Prologue: Go Wayback!

 
Prologue: Go Wayback! is the first game from PlayerUnknown Productions, the studio founded by Brendan “PlayerUnknown” Greene (the creator of PUBG). Released into Early Access on 20 novembre 2025, it is explicitly pas a battle royale. Instead, it is a single-player, procedurally generated survival roguelike. It acts as a tech demo for Greene’s ambitious “Project Artemis,” showcasing machine-learning technology capable of generating massive, realistic worlds on the fly. However, as a game, it is a polarizing, brutal walking simulator with almost zero hand-holding.
Run, Shiver, Die: Core Gameplay

The Goal: The premise is brutally simple: you spawn on a massive, procedurally generated map (up to 64km²) and must reach a designated “Weather Station” extraction point. There are no enemies, no zombies, and no other players. Your only enemy is the environment.
The “Cold” Mechanic: The game simulates exposure with ruthless accuracy. Wet clothes freeze you faster. Sprinting warms you up but burns calories. Stopping to rest restores stamina but risks hypothermia. You must constantly balance movement speed with resource management (finding shelter, heat packs, and food).
Procedural Generation: Every run takes place on a completely new map generated by the studio’s proprietary “neural network” tech. This means you cannot memorize routes. One run might be a gentle hike through a foggy forest; the next might be a vertical nightmare of cliffs and freezing rain.
No Crafting: Unlike Rust ou La forêt, you cannot build a cabin or craft a bow. You are a scavenger, not a builder. You find supplies in abandoned shacks or checkpoints. The game is purely about traversal—finding the safest path from A to B using a compass and map.
Permadeath & Roguelite: If you freeze to death or fall off a cliff, the run is over. There are no saves (though a pause/resume feature was added for Early Access). Completing runs or surviving longer unlocks new starting gear or perks, but the core loop is always “start fresh.”

Comment cela se passe-t-il ?
Prologue is a tech demo wearing the skin of a survival game.



Jeu
Principale différence




La longue nuit
Both are about freezing to death in a lonely wilderness. La longue nuit has a hand-crafted world, a story mode, and complex crafting/hunting. Prologue is purely procedural and mechanical, lacking the narrative soul or deep interaction of TLD.


Death Stranding
Both games turn “walking” into the primary gameplay loop. Death Stranding uses sci-fi tools (ladders, exoskeletons) and social building. Prologue strips all that away; it is just you and your stamina bar against a mountain.


DayZ
DayZ is a social sandbox defined by player interaction. Prologue is the exact opposite—a solitary, meditative experience designed to make you feel small and alone in a massive digital nature reserve.



Détails clés

Développeur : PLAYERUNKNOWN Productions.
Éditeur : PLAYERUNKNOWN Productions.
Plateformes : PC (Steam, Epic Games Store).
Date de sortie : November 20, 2025 (Early Access).
Prix : ~$19.99 USD.
Genre : Survival / Walking Sim / Roguelike.
Vibe : The Revenant but you are lost in a computer simulation.

Pour qui ?

Incontournable pour tech enthusiasts. If you are fascinated by the idea of AI generating photorealistic worlds in real-time, this is a fascinating look under the hood of what might be the future of open-world design.
Parfait pour orienteering fans. If you enjoy reading topographic maps and using a compass to navigate without a GPS minimap, this game gamifies that skill perfectly.
Sauter si you need “content.” There are no bosses, no base building, and no story. Critics have called it “an empty tech demo,” and if you aren’t satisfied by the intrinsic reward of just surviving, you will be bored within 20 minutes.

Pourquoi ça marche
It works because it feels uncanny. The procedural generation is so advanced that the forests feel strangely real—not designed by a human to be “fun,” but generated by math to be “natural.” This creates a unique sense of indifference. The world doesn’t care if you get stuck in a ravine; it wasn’t designed for you to escape. It provides a raw, hostile isolation that hand-crafted games often struggle to replicate.