For a series that has always prided itself on going over the top with its shenanigans, Borderlands 4 might have actually taken things a bit too far in one area — though potentially not on purpose. Across Reddit threads, Discord channels, and YouTube deep dives, Borderlands 4 completionists have noted spending hundreds of hours trying to collect every phosphene, or “shiny,” weapon in the game, only to come up with the jar being only mostly full. There are 69 in total, one for every legendary weapon in the game, and there is even an in-game challenge called “Shining the Brightest” associated with collecting each one.
However, what began as a bragging right for those with enough time on their hands to outlast the RNG gods has shown itself, as of late, to be an impossible feat for anyone to achieve. In theory, completing the challenge should be simple, offering players who spend more time in the game with better chances at finding a shiny weapon. But after dozens of hours of farming (and hundreds, for some), even the most relentless players are hitting their heads on an increasingly hard ceiling. Some shiny weapons in Borderlands 4 seemingly refuse to appear, some won’t register, and others aren’t even farmable from the right source, leaving those who have poured countless hours into the grind feeling like they might actually never complete the Shining the Brightest challenge.
Shining the Brightest May Be Borderlands 4's First Truly Broken Challenge
Borderlands 4‘s shiny weapons were meant to reward the game’s most devoted players, but it has instead become something of an anxiety dream for that remnant, meaning it’s not even a dream at all for those who don’t have that much time to give to the game. Obtaining a shiny weapon in Borderlands 4 is exceedingly difficult, as the variant can only be found on legendary weapons, which are already incredibly rare. Community guides describe a farming process that can take hundreds of hours, with some players seeing only one or two shinies after dozens of boss runs in Borderlands 4. Normally, that kind of challenge would be a big part of the thrill for dedicated players, but as more reports come in, it’s looking like it could be less about RNG and more about the way it’s designed.
One Reddit user posted screenshots showing 58 phosphene weapons in their inventory, yet the in-game challenge only counted 46. Others claim they’ve reached 66 or 67 of 69 with no way to move forward, no matter how many runs they complete. To top it all off, the missing items appear to always be the same, with weapons like the Bloody Lumberjack, the Complex Root, and a few of Moxxi’s guns being among those that no one has seen in phosphene form. In other words, it’s beginning to look like these specific weapons might never drop at all.
That’s not all either, as players have reported unlocking a shiny weapon on one Vault Hunter in Borderlands 4 preventing it from registering on another, and since the skin is supposed to be account-wide, the system often desynchronizes. With that comes the same items being unlocked but not credited toward the completion of the Shining the Brightest challenge, effectively locking players out of the achievement for good. It’s a dead end, to say the least, but hopes are that it’s just a bug that can be easily squashed.
Gearbox Hasn't Confirmed the Problem, But the Evidence Is There
So far, Gearbox hasn’t confirmed that any shiny weapons in Borderland 4 are broken or unobtainable. Creative director Graeme Timmins has pushed back on theories of hidden penalties or manipulated drop chances, saying the system runs entirely on RNG. However, RNG doesn’t explain why entire weapon types seem to be excluded from the challenge, or why the challenge counter doesn’t advance even after players clearly obtain new shiny weapons. There is just too much evidence at the moment to deny the existence of a problem with full confidence.
That being said, the fight for better performance in Borderlands 4 continues across the board, and they’ve been ongoing since launch. Given there are still plenty of kinks in the system that need to be worked out, perhaps it’s only a matter of time before Gearbox not only confirms a possible bug in the game’s shiny weapon system but also releases a patch that fixes the issue.