PUBG War Mode Desert Knights Xbox One Preview

With the final PUBG Xbox One release having already passed there still seems to be a decent effort in adding new content. With that, we've got a special "War Mode" event of Desert Knights. It's a limited event and perhaps the first of many different ones in the future. It may be nothing new to the PC players, but for those on the console it's rather neat to see and a welcomed switch-up of gameplay. I wasn't a huge fan of this particular one, but I liked the idea of what they were aiming for.

Here in Desert Knights players are dropped down in a team of ten. It's a smaller area and respawns are available so that you can come back in after a small respawn time. It's just a straight up team deathmatch basically with tier three level gear and madness. It was weird as it could slow right down whenever hill based areas were present. I was expecting really fast paced gameplay and instead it came across as mostly awkward. When everyone was engaging it was awesome, but a lot of the time you're walking around looking for people.

This aspect of a slower approach makes sense in the regular battle royale PUBG modes, but this is supposed to be straight up carnage. That makes it somewhat awkward as perhaps the area of the circle you battle within is too small. I felt the score settings were right, but they need to mix it up for better results. The conflict was there, but not often enough. It removed the tactical elements of being slower since you're in a small space yet didn't do a good enough job of keeping people interacting. I also found it weird how long health would take to use whereas reviving others is super quick.

Additionally, it was incredibly disappointing that group based matchmaking was disabled due to problems in delivering it. That means it was just straight up solo play to find teams, so basically no coordination or too many people chatting at once. I liked the idea of this and really want to see more of them in the future. I think the desert map perhaps wasn't the best choice here, this type of setup might have leaned better towards the other levels as they tend be more flat. You don't want an entirely flat landscape, but they do provide good bumps compared to the large treacherous hills within the desert sands. PUBG continues to be interesting however, I wish they'd fix those Xbox Achievements...

Read our PUBG Xbox Review
Our PUBG Hub