TLDR: I loved Borderlands two and I'm going to start a replay with a different character, which i almost never do.
I had fun with Borderlands 1, but was basically pushing through by the end trying not to fall asleep.
B2, on the other hand, I was very engaged in the entire ride through, although it seemed well balanced and the game ended when it should, even including the side quests.
Improvements -
The writing! I think I heard a reference to Anthony Burch writing in Borderlands 2 from hey ass. Whatcha playing episode, and he got some award?
Experience tiers, which I didn't initially like because it wasn't explained, but basically the quests are more important than farming enemies for experience, so you get much more engaged with the stories because you're following quests instead of trying to kill enough boring enemies in the same way to get high enough of a level to destroy future enemies.
In any case, the writing that I did like in Borderlands 1, was perfect in 2. Not too long, always funny, always engaging, every character very well defined, which brings me to my next point:
The voice acting was hilarious and perfect, again, very well defined and idiosyncratic for every character, just so much fun to listen to. Every time handsome Jack pops up. It's fun to listen to him be an a******.
The quests were so much more satisfying. At the end of the first game, I was basically just following marker to marker without caring what anybody said or what was written down just tapping through to the next wavepoint until the quest was finished.
In Borderlands 2, Even if I accidentally clicked through the introduction to the quest, I would go back and make sure to read because I know that the paragraph introducing and explaining the quest is funny and that the quest is going to be rescuing lab experiments and I have to find a particular valve or putting together a treasure map with a weird lure, rather than just find the bigger bad guy punch him to death.
Driving was huge - I was not into driving in Borderlands 1 and got really bored and irritated every time I had to drive. I felt like the aiming system was complete dog s***, and it was just not very fun to drive around in general, like the handling was terrible.
I loved driving around the Borderlands too and was actively bummed out whenever. I didn't get a car, but it made perfect sense and they used the car just enough so that the game wasn't too easy. But you could still boost and race around however you wanted, or chase down a beer van. So much fun driving, such a huge improvement from the first game.
Larger levels with more interesting landscapes in them, each level felt much more unique than the entire The first game to me, like each area had its own style to a degree I hadn't seen before.
I can't remember a single place from the first game, but I'm going to remember the different style of the underground bug. Bunker and the dust and all these other places that had an impact on the personality of the game.
Lastly, art is more efficient, not as many bold lines emphasizing the comic book quality, which is carried through more by the personality of the game instead of by the specific art.
I thought the weapons were a big step down in BL2. I swear 50% of the guns I found were gimmicks (e.g. throw it as a grenade to reload) but not actually all that effective.
Torgue weapons were especially bad. Yeah I know everyone loves Mr. Torgue and explosions are fun, but those guns are so inaccurate they can't hit anything >2 meters away. I'd take a weapon that can reliably hit a target any day.
The devs also got rid of the Atlas and S&S brands from BL1. Those were almost always my pick unless so it was a real letdown to see them missing in BL2.
Oh interesting I dug the weapons "upgrades", as they were presented.
The elemental effects and restore effects were much more balanced than 1 for me.
I do think the grenade to reload was a bad mechanic(because I blew myself up with the rocket launcher 20 times...funny every time), but I can't call it a gimmick since I don't know any other games that had that mechanic.
I remember enjoying the elemental guns (Maliwan) a lot in both BL1 and BL2. It's a shame it took till the Pre-Sequel to add ice!
I'd argue the throw-to-reload mechanic isn't in other games because it's a gimmick.
The other letdowns in BL2 were A) the Hyperion "reverse kick" guns that were only accurate after you emptied most of the magazine, and B) the 3-barrel Gattling guns with magazines that were way too small to be worth spinning up. I swear these together were 25% of my pickups and just a waste of time. It feels bad to die while you're actively holding the trigger right in the baddie's face.
Many of the legendary guns and unique grenade effects were pretty fun in BL2 though. Those were both solid improvements.
Torgue weapons also can't get critical hits, which really lowers their potential damage output. I never use Torgue unless it's something like the Unkempt Harold. Especially frustrating are weapons with Torgue barrels that shoot these terrible grenades or rockets that (again) can't crit. What good is a Jakobs rifle with a Torgue barrel over literally any other barrel?
The ability to do aoe damage is a pretty good bonus, but the bullet speed was so awful it rarely helped. Also there weren't many areas where torque weapons aoe was better than just throwing a grenade or usinga rocket launcher. The ammo costs for rockets were also absurd.