Beau’s Number 1 App Reveiw: Player Unknown: Battlegrounds PUBG

Beau’s App series. Each week, I install whatever is the No. 1 bestselling app on the iOS or Android store and review it, to save you the effort in case it’s total waste of life. This week a game called Player Unknown: Battlegrounds, better known as PUBG is in the top spot and Im taking it on. How did it get to No. 1? Because it’s free, because it just came out for phones, and because it’s already crazy popular. Its PC/console versions made PUBG the most-played new video game of 2017.

Lets Start The Battle

PUBG is a “battle royale” game, meaning that it’s a military-style, free-for-all, fight to the death. It’s extremely similar to its arch-rival, Fortnite: Battle Royale (which is also free, and is currently neck-and-neck with PUBG on the iOS app store [not available yet for Android]).

At the very start of the game (after choosing the look, gender, race, and screen name for your avatar), you’re in sort of a limbo where you can run around, practice punching and crouching, waiting for 100 players from the internet to accumulate. Once they do, the action cuts to a plane flying high above an island. You choose when to jump out, at which point you skydive, and eventually pop your parachute.

Just Past the Tutorial

You explore this island by running around (the “camera” is always behind you) or hopping onto rusty old cars, tanks, or motorcycles. As you go, you find and pick up weapons, protective gear, medical kits, and energy drinks. But be wise: You can carry only so much weight — and you can hold only two guns at a time.

If you’re in Squad mode, getting shot by the enemy doesn’t necessarily mean Game Over. You’re just wounded at first, and your teammates can help you back to your feet.

As time goes by, the playing area slowly contracts, forcing players into a tighter space and heightening the action. The walls, in the form of a creepy blue shimmering bubble, slowly close in on you; if you’re caught inside it, you lose Health.

What Makes it Great

PUBG has elements of a survival game, with a stamina and health bar to maintain through collectables, but a typical match lasts no longer than 30 minutes or so. You start each one with no equipment and have to parachute off a randomly moving plane, so that it’s almost impossible to start any two matches in the same place. The location of loot is also randomised, although obvious hot spots do tend to have better equipment.

The most interesting thing about PUBG is that it’s a true sandbox game. None of the gameplay mechanics are very complex or unusual, and while the map is well designed it’s really its size that is the greatest benefit. Everything which makes the game fun comes from the simple but inflexible rules, and the knowledge that if you die that’s it – there’s no lives and not even a way to watch the rest of the match unfurl. The tension this creates is incredible, and every player has their own favourite PUBG story. Your first kill is usually a good one (mine was a fist fight that had me running away into another room, and coming back with a crowbar) but the decision on when and how to move away from the safety of a good hiding place is always the most difficult.

The Final Thought

This is the first app review Ive done and Ive had a blast for the last 13 hours playing this game. Truth be told I only just heard about it last week, quickly dismissed it, one try and Im hooked. All I can think about now is that Ive got the good loot where is the bullet that is gonna kill me..