The house that PUBG: Battlegrounds built is branching out from battle royale. Krafton announced in its latest financial report that its latest game from PUBG Studios is "Project Black Budget," an extraction shooter planned to release in the second half of 2024.
Extraction shooters, a subgenre of shooters typically defined by PvPvE skirmishes in sandbox maps where players can "extract" whenever they want, have become the fashionable genre of the moment, with games like Escape From Tarkov and Hunt: Showdown leading the pack alongside the well-liked DMZ mode in Call of Duty: Warzone.
Just a few years ago, I would've assumed the next big thing from the PUBG folks would be another battle royale. Many tried to capitalize on the high-player-count thrills popularized by H1Z1: King of the Kill and PlayerUnknown's 2017 surprise hit, but most of them shut down. As PUBG, Fortnite, Apex Legends, and Warzone have settled in as the kings of the genre, battle royale seems to be done growing for now. Meanwhile, extraction shooters are on a (considerably less meteoric) rise.
Krafton's PUBG spinoff is the second high-profile extraction shooter announcement of 2023, joining Bungie's Marathon reboot. Also on our radar is Arc Raiders, the extraction shooter from Embark Studios, the same folks currently gearing up to release The Finals.
Lots of pots are cooking in the world of PvPvE shooters, though I wonder if interest in the somewhat niche subgenre can support all these big games at once. Project Black Budget should be an interesting test to see if lightning can strike twice.
