A new vault hunter is coming. Developer Gearbox Software teased a new playable character is forthcoming for Borderlands 2 during a panel at South by Southwest (SXSW).

Although details were scarce regarding the new character class, Gearbox Franchise Director Matt Armstrong explained that it shouldn’t be long before players see him or her. Unfortunately, the character will not be included with the Borderlands 2 Season Pass, but will instead be a separate purchase.

Furthermore, the announcement video (featured below courtesy of Joystiq) suggests that the new character will focus more on melee combat than most of the other classes players have seen thus far. Either way, this new combatant will join the Mechromancer, and bring the total character count up to 6.

Unfortunately for Gearbox, this announcement comes less than a month after the release of Aliens: Colonial Marines, which for all intents and purposes was a failure. A disconnect between preview materials and the final product, and a borderline broken game, were some of the biggest problems with that game.

And so, when Gearbox shows up at SXSW with talk of DLC, and says that the new character will not be part of the Season Pass, they are making a bold move. To be honest, there are probably lots of gamers that might be upset by this announcement.

There was a surprisingly large contingency of gamers that were unable to play Borderlands 2 at all for the first 2 months or so, because of a few game-breaking bugs, which rendered their Season Pass purchase worthless. The only solace they could find at all was knowing that whenever Gearbox did fix the game, they would have a ton of content waiting for them. Content including Captain Scarlett and Her Pirate’s Booty, Mr. Torgue’s Campaign of Carnage, and Sir Hammerlock’s Big Game Hunt — the first two are also packaged in with the Borderlands 2 Add-On retail release.

One other important thing to note: Gearbox’s Randy Pitchford recently teased that a new character AND a new DLC expansion were not that far off. So, since Gearbox announced the character, does that mean a full expansion is in our future?

What do you hope to see from a new character class? Was it a mistake not to include the DLC with the  Borderlands 2 Season Pass?

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Source: Joystiq