The Gearbox away team for GamesCom 2009 just got back in Texas after an extremely successful show. This year, more than 200,000 gaming enthusiasts visited the convention at Cologne, and Borderlands made a great showing! We were part of 2K's booth on the floor, where people piled in and were treated to videos from many of 2K's upcoming games, including Borderlands. Our trailer was also shown on the outside wall of the booth for passers-by. Visitors to the booth got some pretty cool swag, including a Borderlands t-shirt!
In the business area of the convention (only accessibly to press and exhibitors), we treated the press to a demo of a portion of the game we haven't shown before. The demo ran about 20 minutes long and focused on showing 4-player co-op, showing off two bosses, vehicles, and even a duel! Response was extremely positive, and more than once we heard excellent comments from press members leaving the demo. My favorite comments were those that indicated how much the press enjoyed seeing a demo where the demonstrators were actually having fun! The enemies and loot are always different, and that helped keep the demo fresh for all of us, even after dozens of demos. It doesn't hurt that the co-op experience is so great - it's hard not to trash talk and goof off a little when you really are having fun showing people the game!
Getting ready to give a demo! You could see all our screens as we played through.
On the very last day of the show, we headed back into the booth for some special hands-on time for a few journalists who missed our European PR tour a few weeks ago. After that, Randy braved the extremely packed show floor to go and sign a few autographs for fans at the public booth! Overall, Borderlands had a great show. The press seemed to really love our demo, and we keep hearing that people can't wait to get the game into their hands!
During the show we released 15 new screenshots - including the very first image of a Borderlands skill tree! The press articles are still rolling in, and our forums users are on the ball as always collecting the articles as they roll in, so make sure to check out their thread! A few articles of note:
Eurogamer nominates Borderlands for Best of Show!
During the show, we used our official twitter accounts for micro-updates. Check out the twitter page to review the comments over the last week, and see a couple photos from the show. For even more photos of the booth and the show, check out the Flickr album. Don't forget to join the Borderlands community for news and up-to-the-minute Borderlands developments and discussions!
