PUBG: BATTLEGROUNDS News

PUBG's new map Haven packs all the action into the smallest, densest map yet

When players jump into the new Season 10 map in PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, they're going to be playing a version of the game that's unlike anything that's come before it. Not only is Haven a tight urban environment much smaller than the sprawling wilderness zones of maps before, they'll also be contending with a new and deadly NPC faction that's actively hunting them down. It's what creative director Dave Curd says is his team's "biggest challenge yet."

"The way PUBG wants to play, and the way it wants to be built at the architectural core is that it loves to be a big, vast, open field with small clusters of compounds and the occasional dotting and smattering of towns," Curd says. The original Erangel map, Miramar, Vikendi, and even the smaller Sanhok map all follow this rough formula. Season 10's Haven does not.

Haven is a 1x1 map for 32 players. That tight space is almost completely covered in a built environment: everywhere you look there's concrete and steel, rusting hulks of factories and warehouses inspired by the decaying steel industry in America's Ohio Valley and Rust Belt.

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Steam Global Top Sellers for the Week ending 6 December 2020

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Now's your last chance to play PUBG's Paramo map

While PUBG's Paramo map was only introduced at the start of Season 9, that season's now coming to an end, which means it's being removed very shortly. At 3x3km, it was one of the battle royale game's smallest maps. It's unique, too, as it changes every single match and has an active volcano you need to be wary of.

PUBG's Season 9 ranked mode ends on December 16 once servers go into maintenance, according to the game's Season 9 ranked rewards announcement, so it looks like you have about two weeks to give the map a go before it's gone forever. Around the time of the Paramo map and Season 9 release, PUBG also launched an official lore website, which has provided an extensive background to the map if you would like to learn more.

PUBG Season 10 begins as soon as maintenance ends on December 16, at which time you will be able to collect all of your hard-earned Season 9 rewards. The details on what Season 10 will bring haven't been announced yet, but we should get a launch trailer and details on the rewards closer to release.

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PUBG's PS5 and Xbox Series X versions to receive big improvements next year

A recent blog post from Joon H. Choi, lead project manager of PUBG's console versions, has shed more light on the game's next-gen performance goals and development. As is, there is currently no native next-gen version of PUBG, with the team instead focused on providing solid backwards-compatibility support for Xbox Series X|S and PS5 hardware.

Choi says that many fans have been calling for higher-quality graphics, boosted frame rate caps, and additional features to benefit the next-gen experience. The Xbox Series S uses the Xbox One S version of PUBG, which previously meant that any changes made to either version would affect the other. The team has now found a solution that allows for changes to be made to a specific device, which has resulted in a 60 FPS version becoming possible on Xbox Series S with update 9.2.

In theory, this workaround should allow the team to make greater enhancements to other versions of the game, but the decision has been made not to do so. "This is where we cross the line between backwards-compatibility and native support", says Choi.

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Steam Global Top Sellers for the Week ending 29 November 2020

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