Borderlands 3 cross-play update won't come to PS4 and PS5 platforms

Borderlands 3 is getting ready to enable cross-play on all platforms, but support for PS4 and PS5 has been pulled.

Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford took to Twitter earlier today to deliver the news through the tweet seen just below. In the announcement, Pitchford says that there's good news and bad news. The former is that Borderlands 3 has been preparing an update that would enable cross-play on all platforms. The latter is that for certification purposes, "the publisher" has required Gearbox to remove cross-play support for PlayStation consoles.

This means when the new Borderlands 3 update arrives that enables cross-play for players, those on PS4 and PS5 consoles will be left out. From Pitchford's statement just above, it's not entirely clear who's demanded that cross-play be cut from PlayStation devices. "The publisher" could theoretically refer to either 2K, who publishes Borderlands 3, or Sony.

If this truly is a certification issue, as Pitchford claims above, then it's entirely possible that cross-play for PlayStation players could be added to Borderlands 3 later down the line. If the new Borderlands 3 update was going to fail certification on PlayStation platforms, it's entirely possible that the update could have introduced a critical issue for the game, like a game-breaking bug, hence why it would have been refused certification.

Right now, Borderlands 3 supports cross-play between the same consoles across different generations. Xbox One players can play with those on Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S, for example, but cannot play Borderlands 3 with both PC and PlayStation players. 

It's not clear if the dropping of PlayStation platforms means Gearbox will pause the new update for Borderlands 3. The developer could opt to hold off on releasing the update until it passes certification on all platforms, or they could release the cross-play update for Xbox and PC players, and add in PlayStation players later on down the line.

If you're still churning your way through Gearbox's looter shooter, head over to our Borderlands 3 Shift Code guide for information on how to unlock every Golden Chest on Sanctuary 3.