PUBG: Black Budget is Krafton’s next big experiment as a standalone extraction shooter that blends PUBG’s grounded gunplay with a tense sci-fi twist.
Instead of the familiar last-man-standing format, Black Budget sends you into a time-warped island that turns every run into a short, intense hunt for loot and a desperate escape.
It’s designed as a first-person PvPvE shooter where squads clash with other teams, face wild enemies, and survive an environment that grows harder the longer they stick around.
The core loop is straightforward. You drop in, collect high-value tech from abandoned labs, and escape before the island resets, or something kills you and wipes your gear.
What’s Going On With the Time-Loop Island?
The island itself is roughly 2.5 km by 2.5 km, packed with varied biomes, underground laboratories, and abandoned outposts left behind by a failed experiment known as the SAPIENS initiative.
You play as a Contractor hired to investigate the island’s secrets, collect artifacts, and uncover what caused the anomaly that constantly resets the landscape.
You can play for up to thirty minutes per round, yet staying close to that limit puts you at risk since the anomaly keeps tightening and turning every encounter more dangerous.
Some runs will end in chaotic gunfights with other squads, while others might fall apart because of environmental hazards, mutated wildlife, or unpredictable anomaly-driven events.
How Does Progression Work Outside of Combat?
What really separates Black Budget from other extraction shooters is how much emphasis it puts on out-of-combat progression.
Everything you extract feeds back into your progression, helping you craft stronger gear, upgrade your hideout, level your abilities, and open up better options for your next runs.
Squads can build structures that provide income or passive bonuses, take on contracts from different factions, and slowly carve out their own approach to surviving the island.
The penalty hits hard because a mid-raid death means a full loss of your equipment, gathered resources, and any top-tier tech you were holding.
What Kind of Combat and Enemies Should Players Expect?
Matches support up to forty-five players, divided into small three-person squads.
You’ll be facing human opponents looking for the same loot you are, but the PvE side matters just as much.
The island is filled with threats ranging from hostile AI soldiers to mutated animals, crocodile-infested waterways, swarms of flying insects, and stronger anomaly-born creatures tucked inside deeper facility zones.
Weapon handling feels very close to classic PUBG (heavier recoil, more realistic bullet behavior, and a focus on positioning) but wrapped inside a much more unpredictable environment.
When Is the Closed Alpha and Who Can Join?
For now, everything leads into the game’s Closed Alpha, which will run on PC via Steam across two separate weekends in December 2025.
The first test is scheduled for December 12 to 14, and the second runs from December 19 to 21, giving players six days of access in total.
These sessions are only available to players in North America, Europe, and Asia, and the test includes multiple supported languages such as English, Korean, Russian, and Chinese.
Unlike many early-access tests, this alpha has no NDA — players can stream, upload footage, and discuss their experience freely.
Entering the Closed Alpha is done entirely through Steam. You log in, search for the game, and hit the Request Access button on its store page.
Steam will notify you if you’re selected, but access isn’t guaranteed since testing slots are limited.
To give players another way in, Krafton is also distributing keys through Twitch and the Korean platform Chzzk via drops during the testing period.
What Are the PC System Requirements?
The technical requirements are surprisingly reasonable for a modern extraction shooter.
The minimum specs call for a mid-range CPU like the Intel i5-8400 or Ryzen 5 2600, paired with 16 GB of RAM and a GPU in the RTX 2060 8GB / Radeon RX 6600 range.
Recommended settings bump this up to processors like the i5-12400 or Ryzen 5 5600 and a GPU around the RTX 3070 or Radeon RX 6800.
Storage requirements sit at around 30 GB, and the alpha runs on DirectX 12.
It’s not lightweight, but it isn’t overwhelmingly demanding either, suggesting the game is aiming for a balance between visual detail and accessibility.
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