🤮 “It’s So Bad and Woke” – Borderlands 4 Fans Aren’t Just Skipping It… They’re Swearing Off Piracy Too! 🚫
You drop cash on a franchise you loved for 15 years, only to get hit with buggy crashes, preachy DEI sermons, and a CEO who calls complainers “not real fans.” Reviews tanking to 50% negative, sales cratering 50% below BL3 – now diehards are like, “Won’t even pirate this trash.” Is Gearbox’s “premium” slop the final nail in Pandora’s coffin, or a wake-up call for woke-washed gaming?
Peel back the vault and expose the rot:
The Borderlands series has long been a chaotic beacon in gaming – cel-shaded mayhem, billions of guns, and antiheroes cracking wise amid alien apocalypses. From its 2009 origins as a Diablo-meets-Duke Nukem fever dream, it ballooned into a cultural juggernaut, with Borderlands 2 alone selling over 28 million copies and spawning a cult following for its irreverent lore. But as Borderlands 4 stumbled into stores last week, the vault has cracked open to reveal not treasure, but a toxic brew of technical failures, “woke” backlash, and a CEO’s tone-deaf tirades. Fans aren’t just refunding – they’re boycotting outright, with some vowing to skip even pirated copies. Sales are reportedly down 50% from Borderlands 3, Steam reviews hover at a dismal “Mixed” with half negative, and social media echoes a single, searing refrain: “It’s so bad and woke.” Is this the franchise’s death spiral, or a symptom of gaming’s broader identity crisis?
The launch was supposed to be a triumphant return to form. Gearbox Software, under Take-Two Interactive, hyped Borderlands 4 as a “premium” evolution: sleeker movement, deeper co-op, and a story probing fascism’s fringes on a war-torn planet. Priced at $80 – a hike from Borderlands 3‘s $60 debut – it promised “bigger and better” for “real fans.” Early peaks hit 300,000 concurrent Steam players, but the drop-off was brutal: halved within days, with daily actives scraping lows not seen since The Pre-Sequel. Technical woes dominate the gripes – stuttering on high-end rigs, frame drops to 30 FPS after an hour, input lag that turns gunfights into slideshows. One X user fumed: “Optimization so bad, blame falls on players – not the devs who shipped lammerda.” Mods for fixes are surging on Nexus, but for many, it’s too little, too late.
Layer on the “woke” accusations, and the powder keg ignites. Pre-release teasers sparked fury over “bland” vault hunters – diverse casts with “DEI checklist” vibes, including trans-coded backstories and non-binary nods echoing FL4K from Borderlands 3. Reddit’s r/borderlands3 lit up with “woke crying” threads, users dubbing it “Concord 2” for black characters and queer rep, ignoring the series’ history of bi Axton, ace Maya, and lesbian Athena. A June controversy boiled over when Gearbox banned a German Steam user for questioning “gendered language” in translations – a push for inclusive terms like “Bäcker*innen” that critics called Marxist overreach. “Censors instead of debates,” one report blasted, tying it to broader “woke mind virus” infecting the loot shooter.
In-game, the story’s fascism critique – from chaos to authoritarianism – lands as preachy slop to detractors. YouTube rants like “Woke DEI Game Developers Ruined Borderlands 4” (views in the hundreds of thousands) skewer it as “political slop,” with one creator lamenting: “Stood up for the female lead, but this rhetoric? No more.” X threads amplify the boycott: “Don’t buy slop from woke communist freak developers,” one post urged, racking up likes amid calls for refunds. The kicker? Diehards aren’t turning to torrents. “Won’t even pirate this trash,” echoes across forums, a sentiment born of disgust over supporting “woke freaks” in any form. Piracy trackers report negligible upticks, unlike buggy hits like Cyberpunk 2077, where cracks filled the void.
Randy Pitchford, Gearbox’s bombastic CEO, has fanned the flames into a inferno. His Twitter rampage – dismissing bugs as user error, suggesting 1440p for “stubborn” 4K seekers, and quipping “code your own engine” – has alienated legions. “Premium game for premium gamers,” he sneered at the $80 price hike, implying cash-strapped critics aren’t “real fans.” Backlash exploded: A YouTube takedown titled “Greedy WOKE CEO Gets DESTROYED” went viral, with X users like @SynthPotato decrying, “90% less outrage if he stopped tweeting.” Boycott calls surged – “Borderlands 4 BOYCOTTED as CEO Tells Fans NOT to Buy,” one video proclaimed, linking it to “woke” overhauls. Sales figures, per industry trackers, confirm the hit: 50% below Borderlands 3‘s launch, with pre-orders cratering amid the noise.
Defenders push back, arguing the “woke” tag is overblown nostalgia bait. r/saltierthankrayt cheered the backlash as “endorsement,” with users noting Borderlands‘ queer canon dates to 2012. A YouTube defense, “Borderlands 4 Isn’t Woke…So Far,” praises the core loop as “undeniably excellent,” blaming chuds for fixating on diversity over gameplay. Steam forums query “How woke is this game?” with mixed replies: Some hail inclusivity, others decry “PC garbage.” Gearbox’s DEI push post-2018 scandals – hiring consultants after #MeToo fallout – aimed for reform, but skeptics see it as forced agenda.
This isn’t isolated. Gaming’s “woke wars” rage on: Ghost of Yotei faces similar heat for female leads, while Sweet Baby Inc. consulting scars linger from Suicide Squad flops. Borderlands 4‘s woes mirror Concord‘s shutdown – overhyped inclusivity clashing with buggy execution. Take-Two’s pivot from DEI amid 2025 boardroom shifts hints at reckoning, but Pitchford’s defiance – “Entertainers making bigger games” – shows no retreat.
Patches promise FOV sliders and stability, but trust is shattered. X rants like @Vara_Dark’s “HORRIBLE Launch Performance” (thousands of views) tie bugs to “ruined” rep, while @Pirat_Nation blasts “incompetent devs.” Forums wail: “Bland visuals, repetitive after 45 minutes – astroturf glazing can’t save it.” One poignant plea: “Utterly disgusting… hope the studio apologizes, or sales go under.”
Zoom out: Looter-shooters face extinction threats from battle royales and indies unburdened by AAA bloat. Borderlands‘ soul – unapologetic absurdity – feels diluted by corporate calculus and cultural crossfire. Fans skipping piracy isn’t just thrift; it’s revulsion at funding “trash bag” ideology. As one X post quipped: “Replace rep kits with HRT, guns with pronouns – that’s the vibe.”
Gearbox eyes hotfixes, but the vault hunters’ exodus grows. Pitchford’s gold watches won’t buy back loyalty; neither will “premium” excuses. Borderlands 4 could rebound like No Man’s Sky, but with “so bad and woke” as its epitaph, redemption demands ditching the drama. For now, Pandora’s plunderers are passing – legally and illicitly alike. The real loot? Lessons in listening before the horde stampedes.
