Bluehole’s decision to delay the PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds release date by a few months is undoubtedly disappointing. But if Brendan Greene’s recent tweets about first-person servers and FOV sliders are any indication -- not to mention the parade of updates published since the game’s Early Access debut -- it sounds like Bluehole is still planning plenty of new features to keep PUBG players hooked in the interim.
If it’s starting to feel like you can’t escape PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds for more than a few days at a time, don’t worry. You aren’t alone. But it’s also been a big summer for PUBG . More than 4 million copies have been purchased since it hit Steam Early Access back in July. The game was a big part of last month’s 2017 PC Gaming Show, the annual, PC-focused press conference held the day before E3 begins. And just a few days ago, data miners discovered more than 50 “work in progress” items from the current build of the game. And that’s just a rundown of the major headlines from the last month. There’s also been a parade of weekly patches, monthly updates and even a streaming deal with Facebook.
Now Greene is ready to show the “hardcore” community a bit of love. Thousands (maybe even millions) of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds fans have been asking for first-person servers and field-of-view (FOV) sliders since the game hit Steam. According to Greene, first-person servers will make their long-awaited debut as part of July’s monthly update. But the rollout probably won’t be fast enough to please everyone. Greene says European and North American players will be the first to get access, with other regions joining the party after Bluehole has a bit of time to work out the kinks. But the feature will also only be available in Solo and Duo queues at first. And there’s no timeline for Squad matchmaking.
Recent comments from the PUBG development team suggest that won’t be the only major change seen in this month’s update. A member of the Bluehole team has confirmed a functional FOV slider has been added to the internal build of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and should be released as part of the July update. We’ve yet to see a similar announcement from Greene or Bluehole; however, there’s little reason to believe a member of the PUBG team wouldn’t have a pretty good idea of when new features were expected to emerge.
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is currently available in Early Access. The game is expected to see a full release later this year and will make the jump to Xbox One in early 2018.
Be sure to check back with Player.One and follow Scott on Twitter for more PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds news in 2017 and however long Bluehole supports PUBG in the years ahead.
