IS Gearbox one of the worst game developers?

[ProphetFlume]

Since I've been seeing this come up recently I'm just going to paste a comment from another one that summarized well why people see Gearbox as shady, at best. From http://cheezburger.com/7068221952

"Stolen from YouTube user EnhancedCognition:

1. The demo is pre-rendered, Pitchford claims it's in-game footage.
2. Sega funded development of Aliens: Colonial Marines for six years (I've also heard seven).
3. Gearbox use the above funds to (allegedly) produce Borderlands 1 & 2 and Duke Nukem Forever, instead of working on Aliens.
4. Gearbox outsource the work they were supposed to be doing on Aliens to three smaller studios.
5. In 2012, Sega finally get impatient and demand answers.
6. Gearbox ask for and get a final nine month extension.
7. Five of these nine months are used to finish Borderlands 2.
8. Gearbox finally take a look at Aliens and discover the game isn't anywhere near release quality.
9. They scrap everything that still needs to be implemented and do the bare minimum of testing.
10. Here is your travesty.

And from HANU8:

This is basically the same thing that happened with Duke Nukem Forever, there where leaked spreadsheets from the time that 3D Realms worked exclusively on it that had every detail about each level of the game, along with a percentage of completion. Needless to say that the game was cut to 2/3 of the original size (in amount of maps/missions), most of the interactivity with the environment was scraped, characters where removed (Bombshell, the female character on the original trailer)... And then they released a DLC that in essence was the actual end of the single-player game, they screwed up the dialogs, and the weapon system (which you can clearly see at the 3D Realms trailers Jace Hall Show leaked game-play) to make it more Call of Duty-like and "modern" essentially breaking much of the game-play, they ruined the face of Duke to make him look younger and "softer"... Aliens: Colonial Marines Angry Review was actually like reading a Duke Nukem Forever review. Gearbox failed us. "

http://kotaku.com/5986694/from-dream...lonial-marines

He was scrapped because escort missions are stupid

Lol.

[Deleted]

The last developer to release a bad game will always be the worst developer in the eyes of a lot of people. Nothing new to see here.

[Deleted]

Well, I thought Borderlands 1 & 2 were boring, and I didn't even play Colonial Marines. My opinion can't really go lower on the scale of "Don't care" without dropping off entirely.

Pretty much agree with this. Aliens:Colonial Marines seems to me to be a dodgy release from a middle of the road developer. Dropping Gearbox's name into a gaming forum will produce a lukewarm reaction at best compared to even mentioning Blizzard's name. I think Gearbox will have to do a whole lot more to disappoint gamers on the scale of Blizzard, Bioware, et al.

[Rennadrel]

Amusing, since I think Gearbox is a fantastic developer. They handed Colonial Marines off to a small team to work on, and it turned out to be shit because of it but at the same time, did anyone really think that it was going to be a good game regardless? Oh and let's not forget Duke Nukem which was in development hell for 15 years before they picked it up, and again, they handed most of the work off to another studio within the company because the main team was working on Borderlands. Seriously, the projects Gearbox has made themselves, speak for their quality as a developer. It's Sega's own damn fault for feeding them money without investigating how they were spending it on the projects they were asked to do. They bit off more then they could chew when it comes to the projects they were working on at the same time and that is why games like Aliens failed hard.

[Torais]

Technically, they certainly have ability. Morally though they are close to bankrupt. Screwing over their publisher, the media and the gaming public.

They might not be the "worst" developer on the planet (which of course depends on your definition of "worst") but they certainly deserve all the flak they are taking over this. Hopefully both publishers and gamers will vote with their wallets when it comes to dealing with these guys in the future.

[Deleted]

As of right now, following the great bomb that was Aliens: Colonial Marines, and the development controversy surrounding it, Gearbox, a once promising company, along with it's head, Randy Pitchford, are considered by many gamers as of now to be among the worst current game developers.

Gearbox made the popular and acclaimed Borderlands series, but it seems as of now, it's not enough to lift them out of their current situation.

Do you personally think all this outcry and hate is justified?

considering borderlands was a pile of repeating crap with same (100) weapons with different mods and skincolors i have to say yes oh god yes. just realised they were in for duke nukem forever to and both of the games was some of the worst i have ever played duke forever being the worst game ever on the 360 if not possible ever.

