Gearbox Software CEO Randy Pitchford on Originality – Video Games Update
Gearbox Software CEO, Randy Pitchford, has stated in an interview that the fact that no other game developer has tried to rip off Borderlands has really surprised him.
Randy Pitchford describes the current Video Games Industry to be very ruthless since almost every developer steals ideas from competitors. Integrity and Individuality are nowhere to be found. Pitchford revealed that when Gearbox developed the original Borderlands,
they were apprehensive as they wanted to announce the new Intellectual Property (IP) to the world but they were also feeling possessive about the new formula the team had created.
"When talking about Borderlands 1, it was really confusing, because on one hand we gotta scream from the highest mountain to get attention because it's a new IP. On the other hand, it's like, 's**t, we don't want to tell people our secret because
then they're all gonna copy it because it's so good,’” stated Pitchford in an interview with Gamasutra.
The formula for Borderlands was apparently a hit as the game was praised by fans and critics, scoring an average meta-score of 84 percent for the Xbox 360 version on Metacritic.com. The game was a blend of First Person Shooter (FPS), Vehicular Combat and
featured deep role playing game (RPG) elements such as levelling up, character customisations, Skill trees and random weapons and items drops.
The main feature that the game boasted was the countless number of Guns available. The game could randomly generate a unique weapon according to the current level of the gamers’ character and it was assumed that no two users would be able to find the same
gun as the weapon drops were random and unscripted.
This added to the RPG elements of the game as players could also trade items with other players while playing Co-op and it made grinding for loot much more fun. It seems that Gearbox has apparently improved on all the first games’ strengths in the upcoming
sequel and has also addressed the weaknesses. The studio seems to be very proud of their work and can’t wait for the fans to get their hands on the game when it launches this fall.
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