‘PUBG’ Update Makes Blue Zone Deadlier, First Vaulting Testing Possibly Next Week

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds continues to creep towards its official launch like a prone player crawling across a grassy field in the game. Bluehole, Inc released a small update Wednesday to make the blue zone deadlier to players. Meanwhile, those hoping to test out the new vaulting mechanic may get to go hands-on with the movement feature next week.

The patch notes for the PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds(PUBG) update released today really only contain two items. The first is to alter the blue zones after the first blue zone to make the Damage Over Time (DOT) effect to increase when a character is farther away from the play zone. The second fix is for a bug where bullets would sometimes ignore armor.

The blue zone change is to attempt to force PUBG players to engage each other in the blue zone. A common tactic in late stages of matches has been for players loaded with health packs and other health boost items to hang out in the blue zone and take damage while sniping at players inside and healing themselves. This change to the blue zone DOT effect is meant to address that.

The first test run of vaulting, the ability to climb over objects in the game, will arrive on the PUBG test servers “in early November,” per Bluehole. This potentially puts the test server update with the new feature coming as early as next Wednesday, November 1.

As previously covered, Bluehole plans to run three test phases on the test servers before releasing the official 1.0 version of PUBG. This should take two to four weeks and will test not just vaulting but other new content and features including the new desert map.

PUBG players should also expect numerous bug fixes to be part of the three test server phases. Community Manager Sammie Kang posted a series of Tweets apologizing for the lack of information regarding bug fixes but the studio is keeping an internal list.

Kang went on to explain that most of the bug fixes and optimizations that PUBG players have been clamoring for will be included in the PUBG 1.0 release.

There is still no exact date on when PUBG will arrive for the Xbox One. An early December launch is looking the most likely as Bluehole stated it will take two to four weeks of testing to get the 1.0 release ready.

[Featured Image by Bluehole, Inc]