---------- Post added 2013-03-04 at 12:35 PM ----------

Gamers are the most fickle, entitled and bitchy people around. Somebody has a bad release, they suck! somebody releases a game that doesn't reach their entitled expectations, They suck and the game sucks too! Somebody likes a game they don't like? that person sucks! Where do these people come from? As a gamer myself i look at the gaming community as a whole and i am ashamed.

obv if i follow there sell talk look at the trailers and get told to expect a fun and amazing game if i spend my money on it just to get lame garbage like dukenukem forever then i will say this company sucks and does boring and bad games for me. You dont spend alot of money then give them the thumbs up and say hey guys it k you had a bad release that bored my guts out and took my money but its k ill just sit here like a good little puppy and wait for your next shitty underdeveloped game becouse iam afraid i might get seen as an entitled shit otherwise. And when people jump out of the blue and say this shit game is amazing and something special when its the same crap over and over with bad voice over and design just becouse they liked the company or cant afford proper games they sure as hell do suck.

[Deleted]

Gearbox purveyed an intent to raise the bar and deliver good games with both Duke Nukem Forever and Aliens: Colonial Marines. What they did was cash grab with a pair of utter shit games that they did little more than stitch together from the numerous parts that other people had created.

You're forgetting Halo for the PC. They only added a few levels, the rest was copied. Yeah, they did create this image themselves.

[LeVvE]

I think this game wasnt even developed by Gearbox.

1. SEGA wanted Gearbox to make the game to begin with but they got caught up with Borderlands 2.
2. Another developer took over the project and continued where Gearbox left off.
3. Think it got moved to another developer more than once.
4. Gearbox in the end got the game back and they just put it out as it was, stating their rep on it.

Thats what I've heard anyway, don't take my word for it.

[Herecius]

Aliens:CM was already a trainwreck when it was handed off to Gearbox. That it was 'finished' in any state at all is a feat by itself. Anybody who immediately and unapologetically throws Gearbox under the bus for that is an idiot.

People are panning A:CM, and rightfully so, but who is seriously trashing Gearbox and apparently considering them 'one of the worst game developers'? Is it you, OP? Because I haven't actually seen this said in seriousness elsewhere.

[Deatheryn]

I watched a review of this game on Gameinformer.com and the game is shit. The guys reviewing the game are even Aliens fans and they don't have high regard for this game. Link: Aliens:Colonial Marines
I don't hold a grudge against Gearbox for one fuck up but yeah, it's far easier to tear down a house than it is to build one so I hope they learn from this experience.

[Shinzai]

I'll join in asking for some evidence of who these people citing them as one of the worst game developers.

I can think of PLENTY worse.

They released a flop, which is a whole essay's worth of problems not just theirs.

Their success with Borderlands 1 and 2 amongst several others, including the port of Halo to the PC is highly revered. You'll have a much easier time finding good things than bad. They aren't free of their faults and failures, but once again, far from "one of the worst game developers". Also generally it's good to note when something is "cited" to actually show what it's cited from.

I can cite facts from medical journals but never produce the medical journals.

Sorry, I'm going to have to pull up the Halo reference a moment. The following are from positive reviews of the Halo port:

"Crippling frame rate problems tarnish an otherwise engaging single-player experience. Ultimately, the addictive online multiplayer is the main attraction; without it, there’s not much to see here." - 80/100 Gamepro

"In terms of a port, this is pretty poor. A two year old game and what advancements do we get? A high PC requirement and a few new weapons. Hardly worth it if you’ve already played the Xbox original." - 80/100 Gamers Europe

"But being a console port of two year old dated game, the graphics aren't as pretty as they can be nowadays. Some of the textures look bleak, and the models would really be better off with a higher polygon count." - 80/100 Gamers Hell

"When evaluated against the standards of the current PC shooter catalog, Halo seems to fall short in just a few key areas: repetitive levels, steep performance requirements and a lingering console balance." - 82/100 IGN

"Halo PC is a fairly functional port of an excellent game. The lack of co-op and the sluggish frame rate are the big disappointments, but the solo campaign is a must-play for any respectable FPS fan." - 88/100 AtomicGamer

"I'm going to cheat, and simply provide a score for the multiplayer element of the game...and bearing in mind that this game probably won't run shockingly well without major tweaking, because it's one of the most demanding games in terms of system specs that we've ever seen." - 90/100 Eurogamer

So the port was generally regarded as crap, but the game was still good. The Halo port was carried on the weight of being Halo, not on having a good port. Seriously, look at those scores and the backhanded applause it gets.

Now what games have Gearbox actually made?

The Brother In Arms Series.
The Borderland Series.

The rest are all ports or mods, aside from Duke Nukem Forever and Aliens: Colonial Marines. Gearbox is not a great developer by any means. They're mediocre at best.

The fact that they told us they were investing all their effort into the Colonial Marines game and were going to give fans what they both wanted and deserved by releasing DNF just shows that they have no actual commitment outside of Brothers In Arms and Borderlands. They royally fucked Sega over with the A:CM job and fucked the fans over with DNF.

