PUBG: Battlegrounds reached 1.34 million concurrent players in March this year. This is not a game in decline. Yet its head of intellectual property sits in an office in Seoul, talking about Fortnite with sincere admiration, and sketching out a future that looks a lot like the game that once “borrowed” everything PUBG had built.
In a recent interview with Eurogamer, Taeseok Janghead of the PUBG IP franchise group at Krafton, outlined his vision for the future of battle royale. In short: more game modes, more brand partnerships, more user-generated content, and a respectful nod to the rival who spent years being accused of copying PUBG’s homework.
From the trial to the mirror
The history between PUBG and Fortnite isn’t exactly a warm one. Krafton sued Epic Games over the battle royale format, a legal battle that ultimately went nowhere. From now on, Jang describes Fortnite as one worthy of study, not combat.
“I have great respect for them, and I feel like they’re doing a great job,” he told Eurogamer. It’s a striking statement from the head of the franchise who once tried to sue Epic to withdraw.
Here’s the thing: admiration is not blind. Fortnite’s situation is complicated. Epic raised prices for V-Bucks in March, laid off more than 1,000 developers, and its own executives acknowledged that playtime had declined significantly in 2025. Statista estimates Epic’s gross revenue at around $6 billion for 2025, which seems healthy until you factor in the extent of these reductions. The game “remains the greatest game in the world on many fronts”, in the words of Epic’s Steve Allison, but the trajectory has raised questions.
Jang takes this context into account and always points the structure of Fortnite as the right direction. The bottom line is that he doesn’t admire Fortnite’s numbers so much as its model: a game that has become a platformer, with varied content, rotating modes, and brand partnerships overlaid on a core gameplay loop that players return to.
The platformer PUBG is heading towards
PUBG: Battlegrounds has already hosted collaborations with Balenciaga, Lamborghini and K-pop group Blackpink. The recently released Xeno Point added a looter-shooter PvE roguelite mode to the mix. A partnership with Payday, combining PUBG mechanics with the structure of Starbreeze, is planned for later this year. Jang also discussed the potential for TV series, animations and cartoons based on the PUBG license.
This is, functionally, the Fortnite playbook. And Jang doesn’t hesitate to say it.
“You have to have different, varied content and different game modes to survive as a service in the long term,” he said. “And I think it’s not just PUBG or Fortnite, or different companies or different IPs.”
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Jang also referenced Roblox as part of this platform model, highlighting user-generated content as a direction PUBG is actively exploring alongside brand partnerships and licensing.
The irony doesn’t escape him either. When asked about the cycle of PUBG influencing Fortnite and now Fortnite influencing PUBG’s strategy, Jang pointed out that this is how the market works. He framed this less as a borrowing and more as an industry-wide convergence on what actually keeps players engaged over the long term.
What most players miss about the longevity of battle royales
Jang’s broader argument is that battle royale as a genre has a structural advantage over other live service games. The format can absorb a large player base, offers a distinct gameplay experience that other genres don’t replicate, and provides a foundation that branded events and additional modes can build upon without breaking the core loop.
“What PUBG and Fortnite do really well is have their own unique character in terms of gameplay,” he said, noting that this core content is why both games can continue to offer varied experiences without losing their identity.
Extraction shooters like Arc Raiders and Marathon are currently generating considerable enthusiasm, and the genre change is real. But Jang doesn’t see this as a threat to battle royale as much as a reminder that the genre needs to continue to evolve rather than rest on its laurels.
The fact that PUBG reached 1.34 million concurrent players in March gives Krafton a solid base to work from. The question now is whether the platform strategy will bring the next phase of growth that Jang is convinced exists. For players, that means more modes, more collaborations, and a game that increasingly feels less like a single battle royale and more like a persistent world with a battle royale at its center. Be sure to check out more:
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