[Update]: It took over four years, but PUBG has now gone free-to-play on all platforms.

As you're probably well aware, PUBG has a bit of a problem with weapon balance. Since fights can happen at any point and at any distance, there is simply no reason to carry around ultra-specialized weapons when you can instead always be ready for action with something like an assault rifle. Thankfully, it would appear that the developers are also well aware of this problem and are already working on a solution.

"We’ll save the exact numeric balance changes for the patch notes, but today we want to pull back the curtain a bit and explain our goals," reads the Steam announcement. "According to our research, only a few specific types of weapons (ARs) are used in most situations. We believe the choice about which gun to use should be based on personal preference and its effectiveness in any given situation, rather than simply 'which gun is strongest.' Our goal is to make it so no one gun will feel objectively better than the others."

"Finally, expect some changes to the level three helmet. It’s a game-changing item that can impact the outcome of a match—basically, it gives you an extra life in situations where a headshot would otherwise kill you. We don’t want luck alone to determine who gets items like this, so we’re removing it from the normal loot spawn tables and limiting it to care packages only."

These changes will first go through a lengthy public testing phase before being implemented into PUBG itself, so don't worry about the balance being thrown completely out of whack. Speaking of testing, no exact date has been given just yet, but you can expect to see these changes revealed in the near future.

On a slightly less exciting note, PUBG developers have also announced that work on the map selection system is now almost complete. As you would expect from the name alone, once the system goes live you'll be able to choose which maps you want to play on and which maps you want to veto. It's about as simple of a feature as it gets, but it's still a highly welcome one regardless.

Much like the weapon changes, the map selection system will soon be coming to the test servers. You can learn a little bit more about it, as well as follow any further news and announcements, over at Steam.