Brendan Greene—owner of PLAYERUNKNOWN Productions—is considered by many to be the true originator and pioneer of battle royale. I certainly think he is, and the idea to create a giant playground where many players compete and fight to the death until only one victor (or team) is left standing changed the gaming world forever. PUBG is still one of the biggest battle royale games in 2025.
At Gamescom 2025, I sat face-to-face with Brendan AKA PlayerUnknown himself, and I have to admit, it was a surreal moment. I’ve sunk numerous hours into Fortnite, Warzone, Apex Legends, and various other battle royale games in my life. The genre is expanding even now, with 2025’s Elden Ring Nightreign showing how an established studio is prepared to dip its toes into uncharted waters.
He’s preparing the world for Prologue: Go Wayback!—a new survival title with an open beta. While we did discuss the new project, I would have been remiss if I didn’t get to hear the origins of PUBG and battle royale from the godfather of the genre himself.
“I Didn’t Even Intend to do it” on Battle Royale Creation
Straight off the bat, no messing around, I wanted to know how it felt to create and popularize a multi-billion-dollar genre:
“I just wanted to make a game mode that I wanted to play. The fact that it turned into a genre, it’s humbling.”
Brendan explained that he’s overwhelmed by how much people have come to love and rely on the genre. He’s also been taken aback by how ‘bigger’ companies have integrated the game mode:
“I love Battlefield, and I see Battlefield putting it in all these other games. It’s just amazing.”
He told me how happy he is that battle royale has outgrown its casual roots. Going from a normal game mode to an esports and competitive “phenomenon.” This was obvious during the COVID years with the World Series of Warzone events, where streamers and content creators faced off with hundreds of thousands of dollars on the line.
But it’s also the connections and deeper impact that battle royale has had on people. I asked Brendan what he was most proud of and what he’s most delighted to see arise from this groundbreaking way of playing games:
“I did an interview with a guy called Zach Nefine. He’s a streamer, and he did a really good review of our game Prologue. After the interview was over, he said, ‘Yeah, I never thought I’d be talking to you, and I just want to tell you like off camera that I have a whole bunch of friends now because of old friends from high school that I lost contact with. But because of PUBG, I reconnected with them, and now I have like a close group of 20 friends.’ So that’s the kind of, I think, the most thing I’m proud of is that I’ve heard these stories all over the world from people who have reconnected or like finding groups again because of something I helped create, which is, again, humbling but amazing.”
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is still going strong today. I think Brendan is delighted to see where battle royale has gone, where it took him, but Prologue is his new baby. PlayerUnknown Productions is hard at work on Prologue: Go Wayback!, and you can experience it for yourself with its open beta.
What are your most important battle royale memories? Is there anything the genre needs to do to evolve and keep fresh? I’m interested to hear what you have to say, and you can let me know through the Insider Gaming Forum.
Check out more exclusive interviews here at IG, including Randy Pitchford admitting he’s ‘A little nervous’ about the more challenging parts of Borderlands 4 and Techland saying Dying Light: The Beast has ‘The most diverse world’.
Andy is Insider Gaming's Senior Evergreen Editor and has been in the games journalism sphere in one way or another for over 7 years. His video game taste is as…
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