Preface: Undiscovered World

Preface: Undiscovered World is a free technology demo from PLAYERUNKNOWN Productions, the studio behind PUBG: Battlegrounds. Released on December 5, 2024, it’s available to download on Steam.

What it demonstrates: Melba

The project’s main purpose is to showcase Melba, PLAYERUNKNOWN Productions’ technology for generating a full planet at Earth-like scale using procedural generation and a dynamically changing environment. Processing is done on the player’s computer, without relying on cloud computing resources.

What you can do in the demo

You explore a large procedurally generated world built with machine-learning-driven algorithms, designed to highlight how landscapes can be created and adapted in real time.

Notes from Steam feedback

At the time of writing, the demo has mostly negative Steam reviews (35% positive out of 60). Players point to technical issues such as unstable performance and the limited scope of the demo, while still noting the underlying technology’s potential.

Relationship to Prologue: Go Wayback!

Both Preface: Undiscovered World and Prologue: Go Wayback! use Melba to build large, dynamic worlds. Preface serves as a testbed to refine the technology before it’s applied in Prologue.

Key features

• Free access to the demo
• Real-time, large-scale planet generation with Melba
• Runs locally on your GPU without server resources
• Exploration of dynamic, varied procedural landscapes
• Available to download on Steam