Randy Pitchford, the often eccentric CEO of Gearbox Entertainment and one of the most prolific faces of the Borderlands series, has waded into hot water on social media. He posted an AI-generated ‘selfie’ from his ‘primary AI tool’ and specifically pointed out that elements of the image had zero relationship to anything real.
He was then seemingly perplexed why gamers had a problem with the image, requesting numerous times that they all see it as something silly and fun.
Randy Pitches Divisive Image
Gearbox Entertainment’s CEO, and the former CEO of Gearbox Software, Randy Pitchford, took to social media today to upload a curious image. It contained a ‘selfie’ generated by artificial intelligence. Bizarrely, it looked absolutely nothing like him, and if it weren’t for the references to Gearbox and Borderlands, you’d hardly know it was related to gaming at all.
He had to point out that the text on the whiteboard in the background means nothing, because, if you zoom in, you’ll see that it stresses his current focus is on a ‘new IP‘, as well as on Borderlands 4.
Many saw this as some double-down reverse psychology of sorts. When one user wrote, ‘I’m going to pretend you didn’t post an AI image like it would be received well and focus on that white board that says new IP,’ Pitchford responded with, ‘I’m going to pretend you know how to be cool and enjoy silly things.’
When another user suggested executives such as Pitchford only use AI to ‘reduce head count and cut costs,’ the CEO wrote again:
Don’t make this something it isn’t. It’s just a dumb, silly thing.
One user accused Gearbox of using AI to craft the latest round of Borderlands 4 patch notes, which Pitchford leapt on and defended immediately:
Wtf are you talking about? Our policy is that we do not use AI for anything in any professional capacity that any customer could ever see.
The choice of words being ‘that any customer could ever see‘ was certainly a pick.
Last year, I sat down with Randy Pitchford at Gamescom, talking about all things related to Borderlands 4. At the time, he was anxious about the huge changes being introduced with the new title, which launched on September 11 to mixed reviews.
Do you think Randy Pitchford is just having fun with AI, or is this a tone-deaf post? Let us know your thoughts on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
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Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
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