Four Regional PUBG Pro Leagues Highlight Five Year Esports Plan
By Nicholas Barth ·
Ahead of the beginning for the PUBG Global Invitational 2018 in Berlin, Germany, PUBG Corp. revealed its upcoming five year plan for the esports scene of their battle royale game starting with PGI 2018.
Tuesday, July 24th saw PUBG Corp., the developer of the popular battle royale title of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG), announce its five year plan for the future of the game's esports scene during the media day for the PUBG Global Invitational (PGI 2018) that is set to kick off on Wednesday, July 25th.
The five year plan for PUBG esports will see 2018 be the year that PUBG Corp. lays down the groundwork for the esports system of PUBG. It will begin with the highly anticipated $2,000,000 PGI 2018 event that will see 20 of the best professional PUBG teams from around the world compete against one another.
During the PGI 2018 press conference, PUBG Corp. CEO Changhan Kim stated that the goal for the professional scene of the battle royale title is to have it become a "sustainable, standalone product in 2021-2022", and that the company will not be using the esports scene as only "a marketing tool", but "will be fully committed to the scene".
“We’re investing in PUBG esports for the longer run, we don’t expect to generate any revenue in the short-term," said Kim.
Official regional pro leagues for North America, Europe, South Korea and China will be launching in 2019 that will then culminate in the PUBG World Championship with the first one set to take place in November to December of 2019. Kim also stated during the press conference that 2019 will see a golden standard being developed that all PUBG esports leagues will abide by. PUBG Corp. will also be heavily invested in growing the grassroots and amateur scenes of its game's professional scene with online competitions and third party tournaments that will utilize the title's open API, custom match function and universal esports ruleset.
“To determine who’s an amateur or who’s a pro, that’s still a very vague line. We’re going to create a path-to-pro for anyone who wants to become a pro player. As we’re establishing a plan, we learnt from traditional sports, not esports. We looked at how traditional sports evolved - there are female soccer players, school leagues, office clubs, and with PUBG there will be amateur leagues where female players can compete and progress through to the pro leagues if they have the gameplay skills to compete at that level," said Kim
A major development for the professional scene of the popular battle royale game will be the enhanced and revamped viewing experience that has been developed for competitive play, which will see its first action at the PGI 2018. This enhanced viewing experience will consist of a real-time API, UI improvements and dedicated streams to each competing team that will feature a commentator speaking in the team's native langauge.
A revenue sharing system was also announced during the PGI press conference that will see teams earn profits from the sale of in-game digital cosmetic items. The first set of team based cosmetic items for the PUBG esports scene will be custom hoodies that fans will be able to purchase on Wednesday, July 25th after the scheduled maintenance is performed. These hoodies will represent the 20 teams competing at the PGI 2018 and will be available for $9.99 each.
(cover photo courtesy of PUBG. Corp)