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This is the second in a series of posts intended to introduce you to the world of gaming, in particular titles of the shooter category, consisting of first-person shooter or FPS, and third-person shooter or TPS titles …
This particular blog will discuss two further FPS / TPS titles, which have gained immense popularity in recent times. The first of these is Garena Free Fire, and the second is Player Unknown’s BattleGrounds (PUBG).
Free Fire and PUBG are two of the most popular free-to-play mobile games. And in fact, it wouldn’t be wrong to perhaps even say that these two games have become mobile gaming legends of our time … !!
So let’s take a look at how these games rose to prominence in the mobile gaming world.
Mobile Games that are Free
With the growth of mobile gaming, we’ve seen a rise in mobile games that are free to play. In fact, it is now more common to find a game that is free-to-play rather than one that requires you to pay for it. This implies that even if you don’t have a lot of money, you can still enjoy these games for free.
And regardless, since mobile games are generally more accessible to a larger number of people, due to the greater affordability of mobile devices as opposed to PCs, consoles and VR / AR headsets, etc., it is natural that higher-quality free-to-play mobile games would attain a predominant position in the market.
So, by being released as free-to-play mobile games, it should not be surprising that both PUBG and Garena Free Fire have become very popular among the masses.
Battle Royale has taken over the World
Battle royale games have completely changed the landscape of mobile gaming, and have become staple forms of entertainment across all gaming platforms (including PCs and consoles too). With millions of gamers worldwide now regularly playing such games online and with their friends, and with flocks of professional gamers participating in and following esports tournaments and events, where games of solely this type are focused on as the centrepiece, one can certainly say that the battle-royale genre has completely revolutionised the gaming industry !!
And indeed, today, the two most played battle royale games on mobile devices without a doubt are these two: Free Fire and PUBG …
Free Fire: Battle Royale at Its Finest
The creator of Free Fire is Forrest Li, a businessman of Chinese descent and the founder and CEO of Garena, the Singaporean company that published Free Fire. In 2009, Li launched Garena, which has since developed into one of Southeast Asia, Taiwan, and Hong Kong’s biggest online gaming platforms.
Ever since its 2017 release, Free Fire has been downloaded more than a billion times globally. Compared to other battle royale games, this one has a smaller battlefield and only supports 50 people at once. But, this is what distinguishes the game from others because it produces a dynamic and action-packed setting.
Free Fire has a simple gameplay structure. Gamers must look for resources and weapons and must fight to survive after parachuting into an island. The victor is whoever’s left still standing—individually or as a team. There are several game types, including Ranked, Rush Hour, and Classic. While the Rush Hour mode is a brief, fast-paced game that lasts only 10 minutes, the Classic mode is the typical battle royale format.
One of the main advantages of Free Fire is its reduced size, which lets it run seamlessly on most devices, including low-end smartphones. The game is optimised to use fewer resources and at the same time has superb visuals, making it the perfect choice for those on meagre data plans.
PUBG: The Game that Started it All
The creators of PUBG are South Korean businessman and programming-prodigy Chang Han Kim, and Irish game creator Brendan Greene, who is better known as “PlayerUnknown.” Both Greene and Kim have received honours for their work in the video game business. And the game they created together, the battle-royale game known as PUBG has certainly left an indelible mark on the gaming world …
Ever since its 2017 debut, PUBG has amassed a huge fan base and now has received more than a billion downloads globally!
In comparison to Free Fire, PUBG has a much larger map on-average that is up to 8×8 kilometres in size and can support up to 100 players at once. Three of the different game modes available are: Classic, Arcade, and EvoGround. The Arcade mode is a quick-paced, ten-minute format that is different from the Classic mode, which is in the normal battle royale style. The EvoGround mode delivers fresh experiences and includes distinctive gaming dynamics.
