Gearbox Software
CompanyUnited States
Documents about Gearbox Software
Game Dev Unchained8 min
Scumbag Randy Pitchford Keeps Borderlands 3 Bonuses | Games ReCAP
Gearbox Software, a Texas-based game developer, has faced significant internal backlash following a decision to drastically reduce royalty bonuses for employees who worked on the commercially successful title Borderlands 3.
- Gearbox Software significantly reduced royalty bonuses for Borderlands 3 employees, despite the game achieving billion-dollar status as a global brand.
- The studio historically utilizes a compensation model featuring below-average base salaries supplemented by quarterly revenue-sharing bonuses.
- Leadership attributed the reduced payouts to increased development costs and an expanded headcount, specifically citing a mid-development transition from Unreal Engine 3 to Unreal Engine 4 that necessitated restarting production work.
Game Dev UnchainedApr 2020
Game Developers Conference20 min
Baked in Accessibility: How Features Were Approached in Borderlands 3
This analysis examines the integration of accessibility features into the development of Borderlands 3 at Gearbox Software.
- Integrate accessibility into the development culture by maintaining dedicated communication channels, such as internal chat rooms, to keep the topic in the foreground throughout the entire production cycle.
- Empower cross-functional teams to experiment with accessibility solutions; for example, Gearbox’s effects director independently developed a tiered loot beam system that used varying heights, bloom intensities, and particle densities to convey rarity information.
- Prioritize direct user testing with the target audience, as the lack of thorough focus testing was identified as the primary flaw in the Borderlands 3 accessibility implementation.
Game Developers ConferenceMar 2020
