Borderlands 4 has now been out for over 3 months, and of course the number of players has steadily decreased. After achieving an all-time high of over 300,000 on Steam alone, the latest entry in the long-running series once hit numbers that made it look like Borderlands was officially back and here to stay for the long haul. Before release, Borderlands 4Endgame was initially touted as something designed to keep players around for months after launch, along with an expansive roadmap for 2026. However, player numbers have steadily declined, and it has lost around 96% of its Steam players within three months of launch.
Steam plays count is not everythinghowever, being more readily available than console numbers, they remain one of the best tools for analyzing player retention. Even so, it's worth asking if a game likes Borderlands 4 even deserves to be examined through that lens at all, or doing so only reinforces expectations that the series never really committed to fulfilling. Ultimately, that question cuts to the heart of whether Borderlands 4 judged for what it really is or what it only pretends to be.
Borderlands 4 masquerades as a live service game
Borderlands 4 is not a live service game, nor does it directly claim to be. At the same time, it doesn't seem to be trying too hard not to be either, as its many non-traditional live service accoutrements often make it feel like one. It's also not the first game in the series to include live service elements, but it has made bigger strides towards the model than any of its predecessors ever did.
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Post-launch roadmap with expanded content to 2026
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Seasonal mini-events with unique rewards and cosmetics
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Paid Bounty Packs and Story Expansions
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Weekly activities and rotations
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Black market vending machine rotations
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Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode and endgame progression loops
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Cosmetics and gear updates linked to events/content drops
It's not uncommon anymore with a game that Borderlands 4 to have a post-launch roadmap with planned content, even a full year after launch. In fact, post-launch roadmaps have become an increasingly standard part of modern releases, especially for games that want long-term support. The difference here is how close Borderlands 4s post-release cadence resembles games that actively rely on player retention as a measure of success, despite not being a live service game. As a result, its player count ends up being scrutinized in ways it was never built to withstand, in large part because the game invites those comparisons in the first place.
Live service elements such as seasonal events, weekly activities and vending machine rotations Borderlands 4 sounds more like Destiny 2 than a Borderlands game, with the obvious aim of keeping players invested in the game long after its release. In fact, Borderlands 4 reached a point after launch where it wasn't getting regular major updates anymore and instead relied mainly on its weekly rotation to draw players back in. Things have slowed down significantly for the game since then, with Gearbox recently changing its update schedule to receive smaller weekly updates and larger updates just once a month.
Borderlands 3 marked the series' first major step towards Live-Service Trappings
Borderlands 4 is not the first Borderlands game to start moving things towards a live service model. Rather, Borderlands 3 is more to blame for this change, as it introduced some of the precise attributes of live service that its successors would adopt, expand and normalize, although it never quite crossed the line into being treated as a long-term service in its own right.
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Roadmap after launch with extended content
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Free timed seasonal events
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Mayhem Mode Updates
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Weekly black market rotations and SHIFT codes
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Campaign DLC expansions
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Community events
Borderlands 4The live-service method is almost identical to its predecessor, but with one major difference. For the first time in the series, Borderlands 4 introduced a massive, seamless world with almost no loading screens, making it feel more like an MMO (a true live-service game) than the tighter experiences of previous entries. Such scale can only be expected to heighten expectations of long-term commitment, even though the series has never been at its best when measured in how long players stick around. It becomes especially clear when you look back Borderlands 2a game that is still widely regarded as the pinnacle of the franchise, largely because it never asked players to treat it as a live service game in the first place.
Borderlands 2's popularity may be due in part to its pre-live service model
It very well may be Borderlands 2 is the best game in the series because Gearbox was less concerned with long-term player retention and focused more on delivering a complete experience that stood on its own at launch. Its endgame existed to extend the fun for players who wanted more, not to fulfill a weekly checklist or maintain a revolving door of engagement metrics. Players weren't asked to keep coming back on a schedule (although many did and still do) simply because the game felt finished, sure of what it was, and rewarding to play without anything extra.
That philosophy feels almost inverted Borderlands 4. Instead of prioritizing a completely satisfying experience in the weeks immediately following launch, the game often feels designed to expand engagement over time, even when there isn't enough substance to support it yet. While Borderlands 2 seemed more about giving the players a more nutritious meal straight away, Borderlands 4 feels like it's more focused on handing out snacks that lack the nutritional value necessary to keep their players fit. All of this may at least be part of the reason why every match since then Borderlands 2 has been compared to it, and now Borderlands 4 is a sign that the franchise needs to pick a lane before there isn't even a road to drive on anymore.
The Next Borderlands must choose a lane
Although it is important to realize that Borderlands The series has suffered over the years for various reasons, its trend towards the live-service model following Borderlands 2 is clearly parallel to that suffering. However, it is not Borderlands may never be a live-service game, but that the third and fourth installments have straddled the fence between live-service and tradition without fully committing to either. It is worth considering that next Borderlands The game could really succeed as a live service game if it is fully engaged rather than flirting with it.
But so long Borderlands continues to go halfway towards that model, it will continue to encounter the same problems. By trying to borrow enough from live service design to expand engagement, the series ends up placing less emphasis on delivering a satisfying experience upfront, and player count becomes one of the primary indicators of its success. That trade-off was not included Borderlands 2and it's hard not to see that shift in priorities as part of why the series is where it is now. Eventually, Borderlands just have to realize it can't be both one live service game and another Borderlands 2. It can only be one or the other.
- Released
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September 12, 2025
- ESRB
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Mature 17+ / Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Sexual Themes, Strong Language, In-Game Purchases, User Interaction
