Gearbox Software’s Borderlands 3 is out and about, and despite issues with performance, it’s performed very well. It topped the UKIE’s physical sales charts, beating out rivals like Gears 5, and has had fairly strong critical reception. And despite the PC version’s exclusivity to the Epic Games Store, it’s already set a new record for Gearbox.
According to CEO Randy Pitchford on Twitter, the peak concurrent player total on launch day is twice as high as the all-time peak concurrent players for Borderlands 2. In a follow-up tweet, he noted that these were the “best numbers in Gearbox history!” A brief glance at SteamCharts shows that Borderlands 2’s peak concurrent players topped out at 123,596.
So if Borderlands 3 is twice of that, then that would put its total close to 247,000 or so (and the numbers are only going up). Not bad especially considering the controversy over the Epic Games Store deal. The real question now is whether that success will be replicated or even surpassed when the game finally hits Steam in April 2020. We’ll have to wait and find out.