You cannot go a day without hearing about "PlayerUknown's Battlegrounds" or "Fortnite" and the only thought that's occurred to me is - how long is this going to last? I'm not saying, one way or the other, about whether these are good games, but rather as a genre, are we going to fall into this like we did with zombies? For almost the last decade, it seemed we couldn't have a game come around that didn't feature zombies, and some would solely purchase games like "Call of Duty" just so they could play the zombie mode with their friends. Like any fad, are we just beginning with the Battle Royale genre and is it going to become part of every franchise for the next decade, or will we push past it with these limited number of releases?

Will we, perhaps, see a new influx of independently developed games? No matter the content or fad, introducing the same mechanic everywhere grows tiresome, whether you're a fan or not.

'Call of Duty: Black Ops 4' testing battle royale mode

"Call of Duty" is one of the rumored video game franchises experimenting with their own battle royale mode according to Polygon, with several other franchises rumored to be, at the moment. Perhaps the biggest news of late is that "Call of Duty: Black Ops 4" is dropping their unique single-player campaign because of scheduling conflicts with incorporating a battle royale mode into multiplayer. The campaign has been a staple of the "Black Ops" series since the beginning, and many fans acknowledge it as the best in the franchise.

The other news circulating about this is, "Black Ops 4" will be released on Nintendo Switch as well, but will only have the battle royale mode on it. I don't know about everyone else, but these rumors are very troubling for me, to say the least. Being an avid fan of the "Black Ops" series, I don't think dropping their single-player campaign is in the series' best interest.

I can understand wanting to add a new mode, but don't affect the overall staple of the game and completely dismiss it.

The zombie effect

As previously mentioned, the last several years have seen the rise of zombies in games across the board. Now, they seem to be coming to a close. But with what to fill the resulting void? There have been many fads that come and go, and I think this too shall pass.

How long it will linger for is another story. There are many fans of the genre, as evidenced the news, every website, and every streamer. With exposure around every corner, I don't see any sign of it slowing down, which is completely fine. Keep the genre to the games it belongs in, and the games that popularized it.

"Red Dead Redemption 2" is another rumored title to incorporate it, and with its fantastic storytelling, enticing gameplay and incredible backlog it simply doesn't need to adhere to this new fad. We've already seen this title with zombies as well.

What do you think of this battle royale popularity? Will this be a staple of our video games for the next decade or fall to the waist side within a few years?
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