Borderlands CEO Randy Pitchford says his hopes on Epic Store were 'overly optimistic or misplaced'

[John Elden Ring]

Reprot vis Tweaktown

Back in 2019, Gearbox shocked PC gamers by announcing that Borderlands 3 would be exclusive to the Epic Games Store. The move was a big bet from the Fortnite-maker, who was spending millions to secure exclusive games for its fledgling PC storefront in a bid to attract more users. Years later, Borderlands is back on Steam, with Borderlands 4 planning to launch on both EGS and Valve's store.

Back in 2019, Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford believed in the Epic Store to a greater extent than he does now, so much that he declared Steam may "look like a dying store" in 5-10 years.

In a rather long and illuminating Tweet, Pitchford shares his thoughts on previous Borderlands exclusivity deal, on the Epic Store as a whole, and how he believes his initial gusto for Epic's challenging shop may have been misguided and misplaced.

If Epic successfully pressed its advantage, that may have been the case [that Steam will look like a dying store in 5 or 10 years].

But Epic did not.

So, famously, Steam does very little to earn the massive cut they take and continues its effective monopoly in the West while would-be competitors with much more developer friendly models continue to shoot themselves in the foot. I am a Steam customer and Steam developer that will continue to root for and support competition.

Borderlands 3 and Wonderlands demonstrated clearly that the customers show up for the games, not the store front. But the industry gives Steam their monopoly because publishers are afraid to take the risk to support more developer and publisher friendly stores. It's all very interesting and there is a huge amount of opportunity in the PC gaming space for retail disruption, but no one seems to be able to make it happen.

I had high hopes for Epic - hopes that were validated in the moment of the Borderlands 3 and Wonderlands launches.

But my long term hope (that appeared in a dozens-long Tweet storm I did five years ago) regarding Epic's store were misplaced or overly optimistic.

It's a cool lesson for me and anyone who wants to learn from my experience. Moving forward, we'll continue to support Steam (as we have for literally every PC games we've launched since Steam came into existence. Meanwhile, I sincerely hope Epic keeps up the fight and makes headway.

Epic is going to have to prioritize the store and try some new initiatives while also doubling down on earning pivotal exclusives if it is going to have a chance. I also hope other viable competitors arrive.

I am sure we will all be watching. As a developer I will continue to balance being where the customers are with being where I wished would earn the customers trust and loyalty. As a game player, I will be on all the platforms.

 

[Evilnemesis8]

His tone was hilarious back in the day, but I did understand his enthusiasm to a certain level.

Epic/Tim Sweeney were heavily courting developers, he's not the only one who saw the potential.
In fact, even in this breakdown he's still thinking like that, like here:

Borderlands 3 and Wonderlands demonstrated clearly that the customers show up for the games, not the store front. But the industry gives Steam their monopoly because publishers are afraid to take the risk to support more developer and publisher friendly stores.

Customers are kingmakers, it doesn't matter what kind of support and better cuts or what Epic or a competitor might give in order to get the game(s) to the platform with a better package deal.

If the platform has little value to customers, it's not going to lead to the type of adoption they're all looking for.
It's undeniable that Epic was not prepared to support software development of the store to compete.