Announced early morning last Thursday, top-down arena brawler Battlerite is the latest IP to adopt the heavily popular Battle Royale genre.

This summer, go beyond the Arena.

Announcing Battlerite Royale pic.twitter.com/vddW12Yb9N

— Battlerite (@Battlerite) May 3, 2018

Made by Swedish developer Stunlock Studios, the current and main Battlerite experience is defined as:

…a TEAM ARENA BRAWLER focused on adrenaline-fueled PvP combat. Short and intense matches, stripped of random elements to optimize the action.

Gone are the lanes and creeps from MOBA hits like League of Legends & Dota 2. Battlerite plays more like competitive Super Smash Bros where random weapons/NPCs are removed and players can only rely on how well they execute their chosen character’s skill set.

Technically, Battlerite‘s mechanics and playing field match the definition of Multiplayer-Online-Battle-Arena better than the tower-defense inspired gameplay of LoL and Dota. The question that comes into play is how can you make a Battle Royale mode work in a MOBA setting?

Popular Twitch streamer, Lirik, dropped a seemingly sarcastic lul at the announcement before affirming interest in how this could all turn out due to Battlerite‘s differing genre:

Me too

— Lirik (@LIRIK) May 3, 2018

After more than a year of multiple Shooter Battle Royale games, some found the idea of an alternate genre using Battle Royale mechanics as potentially refreshing:

me too, battlerite had an amazing combat system and was bigly lacking a gamemode. and the map teaser looks like an epic oldschool zelda design style, im super on board here.

— Siv (@SivHDtweets) May 3, 2018

The game developers have created a highly-focused product based on uniquely excellent combat mechanics for each individual character. This well-executed experience has caused some of Battlerite‘s diehard fans to groan at the new announcement though.

Except this game had nothing to do with this genre, it was it’s own unique thing. I feel like the only person “cray” here is you, did you even play Battlerite?

— Popcioslav (@Popcioslav) May 3, 2018

Starting as an Early Access game in 2016 before launching as a free-to-play game in 2017, Battlerite‘s turn for a big update has arrived. Despite any nay-sayers, rolling out any type of new content is absolutely necessary to stay afloat in this sea of games that numerously drop all around us.

If you want to test out the current combat system yourself, Battlerite is available for download on Steam. Though we don’t have an official release date for the new Battle Royale mode, one thing is for certain:

Probably with one person winning

— Ryan Moore (@rmoore08) May 3, 2018