This has been a test of our emergency broadcast systems. Thank you.

Okay, imagination time children.

First, imagine two players on two laptops, playing over LAN or possibly a webzone.

Next, imagine a post-apocalyptic setting. All in the world but two (maybe three) people have either died or mutated beyond recognition. These opponents have stayed alive through sheer force of will...and maybe a bit of life-extending technology didn't hurt either. These archenemies have been battling for centuries, using the relics of a war-centric world to spy the location of thine enemy, to strike devastating blows against each other time and time again, only to have the other rise from the ashes like some macabre phoenix.

They could go one forever.

Or so it would seem. Their life-extensions run on something that vanished from the face of the earth long ago. Plants. They only have enough juice left to cheat death thrice more.

May the best man win.

For the gameplay, I'm still working it out. What I have right now, though, is three distinct phases of a cycle.

1. The player is on a Fallout 1/Fallout 2 style over world map (it's only fitting), beginning the game at a random spawn point. A number of facilities (explained in a bit) are revealed to the player randomly but at a certain distance, such that the player may try to find a closer facility, or journey to one that they know.

2.The play switches to a platforming view of the facility. They explore and regain control of the facility from whatever may be, whether its as simple as strolling in and flipping on a light switch, or journeying through a mutant hoard to reactivate a nuclear reactor. There may be puzzles involved.

3. The actual spying and attacking. A facility could be any of a number of things. A nuclear missile launch site, a station for a currently defunct spy satellite, a military base that reveals nearby locations you couldn't randomly find, a laser death cannon, whatever. Any of them would fall into one of three categories: something to launch an attack, something to gather intelligence, or something to help you power/repair/use mentioned things.

There may also be the option to be able to directly look at the other player's screen when they weren't on the overhead map (through some mumbo jumbo about the life machines being connected somehow) to gather clues as to their location, at the cost of some of their life force.

I realize that the wall of text you may or may not have just read might be sort of vague, but the idea's coming along, methinks.

EDIT:

I just realized the title there is now could fit quite nicely.

Also, I might be collaborating on this with a certain awesome bro.