Gearbox Boss Randy Pitchford Continues Damaging Borderlands' Reputation

If there's someone I wouldn't want to be right now, it's most certainly the head of Gearbox's PR department.

Imagine: you and your team are working tirelessly to build hype for Borderlands 4 while the franchise is getting bombarded with negative reviews over spyware-like EULA changes and the disaster that was the Borderlands movie still being fresh in everyone's memory, only to have your own boss, Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford, completely undermine all your efforts with just a couple of tweets.

And worst of all, there is nothing you can really do about it, as even after getting slammed for all but confirming Borderlands 4 would be priced at $80 and trying to defend it with a personal anecdote and the claim that it's "not his call," Pitchford didn't lay low and wait for the outrage to die down, choosing instead to double down on his bizarre antics and ride the wave of backlash, only for it to backfire tremendously.

That's all to say the drama surrounding Gearbox's infamous CEO shows no signs of slowing down, with Randy Pitchford catching not one, but two waves of criticism this time.

The first wave came after he tried to "play it cool" in response to a joke tweet from Devolver Digital, which pointed out that you could buy Mycopunk – an upcoming co-op shooter with a whimsical art style not too dissimilar from Borderlands' – for yourself and three friends for the price of a single copy of Borderlands 4.

For some inexplicable reason, Pitchford replied with, "Mycopunk is cheaper than a point of meth" and "probably has fewer side effects," which many commenters perceived as cringeworthy, urging him to log off Twitter and stop making life harder for Gearbox's regular developers—who, as history has shown, will be the ones hit hardest should Borederlands 4 flop.

While Randy probably saw this as a winning argument in his head, the gaming community didn't agree. Many pointed out that games simply don't need to have such massive budgets in the first place, and that it's AAA studios choosing to ignore cost-efficiency – so why should players be the ones to foot the bill?

Recent releases have made it clear, gamers note, that a title's quality and success aren't tied to how much money is thrown at it, and with Pitchford's claims contradicting this observable reality, it's no surprise the video he shared was met with heavy criticism.

So, what do you think about Borderlands 4? Will the game's sales be affected by Randy's antics? Tell us what you think down in the comments!