Battleborn Dev Reflects On Impending Server Shutdown -- "I'm Really Heartbroken"

Borderlands developer Gearbox's 2016 shooter Battleborn is shutting down soon, with servers scheduled to go offline on January 25. Battleborn is an online-only game, so the title will be completely unplayable after the servers go dark. One developer who worked on the game, Aaron Linde, has now written an impassioned statement about what the game meant to them and more.

"Battleborn's servers are going dark in just a few weeks. When they do, it'll be like the game never existed at all. All the work and love and blood that went into that game will disappear with it and I'm really heartbroken about it," Linde said on Twitter.

Linde went on to say, "I'm grateful for every person that ever told me that the game meant something to them. For every line I had repeated back to me. I hope something of it lives on in your memories like it will in mine (and in the pile of VO that I keep backed up in three different places)."

The developer, who was the lead writer on Battleborn, said they were happy to build a "weird, wild, bizarre universe" with the game.

"Building such a weird, wild, bizarre universe with and all of my wonderful colleagues at Gearbox was just about the best experience I could've asked for creating a new IP. I miss and love you all," Linde said.

Linde is now a lead narrative designer at Halo studio 343 Industries. The developer ended their message about Battleborn by making a promise to make another "weird" game someday.

"I'm swearing a blood oath to myself now that, one day, god damn it, I'll make something as weird, and personal, and idiosyncratic as Battleborn again," Linde said.

Anyone who has an allotment of virtual currency for Battleborn can continue to spend it until the servers go offline. Players can continue to earn this currency through gameplay, but it can no longer be purchased with real money.

Before Battleborn's release, Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford said the developer invested more in the game than any other project before. "We've invested more than Borderlands 1 and 2 added together into Battleborn," he said at the time. "And we don't even know if people will be interested or not."

Gearbox's latest game was 2019's Borderlands 3, and it was a huge success, becoming publisher 2K's fastest-selling game ever. Gearbox also publishes other developer's games, most recently putting out the PS5/PC game Godfall from Counterplay Games.