Alice in Borderland is a popular manga written and illustrated by Haro Aso. While the original manga was published several years ago, love for the series is only growing thanks to Netflix's adaptation of Aso's work. Alice in Borderland draws influence from Lewis Carroll's famous story, Alice in Wonderland, and it isn't the first modernized interpretation to make it onto the screen. The Matrix is a rather famous example of the influence that Wonderland has had on science fiction works.
What fans of the books or streaming series may not have realized yet, however, is that the Netflix adaptation lays some solid groundwork for an Alice in Borderland video game to be made. Beyond that, there's already a game franchise in existence that offers a surprisingly perfect template: Grand Theft Auto. With the compelling storytelling of Alice in Borderland and the mechanics of GTA behind it, a video game interpretation would be a terrific experience.
How the GTA Map Aligns With Alice in Borderland
Although the Grand Theft Auto series and the Alice in Borderland series are drastically different, there are enough similarities between certain aspects of each that would complement a hypothetical game's mechanics. For starters, the biggest mystery revolving around the story of Alice in Borderland is Borderland itself. The duration of the story takes place entirely within the confines of one city, and the same can be said of GTA.
Anyone who has played GTA, or perhaps some other open-world titles such as Cyberpunk 2077, knows that sometimes a dense cityscape is all it takes to fill up a good game map. GTA technically has a lot of countryside that can also be explored, which helps to make the map even bigger, but this could easily be remedied by some of Alice in Borderland's lore. Surrounding the Borderland is a seemingly infinite amount of lush landscape that could easily make up the outer rim of the map. Since Alice in Borderland also adheres to many video game-like themes within its story, it wouldn't be too out of place to include an invisible border where needed to help outline the map's final shape.
The Borderland Game Would Be an Action Survivor MMO
Besides the map, how the game plays and feels should also be loyal to the source material. Luckily, another similarity between GTA and Alice in Borderland is the amount of chaos that can take place simply within the streets of the city. In GTA players can knock over almost anything in sight, steal a car, start a shootout, or simply try to be as nice as possible. The latter probably doesn't happen as often, but all these options should be available in a Borderland game, considering how lore-appropriate it is.
Many civilians of the Borderland live as if it is the end times, killing and plundering everything in sight, whereas others, like the lovable Arisu, always try to do the right thing. These contrasting personalities are what make a tense and dynamic environment, not too different from GTA when you boil away the different stories and characters.
Speaking of the characters, it sadly wouldn't make much sense to be able to play as a favorite character like Arisu or Usagi. This is because the game would be perfect to play with a multitude of people online, so unique custom characters would be a better choice. Players could create their own custom characters as they see fit, but that's not to say it would be impossible to at least encounter some fan-favorite characters during a quest or two. Most of the time, however, players would be finding their own way to survive within the Borderland, whether it's hunting the local wildlife, scavenging abandoned buildings for gear, surviving a firefight, fixing up an old car, or finding the next all-important card game.
How the Card Games Would Work
The card games that take place within Borderland are essential for progressing the story's plot. Therefore, they should be just as essential within a video game adaptation. The nature of the games should change, however, depending on whether the player is participating in some sort of open-world, public event or trying to complete a campaign mission.
In the original Borderland story, there is a limited amount of games that need to be completed, since they relate to the number of cards in a deck. This makes for a good set of campaign missions, but not necessarily for an endless amount of MMO-based activities. There may be a solution to this, however.
In Borderland, each card suit indicates what kind of game can be played. Spades mean physical, diamonds mean strategy, hearts mean betrayal, and clubs mean teamwork. These could simply be utilized to indicate the type of ever-available activity: Spades could mean single-player PvE, diamonds could mean a puzzle challenge, hearts could mean PvP, and clubs could mean cooperative PvE. Although this begins to stretch Haro Aso's lore, it is still respectful enough to honor his work in a video game.