Borderlands fans have already found plenty of teasers hidden within the game’s marketing, but it would seem that their sleuthing isn’t up to Gearbox’s standards. Earlier today, the company released a high-quality version of the Borderlands 3 boxart, encouraging players to look closely for more clues.
Sure enough, it took players very little time at all to uncover more hints. The most interesting is a simple code found in the bottom right of the image (linked in the tweet embedded further down this article). At first glance, it’s just a string of numbers, but once translated, players found a hidden message, reading “we don’t speak of Sanctuary 2.”
Sanctuary is the major hub area in Borderlands 2, from and around which many of the game’s main story missions take place. After an attack from Handsome Jack, the entire town is teleported to safety in the sky, become a flying hub town – a little bit like the Shield Helicarrier in the Avengers movies – which is much cooler than one that’s attached to the ground.
I don’t know what Sanctuary 2 is, but if we’re not talking about it, it sounds like it’s not a great place to be. Presumably it was an attempt to set up a second major settlement on Pandora that went very wrong.
Sadly, it sounds as though we’re not likely to actually see it – many years have passed between Borderlands 2 and 3, and this message sounds like whatever happened to Sanctuary 2 is done and dusted.
Tune in May 1 on https://t.co/7iButjDoDj for the #Borderlands3 Gameplay Reveal Event and witness hands-on gameplay for the first time ever! While you wait, you might want take a closer look at this art…
Look closer ➜ https://t.co/Ri4ivM3L3q pic.twitter.com/nUJ7AtaoGl— Borderlands 3 (@Borderlands) April 15, 2019
The second teaser is found at the top of the image. There, you can see a rocket ship, which is presumably what your characters use to planet-hop (Borderlands 3 won’t be set solely on Pandora). Around that ship are three symbols: A smiley face, an equals sign, and a key. That looks a lot like it’s supposed to mean ‘happiness is key’, but what that means is anybody’s guess.
Related: Borderlands games could be getting a new loot tier
Other teasers on that image point to the return of the first game’s final boss, but we’re unlikely to find out what any of them mean for sure until the game actually releases. Thankfully, the Borderlands 3 release date is only a few months away, so we should know more relatively soon.