A month has passed since Borderlands 4 reached its peak popularity, and the game has already lost a sizable portion of its audience.
On September 14, 2025 — roughly a month ago — 304,398 players were concurrently active on Steam. That number has since dropped to about 44,000 (weekend peak), an approximate decline of 85%. Such falls are common for live-service titles.
Most single-player releases are structured to earn the majority of their revenue at launch, with only a handful of franchises maintaining a long-lasting player base. The advent of live-service games promised greater longevity, but it also introduced significant risk. Failures have even forced some studios, particularly in the mobile sector, to shut down.
Still, successful live-service games continue to shape the industry. Gearbox is placing its bets on Borderlands 4, rolling out both paid and free DLC throughout the first year after release.
The principal issue is a shortage of endgame content — players want more meaningful activities after finishing the campaign. The launch also experienced performance problems across platforms, and many users are awaiting those fixes.
Gearbox retains avenues for recovery: a release on the Switch 2 could generate a second surge in interest, and the promised cross-progression will let players carry character advancement and save data across different platforms.
Source: iXBT.games