Battle Royale games are all the rage lately, both for their emphasis on having players duke it out in huge battlefields, and sometimes with wacky sets of abilities and gears. While hit titles such as PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds introduced the potential of Battle Royale with players on equal terms, the likes of Apex Legends and the upcoming My Hero Academia Ultra Rumble showcases the sheer delight and chaos in ability-based Battle Royale titles.
In My Hero Academia Ultra Rumble, players participate in a 24-player Battle Royale using villains and heroes, alongside their abilities, from the iconic show. And interestingly enough for otakus, there’s still a fair share of anime that would perfectly fit being in a Battle Royale game. These include action-packed anime with its fair share of stakes, to anime with themes akin to Battle Royale . Just which anime are perfect for Battle Royale games?
7 Fate/Stay Night
Otaku with a love for historical anime will likely remember Fate/stay night, the acclaimed visual novel from Type-Moon that spawned its own franchise. In Fuyuki City, seven pairs of Masters and Servants fight to the death in a secret war for the Holy Grail, a mystical artifact designed to grant wishes. Each Servant is a Heroic Spirit — historical figures, legendary heroes, or even mythological beings.
While Type-Moon and the Fate series pride themselves in their complex narratives, Fate/stay night is suitable for a Battle Royale game of its own. Fuyuki City has its fair share of locales that are vast enough to host all-out battles between powerful Servants. Gameplay-speaking, such a Battle Royale can have players take the role of Masters who can acquire various Servants with limited uses throughout the game.
6 Gantz
Sci-fi fans would understand why Gantz would make for a grisly Battle Royale, because of its merciless premise. In Gantz, the titular mysterious black sphere “captures” deceased people. Gantz gives these people a second chance at life, in exchange for conducting missions against mysterious superpowered creatures in the dead of night. Thankfully, Gantz outfits its unwilling operatives with suits and high-tech gear to kill these creatures. And its reasons in conducting these missions are more sinister than they appear.
Fans of Battle Royale could easily gravitate towards a Gantz game, as the anime demonstrates a skill-based nature. Suits in the anime provide users with remarkable strength, speed, and durability. Moreover, its limited weaponry provides massive damage to creatures, and even users themselves when used wrongly. The limited amount of equipment could force players to get creative, and the threat of monsters can add a layer of thrill to any match.
5 Magical Girl Raising Project
Who says a Battle Royale has to look realistic? In Magical Girl Raising Project,a popular social network game of the same name promises to grant one player out of 10,000 “real” powers as a magical girl. However, a calculation error grants 16 of them real powers. Deciding that 16 in a single city is too many, the game decides to cut the number in half by removing the powers of Magical Girls. Unfortunately, the rules get out of hand, and the game becomes a life-or-death situation for its participants.
It’s easy for Magical Girl Raising Project to become a cutesy Battle Royale. The anime does showcase Magical Girls having unique abilities of their own, from reading minds to never missing shuriken shots. A Battle Royale based on this game could take on cues from Hero BRs like Apex Legends, where each character has a special ability.
4 Btooom!
A lot of Battle Royales have players take on the role of trained mercenaries that need to find various weapons to survive. In Btooom!, participants are more or less ordinary people. The catch? The weapons in this fight to the death are bombs — different sorts of bombs. In this anime, 22-year-old Ryota Sakamoto is a player of the hit game Btoom!, where avatars use bombs as weapons. But this time around, he’s transported to a mysterious island with other players, and they’re expected to kill each other with very real versions of the same bombs if they hope to survive.
Unlike other anime, the premise of Btooom! remains straightforward enough to snag a Battle Royale. In the fictional game, Btooom! players access a multitude of bombs that have various uses in the battlefield. In the story, such bombs can have simple uses such as clustering or timed explosions, or more bizarre uses such as blazing gas and homing capabilities.
3 Deadman Wonderland
When a cataclysmic event causes a great earthquake in Japan, a prison/carnival called Deadman Wonderland is created, with its gladiator-style Carnival Corpse gathering thousands of spectators. This prison complex was seemingly created to gather funds to help rebuild the destruction from the calamity, with the unfortunate Ganta Igarashi being sent there after being framed for massacring his class. Soon, Ganta realizes that he has the ability to control his own blood. Now a Deadman, Ganta is forced to participate in Carnival Corpse matches to ensure he remains alive.
Despite the heavy premise, Deadman Wonderland could easily become a Battle Royale anime due to its straightforward arena-style premise. A Deadman Wonderland match can take place in a huge arena, with players serving as Deadmen with various blood-related powers they acquire as the match progresses.
2 Aoharu X Machinegun
Who says survival games always have to get all bloody? In Aoharu X Machinegun, protagonist Hotaru Tachinaba ends up joining a “survival game” involving plastic guns. Now a part of team Toy Gun Gun, Hotaru and her teammates hope to become the best in Japan when it comes to survival games. The catch is, Hotaru is actually a girl, and her team doesn’t allow females in the squad.
Aside from the gender-bender angle of the anime, Aoharu X Machinegun does hold the premise for a straightforward Battle Royale title. Its matches can take place in closed or open spaces that seem innocent-looking enough, making for quite a change compared to islands and desolate spaces in other Battle Royale titles. Moreover, the existence of plastic guns and fake weapons in an Aoharu X Machinegun game can make for a not-so-gory, yet equally exciting experience.
1 Sword Art Online
Despite its mixed reception, the Battle Royale premise of Sword Art Online immediately makes it a great candidate for a Battle Royale game. Its first season already has a survival premise, wherein player Kirito finds himself and 9,999 others trapped in a virtual reality game called “Sword Art Online.” While reaching the top floor of the game guarantees their freedom, dying in the game also means dying in real life. Players must choose whether to risk their lives in the hopes of escaping, or just settle into a life in the virtual world.
A Sword Art Online Battle Royale could take place in the original “SAO” game, perhaps in a special instance of the game that grants freedom to the winner of a death match. The swords-only nature of the game, coupled with the existence of specialized skills, could result in an action-packed Battle Royale for fans to enjoy.