Duke Nukem Forever's assets were already in existence and easy enough for them to glue together into some slipshod game, but they never made any attempt to improve on or polish it. The game's a huge mess, with no coherence and some outright offensive content. It's an amalgamation of everything it makes fun of, without being better than any of the games it makes jibes at. It's childish and turgid.

When in Duke Nukem 3D, an earthquake happens and he says "I ain't afraid of no Quake." it was funny and the game was good enough to stand up to Quake on equal footing. Now when he jokes about Halo, you suddenly remember he has regenerating health and only carry a couple of weapons at a time and his game's shit annnnd it's not so funny any more.

When A:CM was in production, everyone expected they'd release some kind of wunderbar, AAA effort. We were so wrong. They dumped it on a group of no-name companies, after telling the world it was their baby, that they were huge fans of Aliens and wanted to do the films justice. They shat the money that Sega gave to them into their own, other projects and went afk while inexperienced developers did all the work for them and it shows.

[Deleted]

I don't hate gearbox, but I am dissapointed with the lack of effort they put into the aliens franchise, I'm not entirely sure what kind of situation they were in that caused the game to be as bad as it was, but it's dissapointing to see a company who has put out good games in the past, release something so bad.

[Zeek Daniels]

As far as im concerned Gearbox has 2 of the best rpg shooters ive ever played in Borderlands 1 and Borderlands 2. I hate shooters and rarely play them. But these 2 games i loved. The Aliens game was clearly bad, but from what i understand they didnt even work on it. So i guess not working on a game makes you a bad developer huh. They outsourced the project which they prolly should not have done, they should have just waited till BL2 made them a ton of money then put that back into the Aliens game. Maybe they are not a big enough studio to be doing 2 projects at once.

[Deleted]

Randy Pitchford's Facebook and twitter was harassed to the point that he stated he would block any rude comments from then on. The game and its failure has generally turned many gamers against Gearbox, but the primary reason is this.

What Gearbox did, was they seemingly took the development money of Aliens Colonial Marines from SEGA to fund into Borderlands content, and lied to them while doing so (refer to Wikipedia)

Wait, really? You extrapolated in your own words that, and I quote, "Gearbox cited as one of the worst game developers" from a facebook and twitter outcry (i.e. what pretty much every game developer ever gets every day, let alone one spun up in controversy)? Are you even trying to make this constructive or are you being deliberately sensationalist?

As for the controversy itself, it'll blow over. I'm not saying that to defend or validate any of their actions, it's just how every reddit/4chan/whatever outcry over games always goes. Studio puts their name on shitty game, people fervently hate shitty game, studio takes any PR route other than going down on their knees and begging everyone for forgiveness*, people keep blowing it up for the next few weeks, controversy blows over, no one is any wiser from anything that was said and everyone repeats the same pattern next controversy.

[*]I'm NOT saying anyone should do that, but it's the least it would take for people to be content after the first outcry

[khalltusk]

Aliens:CM was already a trainwreck when it was handed off to Gearbox. That it was 'finished' in any state at all is a feat by itself. Anybody who immediately and unapologetically throws Gearbox under the bus for that is an idiot.

People are panning A:CM, and rightfully so, but who is seriously trashing Gearbox and apparently considering them 'one of the worst game developers'? Is it you, OP? Because I haven't actually seen this said in seriousness elsewhere.

Why would we be an idiot for blaming gearbox when they delegated the work to another developer went over budget and over their delivery making the game? If they were tasked by Sega to make a game but were unable to do so they should have passed it up. They released a game that clearly was not finished had major bugs in it and was poor in almost every department. They also did a classic bait and switch with the demo.

I won't bash gearbox as a bad company. I will however say they deserve every bit of bashing they get over aliens cm. They made a bad game and by the looks of it took the piss by taking so long to make it.

I also disliked borderlands, played it hated it. Its good for some people though that's fine. I did however love opposing force.

[Ravenblade]

I am guessing you guys didn't read that they used a lot of the money sega gave them for aliens to fund borderlands 2.

To which Mr.Pitchford replied on Twitter that this is false and that the earnings from BL2 actually helped the development of other things among them AC:M. The guy who said otherwise was a fake employee who stated all kinds of stuff about SEGA which never happened. His site has since been taken down.

I have played and I am still playing both of their Borderlands games including DLCs and I am a fan of the series. So for me they are the guys who made Borderlands and made me happy by creating this series.

