Borderlands 4 to feature 30 billion 'unique' weapons thanks to procedual generation and weapon customization

Gearbox Software’s upcoming Borderlands 4, set to release on September 12, will feature over 30 billion guns thanks to procedural generation and a new weapon customization system. 

According to Borderlands 4’s Art Director Adam May, this whopping number of weapons in the game isn’t an exaggeration. It’s possible because of the game’s use of “advanced” procedural generation. According to May in an Epic Games feature post, “There are more than 30 billion guns to try out in Borderlands 4.”

Borderlands 4’s weapon system allows players to customize and swap out weapon parts, including barrels, attachments, sights, and magazines, which wasn’t possible in the previous Borderlands entry. Borderlands 3’s weapon customization extended to merely equipping trinkets and skins.

But Borderlands 4 now introduces a new Licensed parts system, allowing players to use weapon parts from different manufacturers, something the developers are calling “cross-pollination.” Players can choose from a range of weapon manufacturers, including Jakobs, Daedalus, Order, Ripper, Vladof, Torgue, Tediore, and Maliwan. 

For example, players could come across a Daedalus underbarrel on a Maliwan shotgun, making for some unique functional and visual weapon combos.

May further explained, “Players have some recognition when they’re picking up a certain manufacturer’s weapon and have a rough idea of how it’s going to function.” 

Borderlands 4’s Principal Artist and Art Director, Jimmy Barnett, played a pivotal role in this process. Head of Borderlands 4 development, Anthony Nicholson, stated that Barnett created a “wall of guns” in Unreal Engine. Nicholson further added:

“It was this really large gun map where you could see all of the individual parts for all the individual guns, for all the individual manufacturers. It made it so you could see how each of those things was and how we could have those combinations roll together and how they would work–the slides, the animators, the actions, the art all fitting together.

Because a certain gun, if it pumps one way, but there’s a long barrel that goes on the bottom, obviously those parts can’t go together.”

For those looking for information about how this plays out in-game, the game’s loot grind remains a core pillar of Borderlands’ gameplay. Players will constantly discover, use, swap parts, and discard weapons as they explore Kairos.

Borderlands 4’s narrative team has also enriched the game’s weapons system by assigning unique weapon names and adding a distinct vibe to each corporation’s weapons.

Preorder Borderlands 4 on Amazon