PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Player Count Drops Amidst Cheating Epidemic
Images via PUBG Corp. Games News PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds
On Wednesday, Bloomberg tech reporter Yuji Nakamura connected the cheating epidemic in Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds to a drop in the game’s player base.
Nakamura tweeted:
PUBG hit 30m in sales this week, but it is churning hard. Bluehole still not taking cheaters seriously enough imo pic.twitter.com/Iqjz8BPzVE
— Yuji Nakamura (@ynakamura56) February 14, 2018
The past few weeks have been a mixed bag for the gaming sensation. Earlier this month, the PUBG cheating epidemic became a hot topic after a player was caught using an aimbot cheat during a charity streaming event hosted by PUBG Corp. and Twitch. Just this week, the company announced that the game had hit 30 million in sales. Early access to the mobile versions in China proved the game’s staying power, with over 75 million pre-registered players before the Feb. 9 release. But those victories proved to be short-lived after this recent revelation.
The drop of nearly a million players was the most significant since PUBG’s launch last year, even with player bans and anti-cheating measures in place. Between this and other issues going on in the gaming world, the industry seems to be at a crossroads when it comes to consumer-company relationships.