CTF shooter Last Flag now has a Steam demo, and it's worth trying whether or not you're an Imagine Dragons fan
If you told me a year ago that the manager and lead singer of Imagine Dragons—brothers Mac and Dan Reynolds—were making a videogame, I probably would've pictured some kind of promotional tie-in for the band. I wouldn't have guessed that, in fact, the thing I have most in common with them is an enduring love for CTF shooters.
With their new studio Night Street, Mac and Dan have been making Last Flag, a 5v5 capture the flag hero shooter influenced by some of their favorite games, including Team Fortress 2 and League of Legends. The brothers just appeared in this year's PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted to introduce the game to the world, and there's a demo on Steam you can try now.
I recommend giving it a go. I've hopped into brief Last Flag playtests a couple times this year, and have found a lot to like about it:
- Each team gets to hide its flag at the start of the round, which creates a fun opportunity for mind games. (Do you put it somewhere super obvious to trick experienced players who are expecting it to be hidden?)
- Another nice twist comes from three radar towers that form a line across the center of the map: Capturing them slowly reveals where the enemy flag isn't, but only in that tower's sector, and they also act as fast travel points and healing stations.
- The '70s game show presentation and character archetypes aren't blazingly original, but the announcer VO is funny and the big TF2-inspired maps with all their hand-designed hiding places are a refreshing break from so many dreary modern warzones.
- It's a new capture the flag game. How often do we get those? (Miss ya, Tribes: Ascend.)
As it turns out, the Reynolds brothers grew up playing games like Quake, StarCraft 2, World of Warcraft, and Team Fortress, and also ran around in the woods playing capture the flag for real. Dan says that he was playing videogames before he was ever playing music, and when we visited to shoot the PC Gaming Show interview (embedded above), mentioned that he'd started learning Unity from online tutorials and making prototype games several years ago.
The brothers have since recruited a team of developers, some of whom were surprised to discover that they were working with the guy from Imagine Dragons, as you would be.
In hindsight, it's not too surprising to learn that Dan is a League of Legends player, given the band's collaborations with Riot Games. Mac is more into shooters, which explains how you get Last Flag: a third-person shooter with MOBA-like creeps and abilities.
Last Flag is due to release in 2026, and prospective flag runners can try the demo on Steam and wishlist the game for updates.
Run the flag back to your base, and then check out everything else that was announced during the PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted Powered by Xbox Game Pass.