I must be crazy but I think a "Battle Royale" mode could work

[MAtgSy]

For the (presumably few) uninitiated, battle royale games are the hot new thing in gaming: 100 players land in different parts of an expansive battlefield & fight it out until 1 player is left standing. As the number of players diminish in a match, the playing area shrinks so the remaining players can't get too far from each other.

Now how does this apply to Smash? Well the genre is still pretty new, any dev currently making a BR game is just simply copying the core concept, not really experimenting with what new ways to spin it. All current battle royale games are shooters, but I don't think it's impossible for other genres like fighters or beat-em-ups to have BR modes as well.

Both versions of SSB4 have been testing the waters of bigger scale battles. On the Wii U we obviously have 8 player smash as a bigger scale version of 4 player matches. It also features some stages that are simply gargantuan, namely Palutena's Temple & Great Cave Offensive, 2 stages so ridiculously big it almost seems like they were designed with an even larger number of players in mind. It is known that Sakurai had experimented with 8 players since Melee so maybe he experimented with even bigger player counts during 4's development?

Meanwhile the 3DS version had an even bigger stage in the form of the Smash Run Maze. While it is limited to 4 players, it is crammed full of enemies & is far too big to explore all of in a 5 minute time-frame.

So while the battle royale concept is fairly new in gaming, it kinda feels to me like SSB is moving in this direction already. I can imagine an online mode where 100 (or maybe trim it down to something like 64 players) in put in the Smash Run maze or a similarly large new labyrinth, each given only 1 stock & must scavenge for items & heart containers while battling other players. Maybe there can be like a black hole in the background that periodically tears off the outer sections of the maze until only the few remaining players gathered in the center are left.

 

[Yokta]

I don't think it's feasible to just copy the ruleset of a Battle Royale and attempt to retrofit existing Smash Bros gameplay and assets into it. Fighting games are not as simple and manageable as shooters. Smash 4 couldn't manage to connect 8 players into the same online match, let alone eight squared.

A Battle Royale mode in Smash Bros would have to make many concessions just to be playable, let alone fun and exciting. Concessions like these, for instance.

 

[MERPIS]

We have a battle royale mode, its called free-for-all

 

[FamicomDisk]

We have a battle royale mode, its called free-for-all

That’s not what they’re talking about.

—

Personally, I think it would a lot of fun if it could be pulled off. If they used a stage like Smash Run and expanded it further, then the concept could work nicely. And maybe they could give it the rules of a Stamina match? All players have HP, so you’re alive until you hit 0. I know that Smash Run stopped the screen when you got smashed away, but I feel like HP might work better for this concept.

As a difference to the regular matches, I could see each player having an inventory - when you pick up an item, it’s added to your inventory, so you can use it at the best moment. Maybe you’ll save a Maxim Tomato for later in the match, or maybe you’ll use a Franklin Badge when an opponent starts to chase after you. The catch could be that you can only use it when you’re on the ground, not moving - using items while in the middle of a fight wouldn’t be super fair. The inventories could also act like the Dragoon pieces, in that you can lose your items if you’re getting attacked, and they’ll fall, so others can pick them up.

I’ve never even played a battle royale game, but it seems like a fun concept and I think putting a similar mode into Smash would be a lot of fun. Can’t say I see it happening, but I’d love if it did!

 

[Watch Out!]

If they pull it off the way you described it, it would probably be my favorite online mode.

 

[Rocket Raccoon]

As exciting as it sounds on paper, if this were real I'd feel like it'd be a cash grab to get in on that Fortnite/PUBG cash which would be an awful thing to do.

 

[CrusherMania1592]

If they pull it off the way you described it, it would probably be my favorite online mode.

The internet would break of course


I definitely love this idea. Would be insane if we can do this for CPU players as well

 

[DeltaSceptile]

The internet would break of course


I definitely love this idea. Would be insane if we can do this for CPU players as well

Yeah, it would probably include less insane lag spikes with CPUs in a local/single player mode, especially with that many fighters in the same map.

 

[Sean Wheeler]

You say 100 characters? I don't know if the Switch could handle 100 onscreen players. And since I don't like duplicate characters with alternate costumes, the roster really needs to double so that there are at least 100 characters to choose from.

 

[Roberk]

I was actually thinking of this same idea, using something like smash run to have a huge online mode. I think the only problem would be handling that many characters at once.

 

[FamicomDisk]

It wouldn't be common for 100 players to be in an area at once, but maybe graphics could start to lower in quality if a ton of people gathered together, and then go back to normal as they split up/got defeated? Or maybe only a certain number of players could be in a specific section of the map at any time? I'm sure there are workarounds if they did this idea.

 

[smashingDoug]

You would have to have Stamina with HP at 300% to make this actually work,

If any items are on it’s only food,

But a giant hunt each other down, last man standing, in a maze like giant stage, gamemode I support, it sounds fun in a game like smash