The battle royale that once topped the genre, PUBG, has once again registered a large number of concurrent users.

It was “only” released seven years ago, yet it is one of history’s most influential video games. We tend to underestimate the impact of PUBG’s success on major developers. This is partly because, while it was incredibly popular in its first year or two, interest in the game that defined the battle royale genre gradually waned. More than once, we have heard that the title is “dying”. There was always some exaggeration in this sentence, although it was based on real foundations: the trend had been negative for years.

PUBG is showing its best form in years

Although it will be a surprising discovery for many users, it is safe to say that PUBG is experiencing a second boom. The number of users of the game has steadily increased since last August. In total, it achieved about a 72% increase in average player count (according to SteamDB). The numbers are even more staggering when you focus on user peaks.

If last July there were “hardly” 356,738 simultaneous players at the peak of the month, then the current record has doubled: in March of this year, there was a period when 768,362 people played simultaneously!

Why is there so much interest in PUBG? Speaking of recent days, the game is celebrating its seventh birthday. However, the interesting thing comes when we focus on the previous months. Bluehole has introduced a lot of updates. New features, such as the system of resurrecting allies (in the style of Apex Legends), new levels and many exciting mechanics, have arrived in the game. In addition, there were quality-of-life modifications. A lot of cosmetics have been added and the events keep coming. In short, it is a live service game that, despite some friction with the community, is able to retain its users again.

Although the game was a global success at launch, it seems that most of its current audience is Asian. This gives the title plenty of room for future growth. After all, many of the potential players have not yet returned. In fact, they may have reason to return in the not-too-distant future.

The developer has announced that it has set its sights on moving to Unreal Engine 5 and focusing on user-generated content as pillars of the future.

PUBG is still nowhere near the numbers it saw when it initially launched. It probably never will, because no other game in Steam history has had so many concurrent users. However, the title is at its best moment in four years. In fact, it even surpassed the numbers measured when switching to the “free-to-play” model. In that sense, all signs point to a great future ahead of him.

Source: SteamDB