You might remember that last month, we wrote a story about a terminally ill gamer by the name of Trevor Eastman, who managed to organise a chance to play Borderlands 3 early.
Trevor was diagnosed with stage 4 esophageal, stomach, and liver cancer, and being unsure how long he actually has left, decided to ask around online to see if there was a way he could get in touch with developer Gearbox and play some of Borderlands 3 ahead of its September release.
With the help of the wonderful Borderlands community on Reddit, Trevor confirmed that he’d been in touch with a rep from publisher 2K Games, who would be heading out to him in early June with a build of the game.
He wrote at the time:
Hey everyone, I just wanted to give you all that were kind enough to upvote and tweet about my situation an update. One of the people from 2k has been talking to me(not sure if I’m allowed to say who so I won’t mention a name) and he’s making it happen. They’re flying somebody out at the beginning of June most likely to give me a copy of the game. I just wanted to thank you all so much for helping make this dream come true. It means the world to me that you all cared enough to do that for me.
Now, Trevor has headed back to Reddit to give a further update to the community that helped him out. As it turns out, not only did Trevor get a chance to play some of Borderlands 3 early, but Gearbox actually gave him the opportunity to name one of the game’s many guns.
Trevor wrote in an update on Reddit:
Hey everybody! So I know a lot of you have followed me and my story with my cancer and how Gearbox actually made my dream come true of being able to play some of the game early…but recently an amazing person from Gearbox actually allowed me to name a gun and the red text under it! I am seriously so happy and astonished how kind they have been to me and it really means the world to me that they did this for me. I wish I could pay them back for everything they’ve done…and all of you as well for making this dream come true. Thank you again and let me present to you a special gun that’s going to be in Borderlands 3!
As you can see below, the Compressing Trevonator (great name), will ensure that Trevor Eastman lives on forever in Borderlands 3. I hope I come across one when I pick up the game, because it looks and sounds pretty badass.
If you want to feel entirely warm and fuzzy inside, I recommend you head to the Reddit thread and read through some of the incredibly supportive and kind comments people left for Trevor. For what it’s worth, I wish him all the best too, and hope Borderlands 3 was everything he hoped it’d be.
If you have a story you want to tell, send it to UNILAD via story@unilad.com
Ewan Moore is a journalist at UNILAD Gaming who still quite hasn’t gotten out of his mid 00’s emo phase. After graduating from the University of Portsmouth in 2015 with a BA in Journalism & Media Studies (thanks for asking), he went on to do some freelance words for various places, including Kotaku, Den of Geek, and TheSixthAxis, before landing a full time gig at UNILAD in 2016.