GBX has been sold to Embracer Publishing

Borderlands 3 Borderlands 3 General Discussion
#50

So, for me the quick takeaway is that Gearbox has a new ownership group, but its business relationships are intact, with 2k still publishing, and Gearbox still publishing the titles it’s released for other studios.

Publishers do not always own the titles and studios they work with. They primarily secure the rights to distribute and promote the games for a share of the profits.

Studios actually produce those games, and own the intellectual properties, unless they sell or license their rights to use them to other parties for a specific period of time. Marvel’s sale of the rights to Mutants and Fantastic Four to Fox, the Spiderverse to Sony, the Hulk Universal?, along with a hodgepodge of characters like Marvel Knights titles to was an example of this. The Marvel was eventually sold in its entirety after forming their Film Studio, and having it purchased by Disney, but as we all know, the other studios retained the rights to the characters (IPs) they purchased, and continued to make and distribute films with them.

2 Likes
#51

Here is a bit more context to this deal. In short, it looks good for Gearbox as the deal and the plans of both the Embracer Group and Gearbox alike are meant to be very long-term. Gearbox will grow and expand and is open to collaborations and crossover work, going both ways.

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/amp/2021-02-03-pitchford-says-embracer-is-like-a-rocket-booster-for-gearboxs-ambitions

2 Likes
#52

Only real bad news so far is that Pitchford is, sadly, still the CEO of Gearbox.

4 Likes
#53

As much as a dislike him, without him none of us would be here, so even if he sticks around, he has earned at least some respect for his accomplishments.

O and just think about it this way: The more projects Gearbox takes on the less Randy can insert himself into them. This whole deal could very well profit even the developers themselves in that regard. For sure Borderlands stays his baby and he will make sure to be present for those games, but otherwise he should be busy enough to give people a break from him at least every so often.

2 Likes
#54

@narfkeks @EzioILMentore Keep your heads up friends! I am sure we will still have Randy’s horribly cringeworthy convention presentations to sustain us.

I definitely respect Randy’s accomplishments at GBX, 100%. The Borderlands franchise has provided me with endless hours of fascination and entertainment. He (and many others helping along the way) built a billion-dollar business from nothing, and that’s amazing. Building a business, especially one that entertains millions of people, is a massive undertaking and achievement. I really mean it - it is truly remarkable.

However, I can also appreciate that a person can be good at one thing and not so good at another. Although Randy Pitchford was successful at building GBX and the BL franchise, it seems fairly clear to me that he has been way out of his depth since the franchise went massive after BL2 (so going on 9 years now). GBX needs (deserves?) better management.

4 Likes
#55

I sunk so many hours in Frontlines. Great multiplayer game back in the day.

#56

Probably completely unrelated, but Steam is running a 2K dev sale right now. $50 for BL3 ultimate edition.

4 Likes
#57

Can only agree to that. I would personally get Randy into a bigger PR role or something where he can use his talents, because, as cringeworthy as he might be, he is still entertaining if you give him a good, tightly structured timeline. Just don’t let him have the time to go on tangents.

When it comes to management it is indeed complicated to just have Randy be replaced. Ideally the new management should come from inside the studio to have a familiar face with actual experience in Gearbox’s matters become the boss. But thats neither here nor there and as long as Randy doesn’t sink the ship that is Gearbox, I’m fine with him being Gearbox’s manifestation of the nine inner circles of hell.

1 Like
#58

I totally get that. PEOPLE are complicated. You take the good with the bad when it comes to people. Not that I am saying anything profound here, but the way that principle works in application in a company, is much more complex. It’s hard to tell how much good and bad Pitchford brings to the table.

Sometimes the positives of a leader are so positive that you can overlook the negatives, and vice versa. Sometimes the leader literally IS the culture of the company (Elon Musk). Sometimes the positive qualities or story of the company’s founder are so compelling to the company’s employees or its story as a whole that it doesn’t matter what negatives also accompany the founder’s presence, the employees will follow the person and do whatever they are asked.

But sometimes you have Randy Pitchford, and I am not sure what quality or culture he brings to the table that is so positive that it outweighs some of the potential negatives I have seen publicly. At his best, he’s an excellent showman; at his worst, he’s an embarrassing showman. So the showman aspect is something, and in my experience watching GBX convention presentations for more than a decade now, I’d say his convention performance is a VERY mixed bag.

I feel like Randy’s bailiwick role appears to be the “idea guy” or the smooth-talking marketing dude. The problem is that, at least publicly, he comes off less frequently as smooth and intelligent, and more often just as a disconnected weirdo. I think you made a comment a few posts back about GBX needing a top-tier business manager of some sort, and I think that is a correct assessment based upon what I have seen (again, publicly only, I have no insider knowledge at all).

No idea if anything I have said is correct, just looking at it from the outside in and based upon at least 13 years watching and being interested in the affairs of Gearbox Software. I have been all-in on Borderlands since I first heard of it from the now-famous 2007 Game Informer cover article.

6 Likes
#59

Randy said a while back (don’t remember when) that he was “on the spectrum”, which probably means he has some sort of difficulty in social situations or signs of autism.

That being said, as long as him being the head of the company means more funding and development for further Borderlands titles, I don’t mind him or anyone else being CEO. He brought up a company from nothing and made one of the highest selling video games IPs from scratch, so we can safely assume he is fairly competent, controversies aside

2 Likes
#60

It would be my opinion that Randy probably doesn’t know about any of the gripes we have with the game. I doubt that anyone is informing him that FL4K’s 4th skill tree is broken, or that some people are having issues with trophies on PS5, or that the HUD is broken for splitscreen.

