Gearbox /borderlands-3-villains-1280x720
By Steven Asarch
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On a brisk Boston Thursday, sipping an overpriced gas station Kombucha, I set off for PAX East 2019. The Penny Arcade Expo is one of the East Coasts' only gaming conventions and the big boys show up to play. Nintendo, Facebook and dozens of other industry veterans flock to the floor to try and grab the spotlight. Today, the chatter centered around Gearbox Entertainment, who had been teasing a huge Borderlands reveal on a livestream.
I managed to grab a seat in the third row, just one of 3,000 faces excited to see what's next for Claptrap, Tiny Tina and the rest of the post-apocalyptic gang. I expected your average run-of-the mill conference where men in suits tell us why their collection of pixels inside a computer box is best. Instead, I got to see first hand one of the most chaotic, confusing and outright delightful streams of my career.
Things started out pretty normal. PAX volunteers passed out plastic masks of the classic Borderlands Psycho, allowing the whole crowd to cosplay as a shirtless maniac. Randy Pitchford, one of the founders of Gearbox Studios, took to the stage to dissect the Borderlands trailer. And to diminish gaming's most popular genre.
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"Battle royale games are fun, but that isn't what we are making," Pitchford told the cheering crowd. Gearbox's head of publishing stepped out on stage, introducing new games like Justin Roiland's Trevor Saves the Universe and the amazing looking Risk of Rain 2 .
Pitchford stepped back out on stage and that's when things started to get a little crazy. He had called up two audience members with birthdays this week to take part in a 20-minute long magic trick demo that showed off the Borderlands card game Tiny Tina's Robot Tea Party . I don't think I've laughed at a game reveal this hard in my entire life; the whole show was beautifully chaotic. Pitchford forces the crowd to count to 47 (twice!) just to fully complete immerses us in his magic absurdity.
Now the moment fans had been waiting for: the reveal trailer for Borderlands 3 . Pitchford throws off his jacket to reveal a bedazzled button down, with a giant golden "3" embroidered around the back, like a mid-80s wrestler making his reveal. And that's where shit really hit the fan. The trailers were experiencing technical difficulties, so Pitchford had to improvise. Calling up members of the Borderlands team, he asked each what their favorite part of the newly announced remaster is (did I mention that they are remastering the series in 4k?) It didn't feel like a multi-million dollar franchises reveal, more like an Amazing Jonathon comedy show that had started to go awry.
"I love PAX, but we should have brought our own equipment," Pitchford jeers to a screaming crowd. "Have you tried turning it on and off again," yells one member of the crowd. "We still love you," yells another. This whole time I'm still laughing my ass off, ruining the live stream of the social media director sitting in the chair beside me. It was like watching a trainwreck in real time, with the only causality being the job of a PA who didn't understand video streams.
This was, by far, the best reveal I've ever seen in my life. Even with all the technical difficulties and magic tricks, the essence of Borderlands 3 still shone through and gave fans a reason to get excited. When I manage to make it back home, I'll be wearing that mask whenever I play, thinking of the ridiculousness that is Pitchford.
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