Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands doesn’t actually get began till the tip. The most effective a part of Gearbox’s new loot-shooter is an endgame mode referred to as Chaos Chamber. It’s each a complete bummer and, finally, for the perfect that you may’t unlock it till you roll the credit, as, take it from me, doing so has genuinely tarnished the remainder of the sport. Now, every time I boot up Wonderlands, all I wanna do is re-run Chaos Chamber.
As you in all probability know, the sport is a spin-off of Gearbox’s fashionable Borderlands shooters. It’s set completely in a model of Bunkers & Badasses (a tabletop role-playing sport with fantasy components). Your purpose is to defeat a villain named the Dragon Lord (voiced splendidly by Will Arnett), restoring stability to the land. Basic D&D stuff—in the event you look previous the truth that this make-believe realm is dominated by a unicorn named Butt Stallion.
When you defeat the (disappointingly simple) Dragon Lord and roll the credit, you’re referred to as again to Brighthoof, the primary hub metropolis. You sit by means of some typical post-game fare—“press X to unlock new characteristic that will’ve been very nice to have 10 hours earlier”—earlier than getting summoned to Queen Butt Stallion’s citadel, the place the Dragon Lord is sentenced to reside out the remainder of his days. That’s the place you discover the Chaos Chamber mode.
Chaos Chamber is an endlessly replayable mode that takes the 2 core verbs of Wonderlands—that’d be “capturing” and “looting”—and does away with the remaining. You’re tasked with combating your means by means of a collection of areas with more and more difficult battles, culminating in a boss combat. On the finish of every room, very like in your favourite roguelites, you possibly can select what prize awaits you upon clearing the next chamber. Some rooms take you to a chest. Some take you to a buff, which lasts for the remainder of your run. Others take you to the Dragon Lord, who can implement parameters that ramp up the problem however help you earn extra crystal shards.
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These shards are key to how Chaos Chamber works. As you progress by means of a run, you possibly can spend them on varied buffs—boosting your gun injury, spell injury, reload pace, protect capability, issues like that—with every buff costing twice as a lot because the final. You could possibly additionally spend 50 shards to show the following chamber you enter into an “elite” room, giving enemies extra well being. (Professional-tip: That is all the time price it, as each enemy in an “elite” room will drop even extra shards.) Or it can save you them for the very finish. Should you do survive to the tip of a run, you discover a room lined with statues corresponding to every classification of drugs; flip over 500 shards to a selected statue and also you get a bunch of loot of that class, not less than one in all which is usually a gold- or legendary-tiered piece of drugs—the best ranking within the sport.
Over my 20-hour-ish run by means of Tiny Tina’s marketing campaign, I discovered three gold weapons and one gold class mod. After finishing simply 4 runs by means of Chaos Chamber, my stock appeared like…
It’s Borderlands distilled to its very essence, stripped of all of the nuisances and carry-on baggage. No complicated maps. No backtracking amid imprecise platforming segments. No blatantly referential, if admittedly fairly humorous, one-liners. Simply vibrant colours and enjoyable weapons, and waves upon waves of enemies to make use of them on.
However Chaos Chamber additionally introduces the one factor sorely lacking from Wonderlands’ essential marketing campaign: an precise problem.
I’m positive this isn’t the case for all gamers, however someplace alongside the way in which, my Wonderlands character grew a bit too huge for his or her britches, to the purpose the place the sport’s ceaseless parade of firefights performed out as rainbow-colored stopgaps between story beats.
As a Clawbringer (you get a child dragon buddy) combined with a Spore Warden (you get a bizarre mushroom humanoid buddy), I’m accompanied by two creatures who not solely run prepare on enemy crowds however may revive me after I die. My cooperative accomplice—a Graveborn crossed with a Spore Warden, which mixes to end result within the delightfully named Morticulturist class—is equally accompanied by two little beasts, and equally invincible. By the point we hit the sport’s remaining third, we just about completely stopped dying, even on the best issue. We defeated the Dragon Lord in, oh, two minutes. We did the identical for the requisite boss-before-the-final-boss-who’s-supposed-to-be-tougher-than-the-final-boss. It’s not that Borderlands video games must be difficult per se, however some resistance would’ve been good, y’know?
Chaos Chamber presents loads of resistance. Whenever you’re beginning out a run, you possibly can go for a “Chaos Trial,” every completion of which lets you unlock new ranks of an extra issue mode referred to as Chaos. (You may apply Chaos mode to any a part of the bottom sport as effectively.) On the first stage, enemy well being is elevated by 25%, and stats like the quantity of harm they deal or the quantity of gold and XP you earn are boosted by 4%. On the second stage, enemy well being is elevated by 49%, whereas the opposite stats go up by 8%.
There are 20 ranges.
I nonetheless have a whole lot of Wonderlands left. My menu is at the moment filled with side-quests that want mopping up, and I’d prefer to fiddle a bit with my alternate characters to get a way of how the opposite 4 lessons work. Subsequent week, the sport’s first enlargement, “Mirrors of Thriller,” is due. I really feel like I’m lacking out a bit—most of these items appears legitimately partaking—however each time I boot up the sport, I ignore all of it in pursuit of an insatiable yearning for one factor: chaos. Extremely profitable chaos.
