It has begun: an upcoming game will require a hard drive to play on the Xbox 360. It was announced at the Leipzig Games Convention today that 2K Games' new first-person shooter Borderlands has different requirements from other shooters and will need a hard drive because of its content generation system.

Borderlands is the new genre-crossing game from Gearbox described as "Indiana Jones meets Mad Max." The game will feature full-on four player co-op. The content generation system it features randomly creates objects and procedures in the game ranging from missions and landscapes to weapons and armor. The unique system for the genre is said to be one of the game's strongest points.

While there's no news yet on how much space the game will actually require, it's a safe bet that 360 Pro units (with its detachable hard drive) will be able to accommodate it. It was last heard from Microsoft that Hard Drive Required games would probably come from MMORPGs to store all the files needed to run so it's somewhat a surprise that the first game to formally announce the requirement would be a shooter.

It's not decidedly final yet, but it seems that the only thing left is for Microsoft to give the go signal for the requirements. Gearbox President Randy Pitchford comments that "I don't know if [Microsoft is] gonna complain about that, and I don't want to be in the middle of a controversy there, but you need space."

Borderlands will also be coming out on the PlayStation 3 and PC and is predicted to be released late next year.