Borderlands 4 live launch coverage: are you ready to loot 30 billion guns?

Have you picked your Vault Hunter yet?

I'm going to be playing Vex—what can I say, I always pick the Siren. Have you made your choice yet? If you're still on the fence, we're here to help. Check out our guide to picking your Borderlands 4 character and avoid wasting time agonising in the character select screen.

Looking back on Borderlands

While we wait for Borderlands 4, we've been having a look back at the series so far. Harvey has ranked all the games, and I've taken on the slightly more pointless job of ranking all their musical intros. We've also made a case for Borderlands 3's often overlooked DLC.

Shift codes

Of course, the most important part of any Borderlands game isn't the story, or the characters, or the gunplay. It's the Shift codes, magical little things that turn plain text into sparkling loot. You'll want to make sure you understand how you get them and how to redeem them ahead of the launch, especially as Gearbox is likely to start throwing them around like confetti to celebrate launch day.

Lucky for you, we've written up a full guide to Borderlands 4 SHIFT codes, which we'll be keeping updated with all the latest as it happens. And there's even a reward you can get straight away—follow our step-by-step instructions, and you can redeem the Hazard Pay weapon skin on the Shift website ahead of the launch.

Where is PC Gamer's Borderlands 4 review?

The Borderlands 4 review embargo has lifted, but unfortunately PC Gamer didn't receive review code ahead of time for Borderlands 4, so we'll be starting fresh along with you guys later today. That means our review won't be for a little while yet. But bear with us, as we'll soon be rounding up the scores and reactions from across other major outlets!

Borderlands 4 Twitch Drops

It wouldn't be a game launch these days without a weird Twitch promotion, and sure enough you can earn a unique skin for your drone in Borderlands 4 just by watching streams. Check out our Borderlands 4 Twitch Drops guide for more info.

Borderlands 4 review roundup

Quite a few outlets don't have reviews up yet, presumably for the same reason as us. Overall reception seems very positive, though not necessarily glowing.

GameSpot: 7/10

IGN: 8/10

GamesRadar: 4/5

TechRadar: 4.5/5

Windows Central: 4/5

Metro: 4/5

VGC: 4/5

Borderlands 4 on Twitch

Keen to see the game in action? Now that the review embargo is up, streamers are free to show off the game on Twitch, and almost 85,000 people are already watching. Remember you can get that Borderlands 4 Twitch Drop while you're at it, too!

Performance issues

Our full review roundup is now live, and the consensus does seem to be that the game is a big course correction from Borderlands 3. But for us PC players, there is some potentially troubling commentary on the game's performance.

Windows Central describes framerate dips and "intermittent zone loading", and before the day one patch experienced "some of the worst performance I’ve seen from a AAA game".

IGN also report experiencing "numerous bugs" and other technical issues.

Combine that with the weirdness around the game's recommended specs ahead of launch, and it does paint an iffy picture of the game's state. We'll be checking out how it runs ourselves at launch as well as keeping an eye on how the general playerbase finds it, and keep you in the loop.

Reddit's already sniffing out Shift codes

Don't ask me how someone's already worked this out, but there's a Shift code at the end of the game's credits, as a thank you for (ahem) watching them all the way through. It's been posted on the game's subreddit, and the full code is T9RJB-BFKRR-3RBTW-B33TB-KCZB9.

We'll be popping that, and any other Shift codes we find, into our regularly updated Borderlands 4 Shift code guide.

Borderlands 4 is out now!

Go forth and download—Borderlands 4 should now be unlocked on your platform of choice!

How to build your Vault Hunter

Already thinking about your endgame build? You're not alone. Our expert theorycrafter and Borderlands super-fan Rory has put together build guides for all four of Borderlands 4's Vault Hunters, so whether you're going for Harlowe, Amon, Rafa, or Vex, we've got you covered.

Anyone else really wishing Gearbox had allowed preloading?

Borderlands 4 launch trailer

Still waiting on that download? Here's something else to pass the time—Gearbox has put out a launch day trailer, showing off all the Vault Hunters in action. Honestly it's kind of just a lot of light and noise but it's certainly got plenty of mayhem and destruction to get you into that Borderlands state of mind.

Borderlands 4 | Official Cinematic Launch Trailer - YouTube

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Borderlands 4 is getting hammered on Steam, but a lot of folks are playing

With a "mostly negative" rating out of the gate on Steam, Borderlands 4 is taking a beating for its performance issues at launch. Hundreds of reviews cite frequent performance dips and crashes, and that includes high-spec hardware. That's consistent with our own early testing, though Gearbox did issue a 2.7GB post-launch patch that reduced crashing for us. Meanwhile, it's selling extremely well: Borderlands 4 is smashing the series' previous Steam concurrent peaks (199,000 as I write).

Borderlands 4 performance test

Our hardware expert Nick has run Borderlands 4 through its paces, and unfortunately he's confirmed that it's got some serious performance problems, even on a super high-spec PC.