Borderlands 2 is a game for those that enjoy the feeling of finding awesome equipment hidden in a massive pile of other stuff.

Sure, you don't NEED to go in-depth with this game. On the first playthrough you can get by with just picking up gear as you travel along, choosing stuff that looks better than your current gear, and maybe occasionally buying something in the vendor that looks handy. The deeper you go down the rabbit hole however, the more there is to discover.

The story is decent for a First Person Shooter (albeit one with RPG elements), and dialogue is often amusing to a degree. Handsome Jack, the main antagonist is a cartoon villain with M rated attitudes. He believes, or at least pretends to believe that he is the good guy, and you are just a "Filthy Bandit.".

Graphically, the game has a lot more variations in design and color scheme than it's predecessor (which was brown, brown, and a bit of color here and there). Cell shaded graphics with thick, graphic novel like outlines is the style of the game, and does a good job of separating it from the average FPS.

Now, on to the gameplay itself!:

Action is often fast paced and exciting. So long as you don't allow yourself to get too far ahead of the enemy levels, you'll find battles where you have to fight hard to win. The game does a decent job of easing you into the various elements, such as different gun types (Pistol, SMG, Assault/Combat Rifle, Shotgun, Revolver, Rocket Launcher, and Sniper Rifle), the importance of a good shield, grenade mods (alter the way your grenade behaves, including damage bonuses and special effects), Class Mods (Class-specific devices which can boost skills, and have other effects like increasing fire rate with specific weapon types), and lastly Relics (Device which generally boost damage or defence in some way). Equipment rarity is also made fairly clear. It goes White, Green, Blue, Purple, Magenta, Orange, Seraph, and Pearlescent. The final two rarities (Pearlescent and Seraph) are special. Seraphs require you to have at least one of the season pass DLC to obtain (and you need all 4 of the Season Pass DLC to obtain all the Seraph rarity items), and as to Pearlescent rarity weapons, you need to be in Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode (Playthrough 3) for them to have a chance of being spawned. Don't assume that a blue is automatically better than a green rarity item, even at the same level. Experiment!

Playable Characters and Skills:

There are 4 included playable characters, and two DLC characters. Each class has it's ups and downs, and a special game changing skill unique to them. For example, Salvador (Gunzerker) will dual-wield guns when his action skill is active, meaning TWICE THE FIREPOWER. Axton (Commando) drops a turret, which damages enemies and draws aggression away from you. Maya (Siren) locks an enemy's movements for a short time, allowing you to get in free hits. Zer0 turns invisible for a few seconds and launches a decoy, and his first attack made whilst in this mode does increased damage. The DLC characters are Gaige (Mechromancer) who launches a flying robot that attacks nearby enemies, and Kreig (Psycho); a schizophrenic musclebound maniac that will whale on everything within reach with increased offensive and defensive capabilities and can even throw his axe at more distant targets.

Aside from the action skills unique to the character, there are various other skills that you can put points into, and have an effect on gameplay in some way. For example, increasing fire rate or damage for a few seconds after a kill is made. Each character has 3 skill trees, each ending with a final gamechanging skill modifier. For example, Zer0's Bloodlust (Melee) tree ends with the Many Must Fall perk, which will instantly re-deploy the hologram if he kills the enemy with one melee strike. As mentioned before, Class Mods unique to a character class will boost certain skills. It's possible for them to go as high as +6, meaning some skills can be boosted to 11, as the normal limit on points you can put into most skills is 5, though some skills are only 1 (those usually affect the way you play).

Plus, there is a gun that shoots swords....EXPLODING swords...In DLC4 (Tiny Tina's Assault on the Dragon Keep). So yeah, there is that too.

I hope you found my review useful, even if it might be a bit messy XD