Borderlands: The Zombie Island

of Dr. Ned

You know what people like? Zombies! Everyone loves them and their brain eating ways. All the shambling around also makes them pretty good target practise for first person shooters. And the sight of a crowd of them exploding? Poetry in motion. Borderlands, the FPS/RPG from Gearbox which I loved on its release, has just had its first piece of DLC released onto XBL and PSN and its rather good.

Totally not Dr. Zed - he has a tache!

The Zombie Island of Dr Ned takes you to an island that is, as the name suggests, infested with the creatures. You arrive as one of your characters from the main game (the island unlocks from level 10 upwards via the fast travel system) to clean up and remove the undead menace with the assistance of “totally not the same guy as the doc in the main game except with a moustache” Dr Ned, who may or may not be responsible for this outbreak of the living impaired. The story is pretty funny as well, featuring a new intro and outro from the bus man, who is accompanied this time by an adopted child who throw in questions and ridicule a couple of times.

The game is set in a completely new area that shares very few objects with the deserts of the main game. Instead we have a Bayou-esque swamp, with ramshackle towns and forbidding gothic mansions. In fact it is a little bit reminiscent of both Left 4 Dead 2 and the Point Lookout DLC from Fallout 3, which are two brilliant things to take inspiration from. The new enemies are also pretty good – all of the normal zombies if you look carefully are actually based of the models of the civilians from the rest of the game, including the drinks holder guys you can see hanging around New Haven. As well as the normal, there are also a couple of specials such as the boomer-esque defiler or the suicidal explosive carrying zombies. More importantly – Zombie Midgets.

This dude is called Tankenstein. Scary!

One of the main things that got me was the humour of this downloadable content. The main game was quite funny, but the new pack is brimming with laughs. From the moment you set foot on the island, you’re bombarded with references and little silly details. The tannoys are giving advice from Jacobs (the gun maker who owns the island) not to deal with the zombies – this includes hugging, kissing and embracing them. The intros return for all the main characters, including one whose description is simply “Holy S###!” or words to that effect. And our favourite claptraps return, as does another favourite one legged character that may bring a ray of joy back to players who weren’t happy with his demise. Though he does bring a really annoying fetch quest which is linked into an achievement into the game.

This DLC also brings 125 point of extra gamerscore on 360. Four out of the five achievements are simply story ones you’ll collect along the way, but the fetch quest award is a little harder to find. At worst, it’ll make the DLC last a little longer, so I can’t quibble too much.

I really enjoyed the couple of hours I had on Dr Zed’s Ned’s Island killing the living impaired. If you enjoyed Borderlands and want some more, than this DLC is a must buy. However, if you didn’t enjoy the main game, this won’t bring you round. But then, you obviously have no soul. Therefore, you’re a zombie.