Gearbox boss Randy Pitchford ruffled some feathers recently with the comment that a "real fan" would pay $80 to play Borderlands 4, if it happened to cost that much, and then somewhat unruffled those feathers with the reveal that it won't cost that much. Borderlands 4 will be $70, like most other games from big publishers right now.
Speaking to GamesRadar, Pitchford now says that $200 would be a fair price for Borderlands 4, but he wishes it were free.
"Shit, I think they could charge $200," Pitchford said. "I wish they'd give it away, because then everyone would play it. That's not how the business works, but the value is there."
This recurring theme in game pricing debates goes back for as long as I can remember: A videogame may cost more than a movie, but a movie only lasts a couple hours, while you can easily spend 100 hours or more playing a big game.
"You look at all the past Borderland games, we have people that spend thousands of hours in The Borderlands," Pitchford said. "If you think about that in terms of the most amount that could have ever been spent versus the time of entertainment, you can't find a better value in the world for any kind of entertainment."
There's some merit to the argument. When I've been strapped for cash, I've definitely favored big RPGs that I can chew on for months. And an astronomical amount of work does go into a game like Borderlands 4.
But as Pitchford acknowledges, the argument only goes so far. I wouldn't pay $70 for an audiobook version of a so-so novel just because it's long, or because you told me that the author spent 10 years writing it. I'll take the shorter, better novel, please.
$70 is lot of money for most people, and I don't think they care how big triple-A budgets are. There are lots of other things they can do with their money and time, and it's notable that we're seeing some games going down from $60 rather than up. Dune Awakening and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 are two examples of highly-rated $50 games from this year.
But as much as Pitchford likes to stoke the flames of discourse (I appreciate him helping us stay warm), he's got no illusions about the realities of the marketplace.
"At the end of the day, when I want something, and I feel like what they're asking is fair, I'll get it," the Gearbox CEO told GamesRadar. "If I don't want something, I won't. Or if I think what they're asking of me isn't fair, I'm not going to do it. All the talk doesn't matter, at the end of the day, that's what it is."
Borderlands 4 will be out September 12 on Steam, the Epic Games Store, and consoles—for $70.
