Loot: 1 (noun) goods, especially private property, taken from an enemy in war. 2 (geek) Open ALL THE BOXES!!

In 2009, Gearbox Software broke down the barriers between action games, role-playing games and first-person shooters when they released “Borderlands.”

Unlike their competitors such as “Call of Duty” and “Battlefield” who put the focus on multi-player war simulators with player against player, “Borderlands” focused heavily on story and multi-player cooperative play. This meant that you and up to 4 online friends, could join forces in search of experience, riches and loot!

And what LOOOOT! So many guns! Much wow. Unlike the big war sims, “Borderlands” has very few “named” guns. But what it does have is a random weapon generator that means that at any time, in any box, you might find a piece of junk pistol, or a fire-breathing, exploding, flying shotgun! This means you never loot the same gun twice.

In 2012, Gearbox developed “Borderlands 2” which took the premise of its predecessor and expanded its world, adding four new characters. Another sequel, “Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel,” followed in 2014 taking players to Pandora’s moon telling the backstory of the main antagonist, Handsome Jack.

It must have been a blast working on the stories and missions for these games. They are zany, hilarious and even, at times, heart warming. They used parodies of several modern pop-culture icons with laughable results. Most of the character upgrades are variations of popular movie quotes (Sexual Tyrannosaurus has got to be one of my favorites.)

Gearbox just released “Borderlands: The Handsome Collection,” containing “Borderlands 2” and “The Pre-Sequel” for the next-gen consoles. Plus it has all of their downloadable content (and Gearbox KNOWS how to do DLC right.) TONS of content, hours of replay value and good times to be had with friends make this a breath of fresh air in a room filled with the smell of mud and gunpowder.

Until next time remember, no refunds.

Class dismissed.