The open beta for Battleborn, the new game from Gearbox Software, is now live for Xbox One and PC. The beta had released exclusively for PlayStation 4 last week. Those who participate in the open beta will receive some character skins for showing their support for the game.
According to GameSpot, the beta includes two story missions, two multiplayer modes, and all of the launch characters. There are 25 characters slated to be available at launch with more on the way. I had the chance to play some Battleborn at PAX Prime last year, where I was able to try out two of the characters – Oscar Mike and Phoebe.
Oscar Mike is a futuristic soldier and his skills and gameplay largely mirror most other sci-fi first person shooters like Halo. He uses an assault rifle and one of his special attacks is the ability to throw grenades. Honestly, I didn’t find Mike very interesting because his gameplay was so similar to gameplay in other games.
On the flip side, the next character I played was unlike anything I had seen from a first-person perspective. Phoebe looks like a steam punk sorceress who would be good with a sword, and that’s pretty much how she plays. Most of the time her attacks involve close-range stabs from a sabre. One of her special attacks include the ability to transport herself into a different area of the battlefield, and another has her spinning multiple swords around her to deliver a lot of attacks all at once.
Battleborn is being developed by Gearbox Software, the studio who made the Borderlands series of games. The game is slated for release on May 3.
