Topic: Borderlands & Bioshock Collections Physical

Hi there,

Apologies if something like this has been posted but I figure it may help someone anyway or at the very least people may find it interesting.

From my purchases of the above, it appears that the physical Borderlands has Borderlands GOTY on the cartridge and number 2 and pre-sequel as the handsome collection by a separate redeemable code. You can play Borderlands but it does prompt you to download an update, you can keep on ignoring this and still play but I can only assume the update is meaning the dlc for Borderlands or it surely wouldn't ask.

Now for Bioshock, you put the cartridge in and it sees each of the 3 games, there is no download code for the other two with only Bioshock on the cartridge. In fact while each game does prompt you it needs an update when started, an will prompt you here and there in game (like borderlands), it will let you play(although Bio2's intro seemed to stutter). While I can only assume the first couple of hours are playable of each game without the download/update. It does make me wonder how much they have of the games actually on there.

Further, why is Borderlands done as a one use redeemable code for 2 games yet Bioshock isn't? Is this down to the developer's and not 2K?

Seems strange to me, any thoughts or input on this would be appreciated

@Rosona hi there, this was fairly well documented in the run up to release in the news sections of the website, eg: https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2020/03/buying_bioshock_bor...

Switch game cartridges are quite expensive and have different size limitations, quite a few publisher/developers have therefore opted for cheaper carts with a download requirement. Especially with packages like this that contain multiple games. It's a shame, but probably isn't going to change as we all shift towards more and more digital games.

@antdickens
Hello,
I understand that it was documented on the news articles here, I read them so was well aware that there would be hefty download sizes, but of course it was never declared exactly what was on cartridge or what would be a download code or an update.

So it is more a question why was Borderlands 2 and prequel a download code yet Bioshock 2 and Infinite were not? That doesn't make a lot of sense to me.
Neither does simply not having all of the first Bioshock on the cart and the others needing to be downloaded in full, as oppose to the seeming starts of each Bioshock on the cart.

Thanks for your response though. Any idea if an when Nintendo Life will do the reviews for both collections?

@Rosona I imagine it simply came down to how the games are structured and their various sizes as to how they appear on the carts, to be honest.

Reviews are in progress and should be live very soon!

After watching a video of unboxing of these 2 games in youtube, these features were discussed also and made me think of buying the bioshock collection physical. Because if you can fit all of the games in 1 cartridge, then basically you can just lend the cartridge to a friend or resell them with no problems unlike borderlands collection where download code is forever on your switch... i mean if you are the type of guy who would generously lend their games to friends for them to try out...bioshock physical is a good choice... Well that’s just my thoughts...

@Spanish_Bread
To clarify, while all the Bioshocks are on the cartridge it is only the first parts of their respective games, however they are all available t download as an update that doesn't require a code.
I do however completely agree with your sentiment.

In the good ol' days before "digital" was even a thing, publishers would have sold a bundle like this with one cart for each game. Oh well, it's a new world. I prefer buying physical whenever I can, but come to think of it, I haven't bought a physical game for my PC in about a decade. I think the last one was Rage so I wouldn't have to download 25GB of data, but the joke was on me because after installing it from the DVD, I STILL had to download 25GB of data from Steam!

Publishers love digital because it costs less to distribute (Hey, how about passing those savings on to us!), and it kills the used market which publishers consider to be no better morally than straight up piracy.

I remember when the first Borderlands game came out with the GOTY edition it had two discs one was the base game, probably extra disc from the initial run and all the DLC on the second disc. Now my friend had the first printing of Borderlands without the DLC. So I loaned him the DLC disc after I installed the DLC on my 360 and got to install the DLC on his system. And for whatever reason once the DLC was installed you just need the base game disc to play the game and access the game. So he got the DLC for free essentially.

Instances like this is probably why devs hate physical media.