Sports Games Deserve Better

The Issues Behind Modern Sports Games, Ideas of How to Fix Them and Why You Should Care

This particular dead horse has been beaten so much it could be compressed into cans as ground meat by now but let’s remind ourselves: sports games are terrible, and they have been for quite a few decades now. Don’t worry, this isn’t a hate article or the 900th joke about EA being awful (god knows I’m trying not to) I instead want to dissect why I think these games perform so much fellatio, what we can do to fix them and why ultimately I think the sports genre is worth saving.

I’ve noticed something funny with these sorts of critiques: there is often a part at the beginning where the author tries to justify his or her points by listing off which sports they are a fan of or detailing some personal history, almost like if you enjoy video games, you can’t enjoy sports. I’m not going to do that here because I think similar to video games, sports are a medium not a pastime by themselves, so there is a sport out there for everybody; I’m not going to sit and justify why I enjoy millionaires driving cars in a circle in exotic locations just because my main interest is supposed to be for nerds.

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Sport Is Full Of Amazing Characters

A big part of why I don’t think sports games are very good today is that they fail to capture the most outstanding part of sport: the people. All sport is built upon people. Fans, coaches, managers, the athletes themselves, it all comes down to the individuals involved; these athletes are the top 1%, the most driven, competitive and talented men and women on the planet all put into a game or display of athleticism where only a single person or team can win. The results are often explosive resulting in feuds, fights, controversy, the decaying of life-long friendships and all we get to play in 99% of sports games is a clean, sanitised version where the athletes become bland playing pieces.

One solution to this lies in embracing the press as a game mechanic, similarly to the Football Manager series (that’s soccer, not the weird version of rugby.) In those games, the player’s answers to the press during conferences can have a direct impact on the morale of players and supporters going forward; tearing down an underperforming player might upset the team but appease disappointed fans, sitting on the fence may frustrate the press and so on, it’s not perfect but it is a step in the right direction.

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Zero Charm

Putting my game-critic lens back on now, what bores me about most sports games (and a big part of why I think Nintendo’s and Sega’s sports games were so appealing historically) is that they are devoid of charm and character and whimsy; as fun as most sports inherently are, the games do their best to have the aesthetic of a JD Sports and all the character of a muddy football shirt. It’s all very corporate.

The songs from Wii Sports and Wii Sports Resort play in the background of virtually every YouTube video essay ever made, I’d argue this pair of games are the most iconic of the noughties and yet, they’re sports games! Based on sports like Tennis and Golf of all things, entire families huddled round the TV to play golf and tennis, why? Because aside from the fun, simple gameplay and the catchy music, the Wii Sports games were bright and colourful, you made your own funny little avatars and got to see them get CTE from Matt’s punches, it was pure fun.

I’m not a big fan of the Sega Saturn but look at this screenshot from Winter Heat, look at how bright and fun (and horribly stretched out) the game looks. Don’t you want to play sports games that make you smile instead of glaze over? Give us more colour!

As much as I praised Wii Sports and Resort, I think Sega are the real kings of great sports games and their racing games were full of charm and colour too. I miss old Sega.

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PEGI 3 Gambling

In the UK, our game rating system is handled by PEGI: Pan-European Game Information. Games are given an age rating of 3, 7, 12, 16 or 18. Here is a screenshot from their website:

The age rating is generally given based on the severity of the content descriptors listed. For example, the website states that the PEGI 18 label is given when ‘The level of violence reaches a stage where it becomes a depiction of gross violence, apparently motiveless killing, or violence towards defenceless characters.’ It can also be given for ‘The simulation of gambling.’ For the sake of clarity though, I will point out that a kid can buy any game they want with parental permission in the UK, or at least they could last time I was young enough to be questioned about buying Doom.

The modern Fifa football games (now renamed to FC) have become infamous for the prominent implementation of loot box/mystery box mechanics; the player pays a fee for a FUT (Fifa Ultimate Team) pack which they then unbox and get given a handful of random players they can use on their team. It’s a bit like virtual fantasy football. I’m not going to get into the legality of it since every month another European country seems to take EA to court over it.

