Join us for our weekly skip through the bountiful fields of fresh gaming joy! Hold our hand as we guide you down the top ten selling games on Steam, to discover which heart-lifting original content has caught the attention of the enthused gaming public! Someone please help me! (more…)
PUBG is in a weird place right now. It's still hugely popular, still hugely well-played, still, by some way, the biggest game on Steam - and somehow it's become something of the underdog.
Fortnite - let's just get on and address the llama loot box in the room - looks an awful lot like a threat, not just to PUBG's dominance but to Brendan Greene's crown as king of battle royale himself. But there's room for two games in one genre, and in fact I think PUBG, really, has a bigger threat to deal with first: from the outside, at times, it can seem as though this game has a worrying lack of direction.
Bluehole and PUBG Corp. have been pretty open about the changes that are coming. When players get a whiff of uncertainty they like to demand the release of a "Roadmap" - but the thing about these development roadmaps is that, while they tell you lots about the actual changes that are coming, they can often tell you nothing at all about what those changes are really for.
Playerunknown s Battlegrounds has inspired a lot of battle royale romps since it hit Steam a year ago, some of which have gone on to carve out their own gigantic niche. Then there s the Plunkbait; the small games that are more overtly attempting to ride its coattails. Graham refers to them as limpet games, which I rather like. While there are plenty of shameless copycats, some are sincere experiments and twists on the Battlegrounds formula; some aren t even battle royales at all. What follows are Plunkbat s most interesting or unusual odes, riffs and copies.
War, PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds' latest limited-time Event Mode, is now live on PC, offering a team-deathmatch focussed alternative to the usual Battle Royale formula.
War is designed for three teams of ten (or the closest that PUBG's matchmaking can muster), and unfolds over a "small slice" of the Erangel map. A match's safe zone is immediately visible from the air, and never shrinks or changes during play.
To get the action unfurling as quickly as possible, all players will spawn with one random AR or DMR equipped, one random pistol, a Level 1 helmet and vest, and one grenade. Other loot can be acquired in buildings, or via care packages which drop every 90 seconds.
Following its recent flares and shotgun/melee custom bouts, PUBG's latest limited-time mode is named War. Billed as its "most deadly Event Mode yet", the ten-person, squad-based deathmatch free-for-all is live now through Sunday, April 15 at 7pm PST/Monday, April 16 at 3am BST.
Set within a "small slice" of the Erangel map, games last 15 minutes and host a maximum of 30 players in ten-person teams. Unlike the familiar battle royale formula, dead players respawn in a plane before being dropped back into action—and kills earn points for each respective team.
Albeit "extremely small", safe zone locations are fixed over the course of each match and remain the same size throughout. Red zones are disabled, the weather is locked at 'Sunny', and the first team to 200 points wins.
Here's a teaser:
As detailed in this Steam Community update post, kills grant players three points, while Down But Not Out hits accrue just one. Likewise, revivals net single points—however team deaths/DBNOs cost five. "If no team reaches 200 points before the 15-minute time limit," says PUBG Corp, "the team with the highest score will be declared the winner."
On the loot front, players are guaranteed to spawn with a random Automatic Rifle or Designated Marksman Rifle, as well as a random Pistol, a level one Helmet and a Grenade. Higher tier loot can be scavenged from buildings and care packages, the latter of which drop in 90-second intervals.
Having missed PUBG's flare-focussed Event Mode, I jumped into last week's shotguns and melee-only foray and had great fun. War sounds suitably chaotic. I'd love to hear from you in the comments if you've taken it for a spin.
Grab nine of your closest murderpals because the latest Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds event mode is going big. War, as it’s named, is a 10v10v10 team deathmatch mode going down in static small circles. Players rain down from the skies already equipped with random gear, then battle to be the first team to hit the frag limit. And yup, this mode does have respawning. War may be good for absolutely nothing, but War mode looks a lark.
In other news, the new small map, Codename: Savage, is returning to closed testing next week. More beta keys will be available from Saturday. (more…)
Developer Bluehole has announced that PUBG's third map, codenamed Savage, will enter its second round of testing next week, and that beta key sign-ups will re-open this Saturday for PC players wanting to get involved.
The tropical-themed Savage is Battlegrounds' smallest map yet, measuring just 4km by 4km - a quarter of the size of PUBG's currently released Erangel and Miramar maps. Its diminutive scale makes for a much faster, more brutal Battle Royale experience, and Eurogamer's Ian Higton recently shared his thoughts on Savage following its first round of testing.
Savage's second round of testing, via Bluehole's Closed Experimental Server, is scheduled to begin next Monday, April 16th at 6pm PDT (that's 2am on April 17th in the UK). Round two draws to a close on Wednesday, April 18, 6pm PDT / April 19th at 2am in the UK.