PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds

PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds airdrops onto PlayStation 4 as a technically messy port, but its brand of tense and tactical battle royale gameplay remains addictive as ever.

There is a whole generation of PS4 owners who are probably way too deep into Fortnite, with that game being their first exposure to the genre. While I wouldn’t count myself amongst them, I cannot imagine that any of those people would choose this $30 experience, with little promise to grow and improve, over triple-A titles that have since leapfrogged over PUBG.

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds on the PlayStation 4 is a port of a bad version of a great concept.

Quotation forthcoming.

A no-thrills PlayStation 4 port that has most of what you’d want from PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds but in a much uglier, watered down package.

While PUBG delivers the core gameplay of the battle royale genre, it doesn't manage to do it with the sophistication of competing battle royale games on the PS4. It looks and plays like an alpha build of a game that's focusing on getting the basics worked out without worrying about optimization or graphical polish. It's also a threadbare offering, giving you a single game mode while games like Black Ops 4 and Battlefield V give you a whole lot more game modes beyond their battle royale modes. PUBG may have come first to the genre on other platforms, but its PS4 debut feels like a game that the world has long ago passed by.

In a time where Battle Royale is all the craze, raking in all that money and not bothering to try to keep up with your competition seems like a stupid idea. Considering PUBG creators sued Epic Games over Fortnite over plagiarism, it becomes pretty apparent that the suit wasn’t over losing money, but out of spite that someone else was making a better version of your game. Instead of paying legal fees, maybe pay a programmer to outdo your competition and beat them by being better, not by throwing a legal tantrum.

PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds on PS4 is a great game, ruined by technical shortcomings and bad controls. The first can be fixed, but the second is tough to improve.

All of this is not to say that PUBG on PS4 isn’t fun, as it’s definitely a serviceable experience for Battle Royale aficionados who want a more strategic and deliberately paced alternative to competitors like Fortnite and Black Ops 4‘s Blackout. Unfortunately, though, there are still a host of problems that PUBG Corp. needs to address so as to justify the PlayStation 4 port’s $30 price tag.

It is easy to be frustrated by the overall state of the PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds PlayStation 4 port. The texture pop-in is ridiculous and the gameplay still has so many rough edges. But there is a certain charm to PUBG‘s gameplay that keeps players coming back for more.

There's fun to be had as a social experience, and PUBG is certainly better than the sum of its many subpar parts, but the resources earned through the record-breaking success of PUBG have not translated into a game that holds up in the current climate of high-end shooters, and we can only hope that if major updates (or a sequel of sorts) are on the way, that PUBG's success supports a triple-A experience instead of a frustrating one that looks and feels dated.

Even though it was the gaming phenomenon that boosted the "Battle Royale" genre, PUBG today feels dated and behind its competition. Especially when you consider the strides that other games on this genre have achieved.