Gearbox, and especially Gearbox’s CEO Randy Pitchford, has come under a lot of fire in recent years, due to shipping some broken games, some obnoxious comments made from the top, and some outright misleading and lying to the customer. However, it appears as though Pitchford is largely unruffled by all the criticism hurled at him or the company. Speaking at the Develop conference, he addressed the question of criticism from the gaming community.
“There is always the person who’s got to stand on the sandcastle, they must crush it,” he said. “That’s their way of relating to that. It’s typically a less sophisticated mind. There’s a dark part of us all that likes the idea of crushing a sandcastle, but most of us will respect it and let it be. That’s why we like playing video games where we can blow stuff up and no one gets hurt.”
“If you’re making entertainment on a grand scale, if you’re reaching millions, there will be tens of thousands of people who absolutely hate us, and some percentage of those will take it upon themselves to let us known how they feel,” he said.
“I read it in this way: we moved those people, we touched them – even the person who hates [your game] so much, you’ve affected them. That’s why we fight, we’re creating emotion and experience – and some people thrive on that type of feeling, some people are sadists.”
I mean… I guess I am glad he isn’t letting it get to him, but yikes. Man must live in a bubble or something.