PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Preview
By Kevin Tavore
Even if you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve heard of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. It released on Steam’s early access months ago and quickly climbed to become an incredible mega-hit. The game took only five months to hit eight million total sales and now, four months after that, it is over twenty million, more than a million of which are on the Xbox One. It also demolished the concurrent active users record on Steam, crushing DOTA 2’s 1.3 million — on Tuesday this week, the game had a peak concurrent userbase of 2.6 million. That’s likely more players playing on a random day than the two best selling games on console will have all year combined.
It’s pretty safe to say that PUBG is a big deal and it’s easy to see the appeal. It’s like the 2000 Japanese film Battle Royale, one of the inspirations behind the Hunger Games. In the film, 42 9th graders are sent to an island with a bit of food, supplies and weapons with one instruction: kill everyone else as only the last one remaining can leave. PUBG is the same deal except you’re given nothing but the clothes on your back. It’s a simple concept where each game becomes its own masterpiece — uniquely different and always with a story to tell. This preview will be a story of one of my many matches out on the island.
The match starts on board a plane with 100 players as it crosses the island. I’ve opted to play solo, which means all 100 players have queued alone, although the game does support duos and four player squads for those looking for a different kind of experience. In each game, the first course of business is to pull up your map to see where the plane will fly over so you can figure out where you want to land. You can choose a city, a town, the middle of nowhere or anywhere in between. Each location is randomly filled with weapons and other gear, so you never know where will be best or who you’ll have to fight to get what’s there. It’s the first of many choices you’ll have to make in a match of PUBG.
I decide to make for an archaeological excavation on top of a mountain. As I wait for the right time to hop out, I see other players flying out like little ants. Soon enough the entire island will be covered with players out to kill each other. Eventually my time comes and I hop out. As I fall, I know I might very well be surrounded by enemies but I don’t have time to check — I guide my survivor through the air toward the mountain and eventually pull the parachute, landing softly. As soon as I land, I look up to the sky and see three other parachutes approaching the mountaintop. One of them lands right next to me and I know I’m up for a fight. So does he.
In PUBG, melee combat exists but it’s pretty terrible. It’s hard to make contact with another player without the homing lunges most games build into their melee combat, so both of us immediately sprint to a pile of boxes to find a weapon. There’s a pistol and ammo on top of one of the boxes but he’s closer, so I pull to the side and spot another prize: an auto-shotgun. He makes it to his pistol first, reloads and begins firing off shots. I make it to cover and grab the shotgun. By the time I’ve reloaded, he’s making his way around the corner and begins to fire at me again. Too bad he doesn’t know about the shotgun. Five quick shots later and he’s dead and already heading back to the menu screen to start a new match. There are no respawns.
The other two parachutes landed on the other side of the mountaintop, so I know I’m safe for a short amount of time. I immediately begin searching for more gear. The area is scattered with weapons, attachments and healing gear. Since health doesn’t recharge, I take a moment to use those and then continue looking for gear that suits me. I settle on the auto-shotgun and an SMG with a 4x scope. After all, beggars can’t be choosers.
As I begin approaching the other side of the mountaintop, I hear shots ringing out to my left and right. It turns out the other two have found each other. I sneak behind one nearby me with my shotgun and quickly put an end to him with a shot to the back. Then I quickly pop out and use the SMG on the other player who’s already lost most of his life in his futile fight with a now-deceased enemy. Both players are looted for any useful supplies, which include a new rifle better suited to my 4x scope, although it comes at the expense of needing to abandon my shotgun. With all the gear collected, I start to make my way down the mountain.
The island itself is gigantic. Despite seeming like a small bit of land, it takes me three minutes to run all the way down the mountain. My pace is slowed by the fact that I always need to be watching for more foes in any direction, but even at full speed it would take ages to get to my destination. What is that destination? The inside of the circle. Since the island is so huge, each game a circle will be placed on the map along with a countdown. When the timer hits zero, the circle begins to close. If you can’t make it inside, you’ll take damage over time until you die or make it into the circle. It’s possible to survive a small amount of time outside, but as the game goes on the circle gets smaller and it does more damage so being inside the circle is always a top priority.
At the bottom of the hill is a dune buggy, one of the game’s vehicles, and that opens up some options. The vehicle is a lucky find as most people will not have one and I’m a fair distance from the circle. On the other hand, the buggy is incredibly loud and easy to spot. I’ll have a target on my back that my enemies will see and hear from a mile away. I weigh my options and opt to take the vehicle anyway, at least for now.
As I drive, I come across a field. Inside the field I see a lone player sprinting across. I quickly drive up to some nearby high ground and take aim. I’m still outside the circle and so is he, but he has no vehicle so he can’t afford to turn around to find the car he almost certainly heard. He is helpless and I am a hunter. In a crouch, I take aim and fire a shot. I miss, but he definitely hears the bullet and begins to zigzag. I fire off a few more shots, a couple of which hit but he continues to run. As I’m waiting for another shot to present itself, something unexpected happens. My screen flashes red and I realize I’ve just been shot. Twice. My prey is going to get away and worse, I have no idea where the other hunter is.
In a panic, I quickly hop back in my buggy and floor it. My shooter steps out from behind a nearby tree and opens fire, hitting me again with SMG fire. I survive, but some of his shots unfortunately hit my tire, which quickly pops, crippling my buggy. I continue driving anyway in desperation for another minute until I’m inside the circle. Then I abandon my buggy and begin to play more safely. A nearby house offers cover so I can watch for the other two I know must still be behind me somewhere, running for the circle. The doors of the house are all closed, but I have to move through it slowly, checking each room for someone camping with a shotgun. By the time I’ve done this, the circle is closing again and I have to move on rather than waiting to see if my foes are still following.
The game progresses in this way. All the while, the top right corner of the screen shows how many of the original 100 are still alive. After about 30 minutes, there are only 12 of us remaining and the circle is closing in on a hillside near a road. I play the part of a snake in the grass, waiting for someone to sprint into the circle in desperation. At this point, the circle will kill in only a few seconds. My plan works, and another player sprints by me in an attempt to get to the circle. Before I can shoot him, another player does the job for me. That other player happens to be right next to me — both of us have been crawling and hiding right next to each other, completely unaware. I get into a crouch and open fire on him, getting the kill but it’s too late. The circle closes in around me. I get up and sprint for the new boundary but the damage quickly becomes too much. I die as the 7th person remaining out of 100. Now it’s time to find a new match and start again.
PUBG is a game preview game and that term is not used lightly. Even on the Xbox One X, which attempts to run the game at 4k, the game features horrific frame drops. The geometry will spawn in out of nowhere on occasion and there are tons of bugs, but none of that matters. The gameplay loop in PUBG is just incredibly satisfying. Every time you finish a match you want to immediately jump into another. It’s pure fun and, when it’s time for its full release next year, you can bet it’s going to be among the most popular games available. It already is and with good reason. Now it’s time for me to start that next match.
