When comparing Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel vs Sid Meier's Civilization: Beyond Earth, the Slant community recommends Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel for most people. In the question“What are the best games on Linux?” Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is ranked 90th while Sid Meier's Civilization: Beyond Earth is ranked 114th. The most important reason people chose Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is:
The end game is the best part of Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel as it requires the player to make the most of their skill and experience while utilizing all of their abilities and weapons. It is quite a balancing act, and when you pull it off it’s very exhilarating.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro End game takes advantage of all players’ skills and weapons
The end game is the best part of Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel as it requires the player to make the most of their skill and experience while utilizing all of their abilities and weapons. It is quite a balancing act, and when you pull it off it’s very exhilarating.
Pro Low gravity effects
The new low gravity effects work quite well, giving players more of a chance to put distance between themselves and their targets. This makes sniping a lot more viable than in previous Borderlands titles.
Pro Four new playable characters each with different acting special abilities
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel has four new playable characters in the game, each with action skills that feel completely different from one another. The action skill trees add further levels of customization depending on what areas in the tree you choose to level up.
Pro Includes systems that add story and philosophical elements to the game
Through quest decisions, the affinity system and the victory condition you choose to pursue, the game asks what type of future would you build for humanity. The choices you make will impact both the gameplay and the outcome of the colony.
Pro Engrossing early game
The game starts by preparing your voyage through space by selecting crew, cargo, etc.
Players have a lot of freedom in what to pick or whether to choose a certain strategy which will impact the rest of the game. How you respond to the environment during the early game may very well shape how the rest of your campaign will go.
Pro Great music
Pro You are not locked to a linear tech progression
Pro Unique take on science fiction
While most science fiction games present one or two ways humanity could develop in the future, Beyond Earth presents six.
Human-Alien Hybrids trying to adapt to their alien planet.
Humans in Battlesuits and LEV weapons with a liking for terraforming.
Societies filled with cyborgs and androids.
Societies of people who want to create the perfect humans.
Societies that are supported by a power base made entirely of machines.
Societies that do almost everything by combining biology and technology to create bio-mechanical weapons.
Pro Great art direction
Pro Involved spy system
The player can send a spy to an enemy city in order to learn what that city is building, what they are using for defenses, etc. This will take a few turns in order to set up, but once it is done, having an inside informant on what competing cities are doing can be big leg up.
Once a spy network is set up, a spy can carry out multiple operations with varying results. A few operations one can take part in is stealing credits, technology, or even research. These are all things that take time to do on ones own, but can speed things up by taking some from other cities while also developing or earning your own.
Overall, this is an improvement over Civ V, where the spy system was a bit shallow, luckily it is quite fleshed out in Beyond Earth, which adds quite a deceptive layer to the gameplay.
Cons
Con Poor writing
The writing in Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is nowhere near as good as in Borderlands 2. The jokes often fall flat or seem like total non sequiturs. Some players may also object to the prevalence that the writing gives to social issues; this has been described as pandering to a certain audience by some critics.
Con Side missions all the same
The side missions of the game are all very similar: Travel to an area on the map, use a key, and maybe kill some bad guys while accomplishing this mundane task.
Con Short
Even if you complete all of the side quests, the game only lasts about 25 hours. Purchasing DLCs or playing through additional times with other characters can extend this considerably.
Con Loot feels limited
Unlike past Bordelands games, the loot in Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel feels very limited. Legendary items are almost impossible to find in chests or from enemies; it’s more likely you will find them in an item shop. This means you may have to spend hours grinding for cash in order to purchase the weapons that never drop.
Con Late game is slow
Growing your colony in late game becomes a bit of a slog.
Con Wasted potential
Beyond Earth had a variety of new interesting systems that, unfortunately, fell short of their potential. Units unlocked by the affinity system were only slightly different to what you would get otherwise so your decisions weren't as impactful, quests in reality worked as a choice of upgrade for a building, the freedom of the tech web ended constrained to certain paths due to goals set by the game, and artifacts ended up being unreliable due to their randomness.