The looter-shooter’s arms race is back with eight confirmed weapon brands — and four major casualties of corporate warfare.
In the Borderlands universe, guns aren’t just tools. They’re personalities, brand statements, and occasionally, lootable corpses. Now, Borderlands 4 is rebooting its arms industry with eight confirmed weapon manufacturers — five veterans and three ambitious upstarts — all competing to be the gun you accidentally blow yourself up with. But even in a galaxy run by trigger-happy billionaires, empires fall. Some of Borderlands’ most iconic brands are gone, and in typical Borderlands fashion, they didn’t go quietly.
The New Hotness: Order, Ripper, Daedalus
Three new players have entered the arena, and each one is bringing just enough chaos to feel like they belong.
Order guns are all about charge mechanics: the longer you hold the trigger, the more devastating the burst — assuming you have the ammo to back it up. Think precision meets recklessness.
Ripper is all in on ramp-up carnage. Hold the trigger and wait for the weapon to spool into full-auto mayhem. It’s the Minigun Effect™ — now handheld.
Daedalus throws the rulebook out entirely, letting players swap ammo types on the fly. Shock? Incendiary? Cryo? Sure. Why not all three.
These manufacturers aren’t subtle, but subtlety never won a shootout on Pandora.
The Returning Heavyweights: Jakobs, Maliwan, Tediore, Torgue, Vladof
Legacy brands are still holding strong, bringing back the loud, weird, and gloriously impractical:
Jakobs still makes high-powered antiques that turn crits into ricochet nightmares. Your great-grandfather’s revolver, but cursed.
Maliwan is the brand for players who like their bullets with a side of burning, freezing, or melting. Always elemental, always extra.
Tediore is back with its recyclable throwaway guns. When you’re done shooting, just yeet it.
Torgue returns to blow stuff up with explosive rounds that now double as sticky grenades. Yes, it’s still loud enough to rupture your HUD.
Vladof sticks to its Soviet-core identity: high rate of fire, absurd mag sizes, and zero concern for accuracy. Suppressive fire with vibes.
Gone, But Not Forgotten: Dahl, Atlas, COV, Hyperion
And now, for the memorial portion of this update. Four major brands are absent from Borderlands 4’s confirmed list — and it might not just be a gameplay decision. The Borderlands universe has lore, and the corporations that make your guns are often tied directly to the villains trying to kill you. Which makes some disappearances more than a little suspicious.
Hyperion, once the face of corporate tyranny under Borderlands 2’s antagonist Handsome Jack, has been in freefall ever since his death and the destruction of Helios station. No Jack, no moon base, no smug voiceover telling you to buy more ammo. It’s not just a missing brand — it’s the end of an era.
COV — the Children of the Vault — were essentially the militant wing of Borderlands 3’s Calypso cult. Their makeshift, never-reloading guns were a product of that fanatical ecosystem. With the Calypsos dead and the cult disbanded, there’s no one left to cobble these overheating monstrosities together in a bunker.
Dahl, once the paramilitary go-to with adjustable fire modes, has likely retreated to whatever shadowy PMCs remain off-world. Their absence stings, especially for players who liked to aim before they shot.
Atlas, despite its corporate rebranding under Rhys Strongfork, has gone quiet. Maybe they’re too busy making smart bullet NFTs. Or maybe Rhys finally ran the company into the ground with one too many mustache-related decisions.
The State of the (Gun)ion
If Borderlands 4’s weapons roster tells us anything, it’s that the franchise is moving away from the polished sheen of corporate sci-fi and deeper into the grime of unstable, untested firepower. The new manufacturers lean heavily into mechanics that reward — or punish — experimentation. And by trimming legacy brands like Hyperion and COV, the game seems to be distancing itself from old villains, letting fresh threats and fresher guns take center stage.
But don’t be surprised if one or two of the missing brands make a comeback down the line. In this galaxy, no one ever really dies — they just respawn somewhere else with a new trademark.