Battle royale has dominated online shooters for nearly a decade, but its reign may be ending. The sudden rise of extraction shooters, led by the unexpected blockbuster Arc Raiders, has convinced even PUBG Studios that the genre's moment has arrived.
Taeseok Jang, head of PUBG Studios, is betting serious resources on that conviction. The Korean developer is now building Black Budget, an extraction shooter intended to capitalize on what he sees as an emerging trend with massive upside.
"I believe in its potential, so that's why we are making Black Budget," Jang told IGN when asked if extraction shooters could eventually surpass battle royales. "The genre itself is very complicated compared to shooter genres in terms of gameplay, and also, as a developer, it is not easy to make a good extraction shooter. But I think Arc Raiders has proven that it has huge potential."
Arc Raiders became the proof of concept the genre needed. The game has sold over 14 million copies and peaked at nearly 1 million concurrent players within months of launch, a rarity in today's cutthroat live-service market. Recent competitors like Concord and Highguard collapsed within weeks. Even Bungie's extraction shooter Marathon, despite critical praise, hasn't come close to Arc Raiders' player numbers.
The success stands out because launching a live-service shooter in 2026 has become brutally difficult. Jang acknowledged the harsh reality when asked what separates winners from the graveyard of failed launches. "That's what I want to know," he said with a laugh during an interview in Seoul.
Krafton itself has tasted that failure. The company's PUBG Blindspot mobile experiment shut down before escaping early access, marking another setback as the ninth anniversary of Battlegrounds approached.
Finding the Formula
Despite the challenges, Jang offered a straightforward thesis: success hinges on discovering what makes a game genuinely fun, then building a unique selling proposition around that core experience. "If you find the core fun factors that you can appeal to players, then you can naturally find the niche market and position in the live-service industry," he explained. "And if you pursue that effort to make a fun game and the USP that you can appeal to, then it will naturally make you successful."
The theory sounds elegant in practice. Reality tells a different story. Countless titles with solid game design, including WB's Multiversus, EA's Knockout City, and Square Enix's Marvel's Avengers, have failed to build sustainable audiences. For every Arc Raiders success, dozens of competent games vanish without notice.
Black Budget remains undated, giving PUBG Studios time to study what Arc Raiders got right before entering a market that continues to prove unforgiving to all but the rarest challengers.
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