PUBG: Black Budget Extraction Shooter has been officially cancelled
Last year, Arc Raiders took the world by storm, sparking interest in extraction shooters within the gaming community. Following this success, Krafton, the developer of PUBG: Battlegrounds, announced PUBG: Black Budget – their own take on the genre.
PUBG: Battlegrounds was released in 2017, when battle royale games were the number one online multiplayer title. The hype surrounding the genre has since subsided considerably, and players have turned to other online games. Last year, with the release of Arc Raiders and the full version of Escape from Tarkov, extraction shooters moved into the spotlight. Krafton also wanted to capitalize on this trend and began developing its own extraction shooter, PUBG: Black Budget. Despite closed alpha tests in December and the following June, the company was dissatisfied with the game’s progress. Therefore, a year later, Krafton decided to discontinue development of PUBG: Black Budget.
PUBG: Black Budget was cancelled after one year of development
During the development phase, Krafton held several closed tests for PUBG: Black Budget so players could familiarize themselves with the game and provide feedback to the developers for further improvement. Unfortunately, this wasn’t enough. As announced on the game’s Steam page, Krafton has discontinued development of Black Budget. Developer PUBG Studios explains why the project is being discontinued:
After reviewing the development status and future direction of the project, we concluded that the current direction would not allow us to provide players with a satisfying long-term gaming experience. Therefore, it is with heavy hearts that we have decided to discontinue development of PUBG: Black Budget. We thank everyone who took the time to participate in our closed alpha tests and share their feedback. PUBG Studios will incorporate the insights gained from development and testing into future projects and will continue to listen to player feedback as we create new gaming experiences.
PUBG: Black Budget can still be wishlisted on Steam, but as far as we know, this is the last blog post about it. It’s not the first time Krafton has pursued an experimental project that didn’t achieve the desired success. PUBG: Blindspot was also a development project whose development was prematurely terminated after a setback.
On a positive note, PUBG fans have something to look forward to. While there’s no recent news on PUBG DED.NET, a multiplayer roguelite showcased at Gamescom Opening Night Live, it remains in development. Hopefully, it will have a better ending than Krafton’s other failed experiment with an extraction shooter.
