, if there is a name for it. I started my gaming experience playing mindless match 3 games, point-and-clicks, and the occasional puzzle game. Aside from the infrequent run-in with a crazy airtight game (i.e. Limbo), I felt myself reaching a dead end. I’ve always hesitated playing anything more difficult than these three great but limiting alternatives, due to the fear of failure. Lame, right? I hate the feeling of losing and do not take the disappointment lightly.  

In an attempt to put these notions aside, I agreed to try my first crash course in Borderlands. I had enough courage to play Baldur’s Gate Dark Alliance for Game Cube by myself, simply due to the fact that I played a hack n slash character, which is my chief MO. So, I figured I could enjoy time spent with this video game as well. The opening is pretty much amazing as well as the menu and character options. As per usual, I chose the tank character that takes and deals a massive amount of damage, Brick. I was ready to start this party. We even had this cute little metal contraption, Claptrap, greet us at the gate - man, I was getting excited. While preparing myself to have a mind-blowing experience, I enjoyed all the beginning encounters the game had to offer, especially the scavenged, post apocalyptic environment. Then Claptrap gave us a pep talk, opened the gate and we ran inside…and it quickly went downhill from there. I couldn’t figure out how to aim and shoot, and ended up frantically spinning in circles looking at the sky. Which resulted in myself literally throwing the controller to the ground in frustration and walking away with a little more hatred in my heart.

After some time passed, weeks or months, I caved in and decided to give the game another try, and have never looked back. It’s super fresh and really addicting! The fact that I gave this amazing game another chance makes me smile a little brighter, and because I use whitening paste, but mainly the second one. Borderlands reminded me of how much fun shooters can be, taking me away from my thought that RPGs are always better than shooters. From the creative thought up enemies to the tormented inhabitants of the land, this is a game worth the sacrifice. I encountered the feeling of failure and did not squint in fear or feel overcome with fret. I no longer had to drag others into playing continuous matches of L4D, although L4D 1 and 2 are definitely in my top 3 games of all time. A small accomplishment was undergone that day, as well as the reward of achievements to boot! Because of this gaming experience; I have opened my mind to almost all other forms of video games, other than racing and sports games, I just can’t do it. You get to meet some pretty interesting characters and get to blow up all kinds of stuff, which is my favorite part. This really is a game for anyone.

Unfortunately, the day will soon come when we will beat Borderlands, but no worries, games are meant to be replayed.