With the success of games like H1Z1: King of the Kill, PLAYERUNKNOWN’s: Battlegrounds (PUBG), and Fortnite: Battle Royale; I feel many people are confused as to what exactly a Battle Royale game is. Battle Royale is a sub-genre of shooters. The basic premise of Battle Royale is that a group of players are put onto a map with the intended goal of fighting to the death until only one remains. The genre is derived from a movie of the same name from 2000. Battle Royale for the most part in the past were mods for other games, with only a few games being solely dedicated to the formula. Recently, more and more games have been rising with a Battle Royale mode or focus. The earliest example of this that I can think of is H1Z1. At the time H1Z1 was one game with a zombie survival mode and a Battle Royale mode. Later on the two modes were separated into different games for further and more focused development. Even The Division: Survival has a Battle Royale focus, albeit more focused on survival against the elements. The real first runaway success was PUBG, releasing in March of 2017. The game reached the highest player count of all time on steam, hitting a whopping 1,645,460 players this month, according to steamcharts.com. My personal belief of why Battle Royale games are so popular lately is because of their balance between time and competition. The way most Battle Royale games work is that the games funnel players closer into the map in order to keep the action going while making sure matches don’t run too long. The result is the perfect balance between a competitive gaming experience and ensuring the matches don’t make the game boring. With the rate of growth of this style of game, I think we’ll see growing support for this genre which I welcome as I’ve been finding the games industry growing stagnant due to their lack of variety.