Since Borderlands 3 was announced, it seems like the series has been on everyone’s mind. This is due to Gearboxes’ absolutely flawless marketing of the series. Starting with when Borderlands 3 was first announced, they showed a good mix of cinematics and gameplay. With games like Borderlands 3, where people have known that it has been in development for years, it gets people much more excited to see actual gameplay then a cinematic trailer. It was also an incredibly smart decision to wait until less than half a year before the release date, to announce the game. It seems like a lot of companies are moving towards waiting to announce their games closer to the release date, rather than announcing something years before it comes out, like in the vein of Final Fantasy 7 Remake or Kingdom Hearts 3. This means that Gearbox can more heavily market their new game for the upcoming months until release, rather than just release a trailer once a year to remind people that the game is coming out.
Gearbox and 2K have done a lot more than just be smart with their trailers and release dates though. When Borderlands 3 was announced, there was also an onslaught of announcements for their past Borderlands games. The game of the year edition for the first Borderlands game was announced and quickly released for PS4 and Xbox, and it came with all past DLC. Then they announced there would be a new HD texture pack for Borderlands The Handsome Collection for Xbox One X and PS4 Pro users, to make the 2 games in the collection look even better in 4K. Bringing the first Borderlands games to current gen, and giving people another reason to go back to The Handsome Collection, was really smart because everyone is playing these games again, while also thinking and talking about how excited they are about the new one. Because this happened, My friends and I have picked up both games and all we have been doing is playing Borderlands lately. All of my friends, some of whom are less hardcore gamers, say they are going to buy Borderlands 3 on launch day.
But the hype didn’t just stop there. It was not long after these announcements that Borderlands GOTY edition and The Handsome Collection, both went on sale, digitally and physically. This is the reason that I picked up the games personally, and how I convinced my friends to do the same. A lot of people wait for these sales to pick up their games, so it was a very smart and deliberate decision to do so. Then, the absolute cherry on top, is when they announced that The Handsome Collection would be part of June’s Playstation Plus’s free game of the month. So even for people who were uncertain if they want to buy it, now they have no excuse and maybe it got a few more people to try out this series and fall in love with it, then buy Borderlands 3.
Hopefully other developers are watching the successful marketing campaign for Borderlands 3 and taking notes. The hype for this game was already high, but Gearbox is doing a great job of maximizing their outreach for the series. The mayhem continues on September 13th, 2019 when Borderlands 3 releases.
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