The Original Voice Actor for Borderlands’ Claptrap Claims That Gearbox’s CEO Randy Pitchford Assaulted Him
Update (5/11/2019): In an interview with Newsweek, Eddings provided more details about the alleged assault and a witness corroborated the allegation. Gearbox once again declined to comment on Eddings’ claims.
Original Story:
David Eddings, a former Gearbox executive and the original voice actor for the Borderlands character Claptrap, has accused Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford of physically assaulting him in a California hotel lobby during 2017’s Game Developers Conference.
Last week, Eddings claimed that Gearbox no longer wanted him to voice Claptrap in Borderlands 3 after he demanded payment for the role. In response to this claim, Pitchford denied that this actually happened and described Eddings as being “bitter and disgruntled” over not being in Borderlands 3.
After tweeting on Monday that he wanted to refute what Pitchford recently said, Eddings wrote, “I ultimately offered to do [the Claptrap role] for ‘free’ in exchange for past royalties owed plus an apology for something I’ve never spoken about publicly until now: Randy physically assaulted me in the lobby of the Marriott Marquis at GDC 2017.”
Eddings also accused Pitchford of “stalking” him on social media and also accused the CEO of stealing $12 million of revenue “from the employee royalty pool.”
In a statement to PC Gamer, Gearbox declined to comment on Eddings’ multiple accusations.
“Gearbox takes any and all claims of this nature very seriously,” the statement read, “and we will abstain from commenting on the allegations Dave is making because it is a personnel matter. We appreciate David’s contributions to the Borderlands franchise and have continued to assert we would welcome him back into the mix as the voice of Claptrap and other future opportunities.”
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