Battle Royale games might be the new hip trend, with Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds and Fortnite leading the pack, and everyone else trying to catch up. It got me thinking though, about other players in the battle royale genre that came long before PUBG hit the scene, and I’m not just talking about games.
When The Hunger Games came out, a lot of people marked the similarities to the aptly named Battle Royale, a Japanese book/film. Which is fair, but some also give Battle Royale credit for being the original free-for-all battle movie, which just isn’t right.
There were other “battle royale” type movies, they just weren’t very good. For example, Mean Guns was a movie that came out in the mid-to-late 90’s that featured Ice-T as a gangster boss (because of course he was) who gathered 100 lowlives, put them in a prison, and dumped a pile of weapons in the middle of the room. Sound familiar? Coincidentally, that movie also starred Christopher Lambert, who was famous for probably the coolest and most original battle royale movie of all time; Highlander.
If you are not familiar with the Highlander movies (the first one in particular) or the television show, first of all, what the hell is wrong with you? And second, go look it up. Watch it. It doesn’t hold up well by today’s special effects standards, but still. Watch it. Then go buy the Queen album A Kind of Magic, because I don’t even know how you’re functioning in society otherwise.
For those that aren’t familiar and aren’t about to go digging up old ass movies, Highlander follows Connor McLeod, of the Clan McLeod, who is a tribe in the highlands of Scotland in the 1500’s. He dies in battle with another clan, and soon after comes back to life. His clan fears it to be the work of the devil, and they banish him from the village. As he wanders, he meets a man named Ramirez (played by Sean Connery, as if you needed any more fucking reasons to watch this movie), who informs Connor that he is immortal, as is Ramirez. Ramirez explains the rules of the “game.” They’re immortal, and they cannot die unless their head comes away from their body. Otherwise, they will wander the world for hundreds or thousands of years, living until the time of The Gathering, in which they will feel an unexplainable urge to travel to a specific place. It is this place that will serve as the final battleground, where the remaining immortals fight to the death (usually with swords). The catch is that each immortal that defeats another receives The Quickening, which is the absorption of all the power the defeated immortal had accumulated over their lifetime. In the end, there can be only one, and that immortal is granted the ultimate prize.
Are you starting to get the idea of why a Highlander video game in this day and age would have the potential to kick all sorts of ass? The whole thing got me to brainstorming, so here’s a list of ideas I would have if I were a big fancy game publisher. Some of these mechanics obviously couldn’t co-exist with some of the others, but this is all hypothetical, so who cares.
Large open maps, each one a specific time period. The Witcher 3 pops in my head almost automatically when thinking of pretty much any game concept, but here it would fit really well, as the primary goal of Highlander was simply to live, to blend in, and to remain as low-key as possible. That means doing side-quests, conversing with mortals, and pretty much doing all the stuff that Geralt does in between his major plot quests. Each map would have a centralized, self-contained story, and could therefore each take place in a specific time period. Like Assassin’s Creed, but on a smaller scale and with multiple settings.
Use the Witchers as a template, with a little Shadow of Mordor nemesis. Encounters with other immortals could be similar to Geralt’s encounters with other Witchers. Until The Gathering, the immortals don’t have to kill each other, though some choose to fight in order to gain The Quickening and thin out the remaining immortals at the same time. Each encounter could possibly end in an alliance or a death depending on the conversation choices. Letting some immortals live might give a short term advantage, and the final battle could vary depending on who you’ve killed in the past already. Those that you let live might come back stronger than ever. Immortals are randomly generated, but finite.
Allow other immortals to invade your game. Hey, I don’t know how this mechanic could work with a set story, but I’m not the designer. Calling in another immortal to assist in taking down a tougher enemy could be an interesting twist if you didn’t know for sure if they’d turn on you as well. A little Souls-ish, sure, but it could be cool.
Collectible gain value the longer you hold on to them. Your home is filled with the artifacts you’ve collected throughout the years. This is your primary source of income, so acquiring artifacts in certain eras and knowing when to sell them or how long to hold onto them could factor in how prosperous you become.
Obligatory “battle royale” mode, The Gathering. Since this is the theme of the game, of course there would have to be a battle royale mode called The Gathering, where 100 immortals fight to be the last one standing, receiving their “Ultimate Prize” (aka chicken dinner). The catch is that since you are immortal, just shooting someone isn’t enough to kill them. once they are “killed,” a timer begins. Unless that player is beheaded and the Quickening is received, that player will revive after a short downtime. Be warned, just because you shoot someone does not mean they can’t be beheaded by another, thus stealing your Quickening for themselves. It also means you must decide if going for the killing blow is worth it, if it makes you vulnerable to another’s attack. The circle would not begin to shrink until the final five immortals remain. The circle will be a barrier. You will not be able to be outside of it and will be forced to move to its center. You are immortal, you cannot resist the Gathering.
And last, a one-on-one fighting mechanic, like For Honor. Because we’re just spit-balling, so why not?
The time is ripe for a new Highlander game. There may have been a Highlander game at some point in history, it was a pretty popular IP back in the day. But with technology being what it is now, it’s simply a crime that someone has not taken advantage of it yet.
Just like how we’re sitting in 2018 and have yet to see a Stargate SG-1 MMO. I mean I know there was one back in the day that got canceled, but damn, the source material is there for the taking. DO SOMETHING!!
That is all.
(Yep, just looked it up and the last Highlander game was back on the Jaguar in 1995.)
