PUBG Owners Krafton Acquire Subnautica Developer

Krafton, the owners of the PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds game as well as several other projects in the works, has acquired Unknown Worlds, the creators of the Subnautica game and its follow-up works. The acquisition was announced on Friday with Unknown Worlds now becoming the sixth studio owned by Krafton alongside others that were created in-house by the PUBG owners. Unknown Worlds will continue working on updates for both Subnautica and Subnautica: Below Zero, Krafton said, while also working on a new game.

Unknown Worlds has created works in the past such as the Half-Life mod Natural Selection, but its most well-known projects by far now are Subnautica and Subnautica: Below Zero. It was not specified what this new game is that the developers are working on for Krafton now, but Krafton did tease that it is supposed to be a "genre-defining game" that's supposed to launch at some point in 2022 in early access form.

Whatever it is, that game and Unknown Worlds as a whole will be helping Krafton to "expand its IP and diversify the company's portfolio of groundbreaking games," the company said. It was clarified in a press release that Unknown Worlds will continue to operate as an independent studio and will be "wholly owned" by Krafton now.

"It was immediately apparent how closely Unknown Worlds and Krafton are aligned in the way we think about games and game development," said Charlie Cleveland, CEO of Unknown Worlds. "Subnautica and PUBG both started humbly and evolved successfully through constant iteration and feedback. We want to bring new games to the world stage – and with Krafton, we're a big step closer. We're truly looking forward to our future together."

As the sixth studio under Krafton, Unknown Worlds joins the ranks of PUBG Studios, Striking Distance Studios, Bluehole Studio, RisingWings and Dreamotion. Within these studios, Krafton has a number of different games in the works including PUBG: New State which just recently got a release date. Regular updates are also still coming for PUBG proper. Much different than both of those – but still somehow in the PUBG universe – is The Callisto Protocol, a game which looks to rival the release of the Dead Space Remake based on what we've seen so far.

Unknown Worlds has not yet announced what it's working on next, so Subnautica fans should keep an eye on the developer to see what's coming in the future.