Putting the Borderlands 4 reveal just 2 weeks after the Borderlands movie's $90m flop is being hailed as Randy Pitchford's ultimate "big brain move"
Aug. 21, 2024“Damage control at it’s finest”
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The newly announcedBorderlands 4is doing a strange bit of damage control for theGearboxfranchise after the disastrous Borderlands movie.
This was all well before Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford very confidently saidBorderlands 4 was the “greatest thing” the studio has ever done. There’s dancing around something, then there’s whatever Pitchford was doing here.
Oddly, it seems the Borderlands 4 announcement is being taken by series fans to be a brilliant bit of a distraction from the Borderlands movie. The$90 million flop is reportedly heading to streaming serviceslater this month, barely three months after it opened in theatres and failed to recoup a significant amount of its reported $110 million budget - let alone the entire thing.
“Big Brain Move: Give movie rights to your franchise to a group that will butcher it… distraction technique! Follow up: Release un-leaked announcement!” reads oneRedditcomment reacting to the game announcement. “Damage control at it’s finest” chimes in another comment.
Obviously, cinematic trailers like the one accompanying Borderlands 4’s announcement take a long time to make and don’t just happen overnight as damage control for a bad movie. No one here is saying that - they’re more angling comments around the weird timing of the trailer arriving as a distraction technique for the movie.
In fact, it’s worth pointing out that the Borderlands movie already appears to have had a positive effect on the games it takes inspiration from.Borderlands 3 rocketed up Steam’s best-sellers chartlast week for example, while Borderlands 2 has also seen a huge influx of players. Even if people didn’t love the movie, it’s good that they’re still trying out Gearbox’s games.
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