Ever since Gearbox announced last April that it is planning to release the third installment in its successful "Borderlands" series, there has been very scarce information made available about the game. Now, fans are questioning whether the game has been scrapped by the studio after all.

Amid the fan uncertainty, however, Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford has explained that the game is still in the early stages of planning and development so they are holding the release of official information until more concrete details are available.

"There'll almost certainly be more Borderlands, but we need to figure out what that is. Because almost certainly anything we're thinking now is going to change between now and when we commit ourselves," he said, adding that the definition of the release "soon" is relative.

Based on a report by Fab Newz, rumors hint that Mikey Neumann will be responsible for writing the next installment. Neumann also wrote the first chapter of the series and when he was asked for hints, he joked that everyone will die horribly.

According to Neumann, the new installment will introduce a new character named Scooper, who will be Scooter's son.

"I did this whole Scooter thing, then I pitch-shifted it up like seven semitones so it sounds like a chipmunk and it was the funniest thing I'd ever heard," he shared.

Still, he warned that Scooter may be scrapped from "Borderlands 3" altogether because at this point, nothing has been finalized yet. Even the title has not been finalized as he said it might even feature a different name other than "Borderlands 3."

"We don't even know if we're going to call it [Borderland 3]". We could call it Borderlands 4 for all we know," he said.

With the game still in its early stages, reports speculate that a 2017 release is unlikely and that the game could be released sometime in October 2018, if development goes smoothly.