PUBG has a free to play week on PC right now, allowing everyone to experience the popular battle royale until Monday, August 16. The event has already notably increased its player count, and it’s not even the weekend yet.
To dive in, all you have to do is to download the game on Steam and create your own account, as this is a PC-only promotion. From there, you are free to enjoy PUBG across any of the available maps and game modes. If you're wanting to make the most of the week, it might be a good idea to check out the new 8x8km Taego map with additional gameplay features like self-revive, and the all-new Comeback BR System.
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During the free to play week, players can acquire all sorts of collectables, including Pass and Mission rewards, as well as XP and BP. In addition, you’ll get access to a special Newbie Training Course, featuring a variety of unique rewards to unlock by completing fun and easy in-game objectives. These are all listed on the game’s Steam page if you want to check them out yourself. All of your stats will be recorded and transferred to the full game, should you choose to finally buy it.
However, it might not be the best time for that, as all of the above fits in nicely with a recent rumor. According to the leak, PUBG developer Krafton is currently tracking player responses to the promotion to decide whether the game should be left as a free product permanently. Considering the current free access period was mentioned by the leaker a few weeks ago, there’s some credibility in his statements.
While the promotion only started on August 10, there are already some illustrative results. As shared by a popular PUBG content creator WackyJacky101, so far the PUBG free week has resulted in about a 12 percent higher player count when looking at active players in the morning in Europe. It will be interesting to see how far the overall numbers will rise in the next few days.
To further expand the PUBG brand and make it easier for newcomers to understand, Krafton recently chose to leave “PlayerUnknown” in the past. Nowadays, the PC and console versions of the title are referred to as PUBG: Battlegrounds. This shift reflects the desire to steer away from the original creator Brendan Greene, as well as allowing future games in the series to have the PUBG name attached.