In late 2019, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds creator Brendan Greene offered the first glimpse of his next game, Prologue: Go Wayback. Unlike PUBG, Prologue isn’t a shooter or a battle royale. Instead, it’s a survival game that pits players against bitterly cold elements and a treacherous environment. According to Greene, Prologue’s extreme difficulty may cause some players to initially hate it, but he also believes they will eventually embrace it.
“I expect a lot of people will hate it,” Greene told PC Gamer. “But that’s ok if it elicits a reaction–that’s all I want. People didn’t get [Battle Royale] at first, but then they did. And I think it’s the same with this, the goal here is creating these big, massive worlds for everyone. We already have a demo on Steam, and people understand what it is. So, if it causes a reaction, fantastic. I’ll happily talk to them and go, ‘Well, yeah, it doesn’t handhold because that doesn’t serve a purpose.'”
The player’s goal in Prologue is to live long enough to reach a weather station that’s randomly located on an 8×8 km map. But in order to do so, players need to find the right gear and battle hunger and thirst as well. The game’s Steam page indicates that there are “millions” of possible maps, so there isn’t any single path to making it through alive. Regardless of whether the player succeeds or fails, the map will be different the next time they play. Prologue doesn’t currently have a release date, but early access is expected to begin in the second quarter of this year. Players who want to get take part in Prologue’s play tests can find more info here.
Nearly a year ago, Greene and his colleagues at PlayerUnknown Productions revealed that Prologue is part of a long-term plan for three games, which also includes a title called Project Artemis. Meanwhile, PUBG publisher Krafton and Nvidia have unveiled plans for AI-powered teammates in PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds that can act like real people. Krafton is also working on the first-ever PUBG spin-off, which is called PUBG: Blindspot.
