Why Imagine Dragons Brothers' Indie Gaming Studio Is Launching With a Capture the Flag Video Game

Founded by brothers Dan and Mac Reynolds, the lead singer and manager, respectively, of the band Imagine Dragons, new indie game studio Night Street Games has taken on the challenge of making 'Last Flag,' a video game that gives you the authentic childhood experience of playing a game of capture the flag, but with added features you can only dream up in a digital world.
Per the game's description, 'Set in a funk-blasted 1970s-inspired universe, 'Last Flag' transforms players into Contestants on the world's most-watched game show—hosted by the mysterious media mogul Victor Fex. When the cameras start rolling, players leap into an outdoor arena to hide their team's flag, then scramble to reveal the enemy's location by controlling radar towers and scouring the map's multitude of hidden nooks and crannies. Capture the flag. Haul it home. Defend it for one minute to win it. Whether you're celebrating your victory or vibing to the smooth sounds of defeat, you can always choose to run it back.'
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In games that last 20 minutes or less, players compete in two teams of five (10 possible characters to choose from) in a classic game of capture the flag with several non-classical modifications. First up: in 'Last Flag,' you don't get eliminated, your character gets vacuum-tubed off to the green room, ready to join back in the fun.
'Dan and I grew up in Boy Scouts, and we've got a bunch of brothers, and we used to play capture the flag in the woods at night,' Mac Reynolds, CEO and co-founder of Night Street Games, told Variety ahead of the game's big reveal Friday out of Summer Game Fest. 'And it's kind of a quintessential childhood experience; some people played it in a P.E. class or whatever else. And we thought a lot about that experience growing up. There's been a lot of capture-the-flag game modes that have been tangential to games over the years, but nobody's ever really built something that scratches that itch of what it feels like to play capture flag, which is real hiding, real finding, the thrill of nature, being a hero, sneaking around. We started from that core place of, what does a pure capture the flag game really feel like? And it took a lot of innovations over the last couple of years, tons and tons of play tests, but today it's evolved into what is a third person, fun-first-competitive-second, 5v5 shooter that is from the ground up capture the flag.'
The Reynolds brothers are infusing their musical talents into the game as well, with a soundtrack crafted by Dan Reynolds, Grammy-nominated musician and producer JT Daly and Dave Lowmiller ('Battlefield,' 'Dead Space' series) and recorded on vintage '70s instruments. And one of the 'best' songs on the soundtrack is only available to losers.
'Sound is very important for us, and one of the our defining philosophies is we want you to have moments of fun, moments of joy at every moment of the game: whenever you press a button, when you're running and all that,' Night Street Games game director Matthew Berger said. 'But that also means when you lose. And so when you lose a match, there's a song that plays. It only plays when you're on the defeat screen, and it is maybe the best song we have in the game. I mean, it's a toss up, I think, with the flag hiding song, which I do love, but it's a great song. So you have lost, which is never great, but you get to have this really cool song that the winning team doesn't get. I think that's really important.'
'Last Flag' is set to launch in 2026 on Windows PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store. Console platform versions of the game are currently in the works.
Watch the trailer for 'Last Flag'. below.
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