Borderlands 2: six things Borderlands experts should know

[Teajunkie]

If you haven't been following Borderlands 2, this isn't the best place to pick up the basics.

Pop over to our last Borderlands 2 feature, then flick back to this when you're ready for a the Hard Stuff.
Diehard Borderlands fans? We present six facts that only the mightiest of mercenaries will comprehend.

1. BADASS POINTS
We spotted these months ago, but Gearbox wouldn't tell us what they were for. If you've played the first Borderlands game, you'll probably remember the extra challenges - tiny background tasks that you could chip away at to earn yourself another chunk of XP.

This time they transfer across all of your characters, and finishing challenges earns you Badass Medals. Each medal can be exchanged for a slight but permanent stat boost that applies to all of your characters.
If you want to power-level a second or third character, this tiny boost should prove useful. If you'd rather take the hard route though, you've also got the option to turn this boost off.



2. CROSS-CHARACTER STASH

More good news for those planning to play at least two characters at once, a new stash system lets you easily transfer items from one character to another. It's a simple trick, but one the first game sorely lacked.

3. E-TECH WEAPONS

The weird and wonderful weapons in the last Borderlands game were mostly scripted pick-ups.
This time you'll have to collect rare chunks of Eridium from around Pandora, which appear to be the game's secondary currency.
We haven't had confirmation of whether you'll spend E-tech to upgrade old weaponry or use it to purchase stuff that's entirely new, but you can expect to see some extreme weapons popping up.
BFG-style guns are promised, as are weapons that have a never-ending clip.
That's already enough to get us excited.

4. IT'S GOT A HUB

If you're a fan of central town-style locations for the purposes of shopping and quests, Sanctuary should scratch that itch.
It's full of NPCs to babble with and glean objectives from, and there also seem to be a couple of cool persistence features.
'This Just in' with Hunter Hellquist is a regularly updated news broadcast that you can pick up and listen to within Sanctuary.
Apparently paid for by the Hyperion Corporation, Hellquist's updates will follow your exploits with a wonderfully ludicrous pro-baddy angle.



5. BORDERLANDS 2 NEW GAME+

You could do this in the original game, but it didn't feel like there was much of an incentive.
This time you've got a whole secret difficulty threshold to tackle, complete with new loot, enemies, and combat mechanics.
We're promised that this will be require much more skill, better tactics, and a pair of unflinching cast-iron balls.
Once you've completed the special 2.0 playthrough, you'll also unlock 2.5 - basically at this point the new stuff ends, will all the enemies and loot scaling to your current level.
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6. THERE WAS A BOX WE COULDN'T OPEN

One of the treasure crates in Sanctuary looked special.
It was gold, and could only be opened with a golden key.
At the risk of sounding dangerously cynical, we're half-expecting these special keys to be quietly tied to microtransactions.

This is pure speculation, but if those keys surface on the Xbox Live Marketplace - you heard it here first.


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