Gamers tend to exaggerate a lot. It's okay to be disappointed but you can't nominate someone or something "worst" if you don't have a list of references and a modest set of criterias. DNF was disappointing and I saved myself some disappointment by not buying AC:M because I knew the guys behind didn't exactly strike me as the type who'd be competent enough to create a horror-surival shooter.
Even BL2 was more of a risk buy though. Still if you are only playing the Borderlands series and don't care about their other games the company won't end up as anywhere near "worst" on your list (if you had one) and by my experience - which is Borderlands-related anyways - they are okay.

[Herecius]

Why would we be an idiot for blaming gearbox when they delegated the work to another developer went over budget and over their delivery making the game? If they were tasked by Sega to make a game but were unable to do so they should have passed it up. They released a game that clearly was not finished had major bugs in it and was poor in almost every department. They also did a classic bait and switch with the demo.

I won't bash gearbox as a bad company. I will however say they deserve every bit of bashing they get over aliens cm. They made a bad game and by the looks of it took the piss by taking so long to make it.

I also disliked borderlands, played it hated it. Its good for some people though that's fine. I did however love opposing force.

Nothing wrong with blaming Gearbox (though if you're going to be fair, blame everybody else that got their hands on the game; as I said, it was a trainwreck before Gearbox had it), my point was that throwing the developer under the bus and going so far as calling them 'the worst game developer' is just silly. Aliens:CM was bad, not about to defend that, and personally I think Gearbox should have simply canned it instead of releasing it in the state it was in.

Just 'worst game developer' is an awfully strong choice of terminology. Then again, I consider most people who use enormous hyperbole with seriousness to be idiots, because it generally means it's somebody who lacks perspective.

[khalltusk]

Nothing wrong with blaming Gearbox (though if you're going to be fair, blame everybody else that got their hands on the game; as I said, it was a trainwreck before Gearbox had it), my point was that throwing the developer under the bus and going so far as calling them 'the worst game developer' is just silly. Aliens:CM was bad, not about to defend that, and personally I think Gearbox should have simply canned it instead of releasing it in the state it was in.

Just 'worst game developer' is an awfully strong choice of terminology. Then again, I consider most people who use enormous hyperbole with seriousness to be idiots, because it generally means it's somebody who lacks perspective.

Oh I agree they are hardly the worst out there. Still regardless of how bad a train wreck both it and duke were before they got it. They relased sub par games. They take the full flak for it. If you take on a project and deligate it to a 3rd party. If its a bad project you take full responsibility. you can blame it on the 3rd party all you want. You chose to let them do it.

ACM was something I REALLY wanted to be good. There has not been a great aliens game since AVP2. The 2010 AVP was horrible. Now the MP on ACM is not too bad but its not enough to save the game. The MP also has very little content and it shows. No life cycle, no massive variation in maps. The escape mode is the best out there along with survival. but there are not enough maps for it.

[Eroginous]

As of right now, following the great bomb that was Aliens: Colonial Marines, and the development controversy surrounding it, Gearbox, a once promising company, along with it's head, Randy Pitchford, are considered by many gamers as of now to be among the worst current game developers.

Gearbox made the popular and acclaimed Borderlands series, but it seems as of now, it's not enough to lift them out of their current situation.

Do you personally think all this outcry and hate is justified?

Every game developer has bad titles...

Not a justification to call out a company who released two amazing FPS RPGs.

[Ichifails]

I think this game wasnt even developed by Gearbox.

1. SEGA wanted Gearbox to make the game to begin with but they got caught up with Borderlands 2.
2. Another developer took over the project and continued where Gearbox left off.
3. Think it got moved to another developer more than once.
4. Gearbox in the end got the game back and they just put it out as it was, stating their rep on it.

Thats what I've heard anyway, don't take my word for it.

That is sort of true. They didn't "get caught up with Borderlands 2".
They used the money they were getting from Sega to develop Borderlands 1 and 2. They contracted other developers to work on Alien and Duke Nukem while they were working on Borderlands. They were never intended to develop Borderlands in the first place.
They made a COMPLETE OTHER GAME that was really short and showed it to the press. The "press demo" isn't even in the game and the mechanics presented there aren't in the game either.

When everyone turned to them and said: WTF Gearbox... this game is shit! they answered with: "Well we didn't even make the game! Here's a list of the devs we hired to do it!" They told no one and had no right to make other people do it when they were contracted by Sega to do the games.

---------- Post added 2013-03-04 at 12:39 PM ----------

Every game developer has bad titles...

Not a justification to call out a company who released two amazing FPS RPGs.

The only problem is that the funds for those 2 "amazing FPS RPGs" were stolen from Alien and Duke Nukem. They used the money and the time that was supposed to be dedicated to Alien and Duke and made their own games. They contracted other devs to work on the 2 games they were actually getting money for and payed them like 10% of what they were getting from Sega.