He’s the CEO, and aside from the occasional play of the game, when I don’t think these issues would be likely to present themselves, I would imagine that his time is taken up with CEO business.

Bugs and faults would be the responsibility of other managers. So I would say that it won’t really matter if he stays as head after the merger/acquisition. CEO isn’t the sort of role that would be involved ‘under the hood/bonnet’ of the game.

3 Likes
#61

I would put forth (strictly from a gamer’s perspective, but one who spent 20+ years in the IT service industry) that a large portion of the business of CEO’s of gaming companies are the state of the games from the players’ perspectives (in other words, Customer Satisfaction). If not, then they (the CEO’s) are out of touch with their customer bases (a bad situation for any industry). And if those to whom the CEO’s have delegated the front end management of staying in touch with the customers are not communicating effectively (or are not being allowed to communicate effectively) with the CEO with regards to issues/topics that are important to those customers, then that is still on the CEO’s head in terms of establishing an effective customer satisfaction reporting system and/or customer service escalation path for problems that allows the CEO’s to keep their finger on the pulse of issues and trends.

I do acknowledge that the nitty-gritty, nuts & bolts of “How do we fix this technical issue?” or “Which piece of code should we work on to correct balance issues with Mayhem 2.0?” are not the kind of discussions that CEO’s would be having. However, the fact that there are technical issues, game play issues, narrative issues and QOL issues and the metrics around the impact that these issues are having with the franchise’s community are exactly the kinds of topics that CEO’s would want to keep abreast of.

Should/would each and every complaint and/or observation/idea be funneled up to the CEO? Of course not. But reports of these issues might pass by their desks, depending on the severity level of the issue at hand, the number of customers impacted and the length of time it is taking to resolve it. A single complaint about Mayhem 2.0 would most likely not make it past the initial help desk. But a report showing thousands of end-users griping about Mayhem 2.0 might make it as far as the CEO, especially if the report shows that people are still upset long after the first complaints were logged and that there has been a downward trend of active users that correlates with the initial launch. Then the CEO might sift through a few handfuls of actual end-user posts to get a feel for what is going on.

So my two cents regarding BL3: If Randy doesn’t know about any of the gripes the players are having with the game then either a) those particular issues are actually not significant enough in the aggregate across the totality of the user base in any objectively measurable way for him to hear about it or b) the issues are severe enough but there is a breakdown in either the design or the execution of the communication/escalation system at GBX. But I disagree with the general principle that the business of a CEO of a gaming company would never include reviewing end-user gripes.

Sorry for the long post. My old IT customer service sensibilities were engaged and the compulsion to respond was too much to ignore. :grin:

4 Likes
#62

Thing is, how much is he taking notice of this forum? I would imagine that GBX has a lot of player data coming in and that would influence their executive decisions more than gripes from a few people on a forum? They sold millions of copies of this game and I would suspect that we, on this forum, don’t accurately reflect the majority of the player base.

3 Likes
#63

If the opinions of those on this forum do not accurately reflect the vast majority of the player base, then “we” would fall under “a)”. Unless someone can produce reports that show otherwise, I would have to concur.

That does not mean we can’t and shouldn’t express our views. If no one ever complains, then gaming companies would never learn anything about how their games are being received. What they do with the information is hard to guess. I have seen some posts that suggest these threads are being watched and ideas are making it into production (I forget who mentioned that).

As to whether or not Randy himself ever peruses these forums, that is certainly up for debate. It could be he has a secret handle and interjects from time to time without any of us knowing. Or it could be that he has never looked at a single topic or post. Either way, all we can do is continue forward in civil discourse while we wait for the next bit of news or release of product.

4 Likes
#64

Metro, Darksiders, kingdoms of amalur - bloody good games. Heard good things about remnant and the hunt: showdown aswell and i think bloodlines 2 were a big reveal for many.

Quite the collection indeed.

2 Likes
#65

If he doesn’t, he’s not doing his job. He is the CEO of an entertainment software company. Part of his job description is being in touch with his company’s player base. If what you have said is correct, then that’s part of the problem here.

I wouldn’t at all make that assumption. Just because he was good at founding essentially a small indie studio that has grown to a multi-billion dollar company, does not mean he has the skill set to lead the billion-dollar company. But I understand your point that if he could do the first, you are assuming he would be capable of the second. In my business experience, however, that is not always - or even just 50% of the time - actually true.

All I am saying is that you shouldn’t necessarily take for granted that just because someone founded and is at the helm of their company, that they are a good business leader and manager. Many entrepreneurs are great at starting up businesses, because they have good ideas and the belief in themselves to create something amazing, but once they create the thing, it grows wildly and out of their ability and skill set to manage. Running a small, 10 man shop is not the same thing as running a multi-national corporation.

3 Likes
#66

But as I said, we few who gripe on here may not be indicative of the player base so may not even register with him. He’ll have senior managers reporting stuff to him, I doubt he reads the forums himself. Chain of command and all that…

1 Like
#67

Pretty sure he’s on here, complaining about Ava, like everyone else. :rofl: :rofl:

4 Likes
#68

For what it’s worth, I found this in my recomendations today:

2 Likes
#69

There has been a lot of speculation here and other places about this transaction. To me, the best and most likely explanation I’ve seen is the one put forth by @LeeHarveyOswald in another thread I have linked below. Seems as likely as any scenario, IMO.

1 Like