by David Kent | staff writer

Ever since both Fortnite and PUBG exploded in popularity, the video game market had become almost flooded with battle-royale games. A battle royale game is a hunger-games esque in nature where, typically, 100 players fight to the death until there is only one remaining to be crowned champion. These games have most likely blown up recently due to the appeal of fighting against 99 other people and winning amongst all of them.

However, the two most popular games of this recently explosive genre still remain to be the first two who started this trend, Player Unknown Battlegrounds, and Fortnite. These two remain the most influential and well-known games of the battle-royale genre and millions of people play both of these games on a daily basis. Which is better?

PUBG is more of a realistic take on the genre. It is a realistic shooter set on a large fictional island with high-end graphics. The game features about two dozen weapons and the map is estimated to be 64 km in length. Vehicles are used to try and help layers to traverse the map at a faster pace than just on foot. However, it will still take you a long time to go from one end of the island to the other.

Fortnite is more of a cartoonish style of the battle-royale genre. Originally, the game wasn’t supposed to be a battle royale, it was originally a co-op player versus environment, or PvE game through the developers decided to change it for monetary reasons. It had about a dozen weapons with a smallish map, much much smaller than the one in PUBG as there are no vehicles that you can drive. Another popular feature of Fortnite is building, thinking something similar to Minecraft, where you build forts to fight each other in with destructible buildings.

Fortnite is currently the most popular and influential battle-royale game out right now, with PUBG being a close second. However, the two are in a bitter competition for dominance over the video game market.

Gameplay

Fortnite, as stated above, allows people to build forts and towers from nearby materials like wood, metal, or brick to protect themselves and defeat other players. With about a dozen weapons, gameplay gets pretty repetitive after a while and well, boring. There is even a crossbow, but it’s crap. Gameplay in Fortnite isn’t very tactical, it’s more arcadish but that doesn’t mean it’s that battle. In fact, it’s really enjoyable. Fortnite is more fast-paced leading to a more intense gaming experience.

Although PUBG doesn’t have building, they have about two dozen types of weapons with a massive map. And vehicles of course, so you can mow someone down in a motorcycle and win this way. I’ve done it, it’s possible and fun! PUBG also has a crossbow, and it is fun to use, unlike Fortnite. The gameplay in PUBG is more of a tactical shooter, well it’s more tactical than Fortnite at least with cover mechanics and parkour mechanics. PUBG is slower paced as well, making for a more relaxed gaming experience.

In this category, Fortnite gets a B- and PUBG gets an A+, thus making PUBG the winner in this section.

Graphics

Fortnite takes a comical and cartoonish style of graphics. It has much less going on in its environment, however, this makes it plainer and kind of 2D. Though, Fortnite it less taxing on a lower-end gaming system than PUBG. Fortnite drains your phone battery, however.

On the other hand, PUBG has more realistic and close to life graphics with detailed environments, making it look more 3D. However, PUBG requires more processing power, although it takes up less battery on mobile.

The winner of this category is…nobody. It’s a tie between Fortnite and PUBG.

Enjoyability

Despite its face-paced gameplay, Fortnite is actually pretty enjoyable due to its quick games and easy gun-play. The building is easy to understand and you can quickly become rather good at the game.

PUBG is more of a slow-paced game, bringing the enjoyability and replayability down primarily due to how long matches could potentially be. The gunplay is pretty easy to understand for most FPS shooters and it is far easier to aim your weapon in PUBG than it is in Fortnite due to a first-person perspective instead of third-person.

The winner of this category is…PUBG. PUBG has an A and Fortnite has an A-.

Verdict

PUBG wins easily, from it’s graphics to its tactical gameplay and replayability. Although, that doesn’t mean Fortnite is a bad game, far from it actually. PUBG just feels like a more cohesive and less frantic game, whereas Fortnite is more fast-paced and just a few seconds away from the screen can lead to your death just two spots away from winning. Not like that’s ever happened.