PUBG’s gameplay is comparable to that of Free Fire. Gamers must look for resources and weapons and then fight to survive after parachuting into an island. The victor is whoever’s left still standing—individually or as a team. The game has more intricate visuals, a more challenging gameplay mechanism, and a more realistic gaming experience overall.
The fact that PUBG provides a more realistic and immersive gaming experience is one of its main benefits. The game is more difficult and rewarding because of more intricate gameplay features, such as bullet drop and recoil, which certainly make the game-experience overall more realistic. And the realistic and immersive art-style of the game’s graphics, along with the inclusion of vehicles, which players can utilise to move across and thus see and enjoy significantly more visuals of the game-environment fast, certainly make the game-experience significantly more immersive.
The Ultimate Battle: Free Fire vs PUBG
Both Free Fire and PUBG share a similar gameplay style. However, distinctively, PUBG provides a more realistic and intricate gaming mechanic, which increases its difficulty and makes it more rewarding. And in contrast to Free Fire, the graphics coupled with the gameplay of PUBG perhaps deliver a more immersive experience.
Both games do have outstanding visuals. But while PUBG provides more realistic visuals and a more immersive gameplay experience, Free Fire has a lower game size along with performant graphics, which perhaps makes it better for those with meagre data plans and more low-end smartphones.
Both games have a sizable fan base and have seen tremendous success in terms of popularity. Both have been downloaded more than a billion times. But while Free Fire peaked at an astounding 150 million daily active users, PUBG at its peak had around 65 million daily active users.
Differences in both the games’ popularity can perhaps be attributed to both the games having slightly different kinds of gamers as their audience, perhaps due to their distinctive gameplay and features. On the one hand, while Free Fire is renowned for its quick-paced action and brief play times, making it perfect for mobile gamers who are constantly on the move, contrarily, PUBG is renowned for its more tactical and realistic gameplay, which calls for teamwork and planning from players. So, as a result, different gamer-audiences may constitute the gamer-bases of both these games.
The aesthetic attractiveness of these games is perhaps another characteristic that could set them apart from one another. Younger viewers may perhaps find Free Fire more aesthetically attractive due to its design’s use of bold colours. On the other hand, older gamers may choose PUBG because of its realistic visuals and settings.
In conclusion, if one tries to answer the question which one out of the two—Free Fire or PUBG—is superior … The straight (and not-so-straight) answer really, is that there are advantages and disadvantages to both Free Fire and PUBG, and it ultimately depends on the player. Although PUBG delivers a more intricate and immersive, realistic and tactical experience that necessitates collaboration and strategy, Free Fire offers quick-paced, colourful action that is perfect for mobile players. In any case, regardless of the ongoing debate in the gaming community, about which one among these two games is better, it is reasonable to conclude that both games will continue to prosper in the gaming business as mobile gaming continues to grow in popularity globally.
Banned in India
As of the present day (i.e. the date of posting this blog), the mobile applications of both PUBG and Free Fire have been banned by the Government of India, primarily due to worries about data privacy and national security. And so the distribution of these two games is currently prohibited on mobile in India.
There were attempts to replace these gaming applications with other mobile applications such as BattleGrounds Mobile India (BGMI) and Free Fire MAX, however BGMI has also been banned by the Government of India, and perhaps Free Fire MAX could also be prohibited at any time if the government decides to do so.
In any event, the Battle Royale genre is still quite popular in India, despite the prohibition of the above-mentioned two games. And players have embraced other games with speed. In fact, local Indian developers and even international developers have now started working hard to produce new games in the Battle Royale genre, to appeal to Indian users, as a result of the popularity boom of game titles like PUBG, BGMI, Garena Free Fire and Call of Duty Mobile among others, in India.
But whatever exciting new direction battle royale and shooter games will head in, in India and/or the rest of the world, finally one cannot deny that Free Fire and PUBG have been insanely popular titles worldwide, which have forever changed the world of gaming … They have indeed become legends – and have indeed established themselves as two of the most wildly popular games of our times !!
