Borderlands

Borderlands 2 shipped tiny subtitles that are hard to read. Borderlands 2 is the example of subtitles done badly: the text is tiny and hard to read. Life is Strange: Before the Storm and Assassin's Creed Origins use large text instead.

Its subtitles are also described as having an unclear font, white text that blends into the background, full-width lines and no speaker label. Tiny text is called "probably the most common mistake that developers make in this area." The advice is to size the default so it reads from across a room and add a size option.

Borderlands 2 leaves no gap between subtitle lines, so players miss new ones. When one line replaces another with no pause, players may not notice that a new line has appeared. Netflix leaves a few frames of blank between subtitles, which creates a subtle flash that signals new text.

The BBC guideline is to hold subtitles about 0.3 seconds for every word that must be read. Fast talkers may need the text to stay up longer than the speech.

Borderlands makes rare weapon drops thrilling because they are unlikely. A great weapon dropping from a body in Borderlands excites because there was only a small chance of it. The same technique taken to the extreme becomes a Skinner box built to drain time or money.

Lootboxes, which are bought and then revealed, are the example of the extreme version. The lesson is to use low drop chances to make rewards exciting, while watching that they don't turn into a Skinner box.

Borderlands The Pre-Sequel lets players scale the whole interface. The game offers an option to enlarge the entire UI, which helps players with low vision, where the issues come down to size and contrast.

It is cited alongside Monster Hunter World, which boosts interface text size. The console guidance is UI text of at least 28 pixels and subtitles of at least 46 pixels, with shadows or outlines for contrast. God of War launched on PS4 with tiny text and was patched with a text size slider.