What I will debate though, was the decision to give Balatro: a card game with a poker aesthetic, a PEGI 18 rating for ‘simulation of gambling.’ This had to be fought and overturned by appeal and even then, Balatro was still awarded a PEGI 12. But what does FC 25 get, a game where you can spend real money in a game of chance?

I like to keep my language relatively clean in my posts but let’s not mince words here, this is a fucking embarrassment.

These sorts of money-spinning mechanics have infested modern sports games and now a genre for everyone has been turned into something you’d be worried to see your kids saving pocket money for.

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Why So Serious?

Two of the greatest sports franchises out there are Tony Hawk’s Pro-Skater and the Forza Motorsport games but more especially: the Horizon sub-series. Simply put, these games stay true to the spirit of skateboarding and of motorsport but they don’t take themselves so seriously; they understand that first and foremost, a video game should be fun. What does this mean? Extra modes, player freedom and a dash of unreality to spice things up.

Forza Horizon has always paid close attention to celebrating the car culture of each game’s setting and providing a compelling racing sandbox, on top of that it has extremely robust character customisation, a whole livery designer and sharing system, where the player can earn in-game currency if other players use their designs and on top of all that, the game periodically dishes out free cars to the player and many ‘barn finds’: regional oddities and iconic cars, can be discovered via exploration; all of this and I’m not even touching on the games’ Forzathon Live battle royale game modes and public events.

I typed Forza custom liveries into google and all sorts of visual crimes showed up.

The Tony Hawk games (and there must be 50 of the damn things, so I will speak generally about the series) had story missions, mini-games, customisation, unlockable characters and plenty of goofy humour and wacky stages and easter eggs. All of this was alongside hearty helpings of counter-culture music, street skating aesthetics and gameplay that allowed the player to perform a long list of real-life skateboarding tricks.

I thought it was important to bring this up too as the upcoming Pro Skater 3 and 4 remakes have cut a significant amount of content from the originals.

So what’s my point here? Well, more games should follow this example and give us a unique spin on sports and their gameplay. Do you remember Fifa Street? Well, imagine physics-based football mechanics where you could do tricks and shoot your football through all sorts of stuff in the environment; every kid played football in the park or on the street growing up and I’d love to see a game capture that.

How many other sports have we not seen in game form too? I think Mirror’s Edge is proof a Pro Skater-style game based on parkour or athletics could really sell.

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But Who Cares?

These are just a few of my ideas but inevitably, I know there are some people out there who will read this and think… who cares? Frankly? I care.

I feel there’s this attitude among serious gamers that the ‘casuals:’ people who buy a few annual releases a year or don’t play games as their primary source of entertainment, are content to play whatever sports games EA coughs up and that their content with buying ‘the same game every year.’ Firstly, that’s just an attitude that reeks and secondly… they really aren’t content, inf act, people are quite sick of the low-quality of these games. Formula 1 fans have been waiting for a really good F1 game since 2020, Fifa fans have watched the career mode atrophy over the years and the game turn into EA’s gambling front; Madden fans have suffered the same I hear.

For those of an older generation, how many hours did you spend growing up playing the NES sports games, or Sega’s catalogue of classic sports games? How many of us huddled around the TV with family and friends to play Wii Sports? How many of you have the soundtracks to the Pro Skater games burned into their brains?

Sports games need saving, not just from EA but from boring, repetitive and uncreative design. When we lose a genre, our whole community gets smaller and less vibrant.

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Poll

Besides my Nintendo Lineage series I have lots of ideas in the works and a few half-written posts, from now on, I’ll be putting a poll at the bottom of each article where you can vote for which topic you want to see the most; this won’t mean the other options don’t happen, just that the winner is next. The poll will be open for 24 hours so be sure to vote quickly!

We’re just 15 subscribers away from the big 50. My posts get much more readers than I have subscribers so if you’d like to see more from Scanlines’ Journal or have been sat on the fence for a while, this is your sign to hit that button.