LogInRandy Pitchford is at it again.
Gearbox
It's a universal rule: you don't have to be a cook to know when the food is bad. Gearbox's CEO Randy Pitchford doesn't seem to agree.
Borderlands 4 launched to a slew of performance issues, earning Mostly Negative reviews on Steam the first day. Considering Pitchford is sure the game is worth $200 and his infamous inability to take criticism, his recent reply to one of the X/Twitter users is not that surprising.
It all started in a thread where Pitchford tried to help people fix their problems with FPS in Borderlands 4, offering some solutions. One user, Colecypher, suggested something else: "Or just an idea here, make your game look good without relying on AI upscale."
Pitchford didn't like that reply and offered Colecypher to make an engine themselves.
"Code your own engine and show us how it’s done, please. We will be your customer when you pull it off. The people doing it now are clearly dumb and don’t know what they’re doing and all the support and recommendations and code and architecture from the world’s greatest hardware companies and tech companies working with the world’s greatest real time graphics engine coders don’t know what you seem to know. /sarcasm"
Naturally, players had their own advice to give, telling Pitchford to own up and listen.
"Randy, some criticism is draining, but much of it is legitimate, especially regarding performance and optimization. You have a history of responding publicly in ways that come across as defensive or confrontational, often engaging directly with individuals instead of maintaining the professional posture expected of an executive. Reacting emotionally rather than strategically only makes things worse over time. People expect their concerns to be acknowledged and addressed, not dismissed with statements like 'Well, you do a better job.' They're not your bros, they're your customers," one user said.
"Wow, really? That's your reaction? Not a good look bro," replied another.
The next day, Pitchford came back with another post, stating that "every PC gamer must accept the reality of the relationship between their hardware and what the software they are running is doing."
"We have made an amazing and fun and huge looter shooter campaign game. The game is pretty damn optimal – which means that the software is doing what we want without wasteful cycles on bad processes. With Borderlands 4, every PC gamer has a LOT of tools to balance their preferences between FPS, resolution, and rendering features. If you aren’t happy with the balance between these things you are experiencing, please tune to your preferences using the tools available to you."
Sounds a lot like a DIY project, but okay. He then proceeds to seemingly try to do some damage control, reminding players of DLSS and other things they can turn on, but in a nicer manner than the day before. However, I doubt it placated anyone. Moreover, his post received a community note, saying, "The publisher of a game is responsible of providing accurate recommend and minimal specs since the consumers has absolutely no way to check how the game is going to run in the hardware before release."
I'm pretty sure we have a lot of drama coming until Gearbox fixes all the issues with Borderlands 4. Meanwhile, I think some bosses should go on vacation right after their game launches.
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