RPS@PAX 2022: All the news from Gearbox's big PAX panel in 5 minutes
Save yourself the torment of an 80 minute stream
Pretend it's Thursday for a second. We've just emerged from Gearbox's 80-minute panel at PAX East 2022, and we're wondering how they managed to spend so much time talking about so little. You know something's gone wrong in a conference when you've got an entire segment dedicated to just merch, and Gearbox groupies are hollering for Tiny Tina G-Fuel cans like it was mana from heaven. Lucky for you, we suffered through all the merch plugs, the failed trailer loads, nothing announcements and yet another 20-minute magic set to bring you this condensed version of Gearbox's panel news, all so you don't have to suffer through that interminably long stream. Here's everything you need to know from the Gearbox Main Theatre Show panel in 5 minutes.
In truth, there were some announcements. As you may have seen earlier today, CJ covered the return of Tales Of The Borderlands, which we also talk about in the video below. But there were two more games announced at PAX East from Gearbox's publishing arm that caught our attention as well: Eyes In The Dark, a monochrome roguelite platforming game, and Relic Hunters Legends, a cartoonish, top-down, multiplayer looter shooter that sounds suspiciously like another of Gearbox's famous games. To see both of them in action, and our initial thoughts on what we saw, have a watch of our round-up video below.
The rest, though, was a big load of nothing. Trailers for games we already knew about. Trailers for games that are already out. A tiny section about Tiny Tina's Wonderlands DLC that mostly felt like a preliminary plug for their terrible G-Fuel tie-in drink rather than anything remotely useful about the DLC. Then a 20 minute magic section in which Gearbox Studios president (and former Gearbox Software pres) Randy Pitchford proclaimed he could practically read minds, before proceeding to be terrible at reading minds, before proving that actually, he really could read minds and what a clever Hollywood guy he was now. All to promote their D&D tie-in Bunkers And Badasses, which the three unlucky members of the audience subjected to this terrible magic show got to take home with them.
The only redeeming highlight, aside from new Tales From The Borderlands news, was a photo montage from previous Gearbox PAX panels, which revealed that Pitchford clearly only has one suit for occasions like this, as he wore exactly the same combo of eye-searingly yellow trousers and blue shirt and blazer combo at PAX East 2019, the year they revealed Borderlands 3. As someone who also sat through that achingly long conference, I also chuckled slightly when they experienced yet another video malfunction, which famously plagued the Borderlands 3 reveal. Good times, those, good times.
In short, though, save yourself some trouble and just watch our five minute recap video if you want to know what went down. That's all you need. None of this hour and 20 minutes nonsense, oh no.
For far more exciting PAX-related things, be sure to keep an eye on our RPS@PAX tag over the weekend, where we'll be posting loads more developer interviews, gameplay impressions, daily round-ups and more.