PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds is taking a page from its competitors' playbooks this time around. PUBG Corp. announced on Tuesday the upcoming implementation of a Battle Pass system on PC, a day after implementing a similar-yet-different system on mobile. Rebranded as Event Passes, PUBG's system will offer new opportunities at in-game content apart from the current Loot Crate system. Event Passes will launch hand-in-hand with the Sanhok map on June 22.

The Battle Pass system is an extremely popular feature used in games including both Fortnite and Paladins. Each Pass is time-limited, requiring players to complete assorted in-game challenges to level up their Pass and unlock new content. Some content is available to all players, but a majority of the content is locked behind a premium version of the Pass.

PUBG's Event Pass is, it seems, exactly the same as a standard Battle Pass. All PUBG players can complete daily, weekly, and event-exclusive challenges to level up their Event Pass. After earning certain levels, free DLC like clothing and weapon skins will unlock and a premium version of the Event Pass will unlock more faster. Players will have around four weeks to complete each Event Pass and can upgrade from the free version to the premium version at any time to unlock any DLC associated with their earned levels.

The first Event Pass will begin with the launch of the Sanhok map on June 22 and will feature map-exclusive challenges.

pubg mobile royale pass

As mentioned, the Event Pass will be exclusive to the PC version of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds for the time being. Though it's expected to be ported to Xbox One down the line. An alternative version is already available on PUBG Mobile, as the Royale Pass system launched yesterday. The Royale Pass is also a typical Battle Pass, though it rewards Crate Currency whereas the Event Pass appears to be distancing itself from Crates as much as possible.

According to the announcement from PUBG Corp., all content earned through the Event Pass can't be traded or sold. It's unclear if the Event Pass will tie into the Crate system at all, either by rewarding Crates, Keys, or currency, but it wouldn't be surprising if it did.

The Battle Pass feature is an increasingly popular alternative to other forms of DLC microtransactions for "Games as a Service" titles. It's not as expensive as splitting DLC up into individual pieces and is not as predatory as Loot Boxes, since there's no RNG. The trade-off is that Battle Passes require a lot of time investment to earn everything, and even then players might not level a Pass up high enough to get everything. For most players, however, that risk is more than worth the benefits.

PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds is available now on PC, Xbox One, and mobile devices.