Krafton’s PUBG: Dednet Pursues Zany ’90s Style and Roguelike Abilities, Dave Curd Says

The debut trailer showed players slithering along the ground like snakes, swords for hands, and a tiny doll wielding a power drill while driving a toy car. Curd told TechRadar that such sights are intentional. “If you want to excite and delight people, you have to give them something fresh,” he said. “If you want a cool, stoic, mil-sim, take your pick; they’re everywhere. But what everyone else can’t do, and maybe they don’t want to, is my take on this world, this lore, these characters, these abilities.”

Curd described the tone of PUBG: Dednet as “my version of the 90s filtered through a meatgrinder.” According to TechRadar, the trailer is over-the-top and drenched in color, with gunfights in arcades, car chases through rural towns lit by neon signs, and a grungy, punk vibe. Curd said, “The audience will forgive almost anything but being bored.” He added that the trailer would likely receive “a lot of love and hate,” and that passionate reactions would be preferable to people looking past it with glazed eyes.

Although PUBG: Dednet remains a battle royale, with multiple teams of three competing to be the last ones standing, it adds roguelike elements to how a player’s game progresses over time. According to TechRadar, it starts with the concept of runs, in which players might nominate how many wins or placements they can achieve before reaching a certain number of losses. Win or lose, at the end of a match, players are presented with choices that can alter or upgrade their chosen character’s abilities and play style.

Those choices can push a player toward a support role, helping teammates with heals or protection from a riot shield made out of a car door, or toward using the doll seen in the trailer, which can ride on a player’s back into battle or sit stealthily on an opponent’s shoulder as a nuisance. Curd joked about how such ideas differ from other shooters: “I’m pretty confident this isn’t going to be in this year’s Battlefield update.” He said the team’s internal test is whether an ability makes them laugh, sounds like an interesting challenge and stays in their minds the next day. “We’re kind of finding our own way here,” he told TechRadar.

According to TechRadar, players can now pre-register for the closed beta.