The massive PUBG September patch is now live – adds new town, new weapon, foggy weather and much more

By Sherif Saed

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds’ September patch has finally made it onto the live servers, with a massive change log.

This is the first Battlegrounds patch in a while, now that developer Bluehole has moved to a new patching schedule. Now, the game will receive patches when they’re ready as opposed to following stricter monthly schedule.

This should also allow the team more time to test the changes, both internally and on public test servers, before the patch goes out to the rest of the player base.

The September patch spent two days on test servers, but has now gone live for everyone else.

The list of notes is long, with changes across many different parts of the game. Some of the highlights include the addition of the foggy weather condition, the 5.56mm Mini-14 weapon, and a new town east of Stalber called Kameshki. The Tommy gun has also – finally – been removed from care packages and will now spawn in the world.

The UI department also got a couple of welcome changes, such as the ability to see teammate’s current stance (crouched, prone etc.) next to their names, and the ability to change crosshair colours. Another really good feature is that you can quickly mark your position on the map without having to open it up and place a marker.

Finally, the update changed how BP is distributed to prevent idle players from earning any, as a way of combating AFK bots.

Find the full set of patch notes below:

Client optimisation

• Optimised shadows
• Improved performance on low-end PCs by optimizing buildings
• Optimised client and server performance when there are multiple vehicles in a close vicinity
• Optimised UI

World

• Added Foggy weather
• oThe foggy weather effect will hinder player sight on the map. This weather effect has a low probability to occur
• oIn order to test the weather effect, the foggy weather will have a higher chance to occur during test server gameplay, but will be reduced for Live servers
• Enhanced graphics of the sky in pre-existing weather effects
• Added a new town, East of Stalber

UI/UX

• Added new Option to change Cross-hair color
• Added new Double Tap feature in control options for leaning (Default keys set to Q and E)
• Added new option to improve the visual effect of going from free look back to character’s line of sight
• Added new key binds when using Consumables
• Teammates’ names are now representative of their current postures (IE Standing, Crouching, Prone, etc)
• Added new key bind to mark your current position on the map (Default key set to Insert)
• Added a new key bind to center the map around the character’s current position (Default key set to Space)
• Added a new key bind to use the Consumables in the order of Med Kit, First Aid Kit, and Bandage (Default key set to “-“)
• Added a new feature to reset the zeroing distance using Mouse wheel click
• Adjusted the position of the Report window

New item

• Added a new weapon, the Mini-14. The Mini-14 is a lightweight and compact 5.56 semi-automatic marksman rifle
• The weapon uses sniper rifle attachments for both the muzzle and magazine slots, and can take any type of optic sight
• This weapon has lower damage stats than other DMR’s, which is compensated by very high muzzle velocity and low bullet drop

Gameplay

• Distance at which shadows are rendered are now synchronized across all graphics settings to ensure fair play
• Characters who are knocked out while underwater will now have a breath gauge as well as take additional damage over time
• Adjusted the balance of several weapons:
• Increased the Crossbow reload speed by 35%
• Tommy gun has been removed from Care Packages and become a world spawn. It now supports attachments such as the Silencer, Vertical Foregrip, and Magazines
• Horizontal recoil scale has been clamped for greater consistency for weapons with high horizontal recoils
• You may now holster grenades by switching to another weapon or unarmed state unless the grenades have already been cooked
• The firing mode of weapons will now remain consistent with the firing mode that was selected, after dropping a weapon and picking it back up again
• Adjusted the collision damage of Motorcycles

Actions

• Recoil animations are updated for all weapons
• Adjusted animations and balance of throwables
• Decreased fuse time of the Flash Grenade to 2.5 seconds
• Increased the lethal and injury ranges of the Frag Grenade
• oImproved the animation for throwing grenades to allow for increased speeds and more accurate trajectories, but decreased visual trajectory distance of throwables
• Cooking of grenades is now manual (Default key set to R)
• You may now toggle the throwing mode between overhead and roll (Default key set to Right Mouse Click)
• The movement speed of a character affects the trajectory of throwables
• Improved leaning animation; leaning on the left side to expose less of the body
• Sprinting will no longer prevent regeneration of breath gauge and will stop leaning state automatically
• You may change your stance while reloading without cancelling the reload

Sounds

• Added new sounds when using Consumables
• Adjusted the audible ranges of reloading and window breaking
• Added a new sound for collisions between vehicles and characters
• Added new sound for the animation of removing the grenade safety pin

Bug fixes

• Characters that fall or glitch underneath the map will now be reset to the ground automatically
• Fixed a bug where FOV slider value would be improperly set inside of vehicles in FPP mode, regardless of FOV slider setting
• Fixed a bug resulting in clients freezing when changing controls in the options
• Corrected the descriptions of certain weapon attachments
• Fixed animation bugs of other characters after reconnecting to a game
• Fixed several bugs related to the Spectator mode
• Fixed a bug of the breath gauge appearing at zero at the start of the game
• Reloading will now cancel if a character loots an item with Right Click during reload
• Fixed a bug with the honking sound remaining persistent when opening the map or performing other actions while honking
• You may no longer set different features on a single key bind in the Options
• Fixed a graphic bug of the Magazine position on the weapon in the Inventory screen when switching to a different weapon

Others

• Revised the BP methodology to prevent BP farming and idle users from gaining BP
• Added FPP Leaderboard for all regions with FPP
• NVIDIA ShadowPlay Highlights now works on Window 7 and Window 8 (However, if Windows Aero is disabled it may not work)