Yesterday at the annual Hi-Rez Expo, a new mode was introduced for Paladins called “Battlegrounds.” True to its name, the mode promises battle royale-style matches with 100 players competing against one another in an attempt to earn the coveted title of last man standing.
Aside from the mode’s core concept, Paladins: Battlegrounds mirrors PUBG in other ways, including a fog which gradually reduces the play area and pushes players closer and closer together.
Having previously incurred controversy over similarities to Blizzard’s Overwatch, the new “Battlegrounds” mode in Paladins has resulted in backlash due to it being a bit too similar to PUBG.
Hi-Rez President Stew Chisam addressed some of this backlash today at the Expo and defended the mode’s name, stating:
“We actually had a lot of conversations. We thought if we call it something completely out of the, people might not know what it was. Or if we call it Survival, which we previously had [as a mode], people might think it was the previous version.
We actually settled on Battlegrounds because—I don’t know if you got the same feeling when you played—but when we got to actually playing the mode, you’re in your four-person team with your classes, it felt like an MMO raid party.”
Essentially, Chisam explained that the name was meant to draw parallels to “the old MMO battlegrounds” where players “get on horses and gallop through a large fantasy landscape.”
While the Battlegrounds trailer definitely showcases the horse system in Paladins, and it was made clear that the mode is intended as more of a “team effort” as opposed to a solo endeavour, it’s hard to separate it from PUBG.
In the end, we’ll have to see what Paladins: Battlegrounds truly has to offer when it’s released sometime later this year. What are your thoughts on Paladins: Battlegrounds? Let us know down in the comments below.
