Randy Pitchford says Borderlands 4 is intended to "bring new people in" to the series, and I can only hope it's better at that than the Borderlands movie and its $110 million loss

Yahoo

4 days ago

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Borderlands 4 is fast approaching, and Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford says "it's a perfect entry point" for anyone who's never played a game from the series before.
In an interview with Rolling Stone, Pitchford says that the devs are aiming for Borderlands 4 to "take care of the people that have been with us but also bring new people in." By the time the new looter shooter releases, it'll have been almost six years to the day since Borderlands 3's launch, so it makes sense that Gearbox would want to cater for the players that never caught up with the series all those years ago. There's past evidence to support this idea, too.
"We saw, for example, between Borderlands 2 and 3, that about a third of the people that played Borderlands 3 were new to the franchise," explains Pitchford. "So, we wanted to make sure that we made the game accessible to people that have never played a Borderlands game before, but also make it familiar."
It's also worth keeping in mind the success – or rather, lack thereof – of last year's Borderlands movie adaptation. With a reported $115 million production budget and an extra $30 million on marketing and distribution (thanks, Variety), the worldwide box office revenue of around $33 million (via Box Office Mojo) meant it didn't even come close to breaking even, let alone making a profit. With an estimated loss of around $112 million, it's safe to say that the movie didn't exactly give the franchise a massive boost of new fans Gearbox might have been hoping for, so now it's on Borderlands 4 to do some heavy lifting.
In the Rolling Stone interview, Pitchford reiterates that "if this is your first Borderlands, it's a perfect entry point," so it definitely sounds like Gearbox is keen to welcome new players with the latest entry. Given its release across PC, Xbox Series X|S, PS5, and even Switch 2, Borderlands 4 definitely seems well positioned to do that, but for now only time will tell how successful it is.
Gearbox's Randy Pitchford celebrates Borderlands 4 going gold by explaining what that means: "The moment we're done is about as monumental as anything we experience in our lives."