Borderlands: The Pre-Sequelreleased back in 2014, following Handsome Jack and his team over the course of his transformation from adventurer to affably evil dictator. Fans got to play as favorite characters from the last game like Claptrap and experience the events leading up toBorderlands 2in another comical addition to the famous looter-shooter franchise.Borderlands 3, however, seems to have left thePre-Sequelbehind.
Borderlands 3released in 2019 and has barely acknowledged any of the characters inBorderlands: The Pre-Sequelor the events of the game. It is possible this is related to thePre-Sequelbeing developed by a different studio, but regardless,Borderlands 3might as well deem the pre-sequel as non-canon for a few reasons.
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Borderlands The Pre-Sequel
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequelwas not developed by Gearbox but by another studio, 2K Australia, and2K Australia shut downin 2014 just a year after the release ofThe Pre-Sequel. WhileBorderlands 2did have input on the story of thePre-Sequel, very little of the story established in the game has been taken forward into Gearbox’sBorderlands 3.
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequelwas another opportunity for the series to dive in to one of best received characters in the franchise, Handsome Jack. InBorderlands 2,Jack was the delightful despot of Pandora who took credit for finding the Vault from the firstBorderlandsand took over theHyperion weaponsmanufacturing corporation. Exploring Jack further was its biggest selling point, but one that ultimately fell flat due to the story and gameplay. Speaking of, the story promised a massive war and more, which still hasn’t come to pass. Much of the game that wasn’t resolved inBL2remains ignored inBL3.
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Moxxi’s Heist of the Handsome Jackpot
The minute references to the events of thePre-Sequelis particularly striking in one DLC forBorderlands 3. InMoxxi’s Heist of the Handsome Jackpot,despite finding a way to bring back Handsome Jack yet again, it still doesn’t rely on much fromthe Pre-Sequel. This time, Jack appears in hologram form and through his haywire robotic guardians, but the add-on made no use of the backstory set up in Borderlands:The Pre-Sequel. Jack’s appearances here are more novelty than story.
Borderlands 3has brought back many player characters from previous installments in the series as NPCs, with the notable exclusion ofSalvador and Axton. This includes Aurelia in the base game, yet her background is effectively established without the game in which she was playable. Similarly, the aforementioned DLC brings back Jack’s Doppelganger who was first introduced inBorderlands: The Pre-Sequel, butMoxxi’s Heist of the Handsome Jackpotcould easily work with or without this background. It’s not necessary to playThe Pre-Sequelto understand what’s happening, and that says something. Notably, many of the characters are dead comeBorderlands 2, but even those that survive have little-to-no weight on the game/
The fact that Gearbox had such a clear opportunity inBL3to make references to thePre-SequelandHandsome Jack’s life before he became the villain fans loved to hate inBorderlands 2suggests a few things. First, it suggests that whileThePre-Sequelmay not be non-canon, it is likely considered as good as non-canonical by fans, and this perhaps allows Gearbox to exercise full creative control over the main installments in the series.
As a result, even fans who enjoyed the story ofThe Pre-Sequelshould likely not expect there to be references to the events and characters of 2K Australia’s addition to the franchise in the future. Though it remains possible,Borderlands 3is full of Easter eggsand references to everything from Rick and Morty to John Wick. The barebone references to the events ofThe Pre-Sequeland its player characters suggest that Gearbox has no plans to move forward with them, even it the game is technically canon.
Borderlands 3is available now on PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One, with PS5 and Xbox Series X upgrades coming as the consoles' launch.
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