Knights of the Cardboard Castle

I’ve been spending most of my time playing the puzzler SpaceChem but that game is incredibly stressful to me. I get a headache if I spend too much time on it, so I’ve been playing through the first DLC for Borderlands in fits and starts. This is one of those DLC that relies entirely on one single theme and it aptly demonstrates that one can never go wrong with zombies.

• It’s shocking how the simple change of zombifying everything makes the game new again. Most of the zombies in the game are the slow, lumbering variety, just as it should be. One by one they are no threat, especially since they lack ranged attacks, except for spewing bile when they’re close. But then zombies never attack as singletons and this game handles hordes of them pretty well. Note: if you need the headshot achievements in Borderlands, this is the place to do them in.

• There are a number of special zombie types to liven things up. You’ll soon develop a hatred for the defiler which can spew bile at medium-short range, which clouds your vision and drops your movement speed to almost nothing. In other words, turns you into zombie fodder. There are also zombies that carry and toss gas cans at you, which seems out of place, but I suppose they needed more zombies with ranged attacks.

• The story is crap as usual, with the feeble attempt at humor especially annoying this time around. Why do they even try? This even supposed to be some odd corner of Pandora. Yeah, no points for worldbuilding here.
• Level design is okay I guess. One complaint is that an entire level from the base game is reused, with a new coat of paint. That’s just lazy guys. And there’s just one point of entry into the DLC’s area, so everytime you load it up you need to fight the same mini-horde of zombies, over and over again.

Overall not a bad DLC as these things go, the main attraction being that shooting up zombies is sufficiently different from shooting up regular mobs that it feels like a fresh experience. Sure is short though. Next DLC please!