Bluehole Discusses The Motivation For Creating Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds

Playerunknown's Battlegrounds has become one of the most popular PC games of the year in a short amount of time. The game has already managed to sell ten million units already – despite still being in Early Access on Steam – and at one point, it even managed to have 1.3 million concurrent players on the service, outperforming even Valve's own DOTA 2. And the fun is likely to continue later this year when the full game goes live on PC, followed by a long-awaited release on the Xbox One.

But where does this motivation come from? Believe it or not, another popular game – H1Z1.

Speaking with IGN, general manager Anthony Castoro, who works with Daybreak Games and is the general manager for H1Z1, explained, "There wouldn't be a PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds if there wasn't an H1Z1."

The creation of the game came at just the right time, when its creator, Brendan Greene, was putting in some effort playing through H1Z1 and coming up with ideas for his own game. "I think there was a lot of mentoring that went on for Brendan," Castoro continued. "because he hadn't done commercial games before, he had done mods. He learned a lot, I think probably, from the development cycle there. It's kind of why I say there wouldn't be PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds without H1Z1."

Along with his modding work with H1Z1, Greene was also hired on as a consultant for Daybreak Games before breaking out on his own and gaining the experience needed to put Battlegrounds together. And it's crazy how H1Z1 actually inspired a full game, considering it's kind of a mod itself, made with the help of the previously released ARMA.

So it's kind of crazy. It shows just how nuts the Steam market has gone for original, well-accepted games, and it has helped balloon Battlegrounds' success in ways even Greene didn't expect. Now, Microsoft is pouring all kinds of development money into the Xbox One version of the game, which is set to release sometime later this year, bringing its multiplayer shenanigans to a new platform for everyone to enjoy. It's just a matter of time before that player count increases even further – and everyone gets a chance at a "chicken dinner".

PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds is available now for Steam Early Access.