Gearbox doesn’t want to take the latest episode of a franchise designed to be humorous in this style, but it’s too early to tell if it will be.

Judging by the video we saw at The Game Awards, it’s safe to say that yes, this is Borderlands, but it will have some changes. For example, the art style that has been a hallmark of the series is starting to take a back seat. Add to that what Sam Winkler, the director in charge of the story, wrote on Twitter: “The toilet humor will be toned down a bit, so that’s something that Gearbox, which has moved to Take-Two, will be changing from the previous episodes! Borderlands 4 may have been a little darker in its humor, but what’s the story?

“I’m not at liberty to talk much about the content of Borderlands 4, but I stand by my criticism of the overabundance of toilet humor in Borderlands 3. I’m not going to say there aren’t any toilets, but if the word “skibidi” makes it into the game on my watch, I’m going to cry real tears. Paul Tassi joked that we were going to have a weapon called the Hawk 2A and a fellow developer asked me if it was real and I wanted to stick my hand down the sink grinder,” Winkler said. Skibidi is a word used a lot by the younger generation, and Hawk 2A refers to Hawk Tuah… and that’s one of those terms again.

Winkler hinted at such a change back in September during a roundtable discussion at PAX, but he wasn’t quite as direct then: “We want to make sure that the world is reactive, that the world is grounded. While we keep our humor in the game, which is what brings a lot of people back to our franchise, we want to make sure that it’s situational, and that it comes naturally. So as we build these characters, we’re always making sure that they have strong personalities, that they react differently to different situations, that we see the effects of that.”

Borderlands 4 will be released sometime next year for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series and PC.

Source: PCGamer