Borderlands 4 found itself in hot water after studio head Randy Pitchford implied that a "real fan" would buy the game, regardless of whether it launched with an $80 price tag. Of course, Borderlands 4 ended up costing $70 anyway and one Baldur's Gate 3 developer can't help but think the backlash was all for nothing.
After the announcement that Borderlands 4 will cost $70, after all, some people speculated that the backlash to Randy Pitchford's divisive comments actually led to the shooter's cheaper-than-expected price. But Larian Studios' publishing director, Michael Douse, says the theory is "extremely unlikely."
"They probably just calculated a higher average price from up-sell SKUs that satisfied them with a lower barrier to entry at 70, especially knowing people would want to play it with friends," he tweeted recently. "Keeping that entry level lower makes a lot of sense."
Borderlands 4 is essentially a co-op game at heart. People are going to want to play with their pals, and you're much more likely to convince a friend to drop $70 than $80 on a new game, meaning publisher 2K stands to gain more with that cheaper barrier to entry.
"Almost everything is far more boring than you could imagine," Douse continued.
When the backlash was at its boiling point, Douse chimed in on all the discussion to call Pitchford's comments "gross" since it seemingly assumed a game was/should be more important to people "during a cost of living crisis than, for example, making it day to day."
It didn't take long for Pitchford to respond to the fan counterblast multiple times, ending with a massive 557-word post trying to clear up the "misunderstanding." It seems to be in the past now, though.
