In defense of sports games

[mregashu]

I've read this board for a long term but never really posted. Reading the thread about Madden and the copyright issue kind of spurred my desire to become more active here.

I've noticed a lot of talk in the video game world by people with a bit of disdain for sports games. (Not necessarily always here, but other websites as well.) Personally, sports games were my "gateway drug" into this great hobby. I really started getting into it with the early EA Sports titles and from there I branched out into pretty much every genre, growing to love Zelda, Final Fantasy, etc. as much as my beloved Madden & co.

For this reason, I feel compelled to defend the sports genre - something that many "hardcore gamers" seem to hate. So Madden has essentially put out the same game for 12 years with just a few new features and new rosters. What Final Fantasy are we on now...12? It seems to me Square has a pretty similar business plan to EA. Release a new game with a few different characters and some new features and watch the cash roll in.

I think anyone who has really disliked Madden et al should take some time to play 94, then try 96 for a while, then one of the PSX versions, then some of the latest installments and see that while the game remains football, the features build on and evolve the game just as much if not more than many long running series in other genres.

Keep in mind that my gripes aren't against those who don't like sports games simply because they aren't fans of that sport. Perfectly understandable in my opinion. This is more about those who seem to look at sports games as a step below "real" gaming - those who see it as just mainstream crap.

Of course, that's just one man's opinion. I'd love to hear what the rest of you think on the issue, especially those who dislike the genre.

[Jibbajaba]

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think that anyone was attacking sports games as a whole. I think that the point of the "Is Madden really worth a billion dollars" thread was that EA has just made it impossible for any other company to produce football titles using the players real names. This will cause most people to choose madden over other football games such as NFL 2K5 or whatever. The problem with this is that lately the Madden series has been declining as EA has chosen to spend more on other titles and is still using the same madden engine that it has been using for years. Now people who dont want to put up with EA's sub-par offerings in the future will have to download rosters from the internet, assuming that their consoles are set up for internet access. Basically some of us feel that EA is using unfair marketing practices and I agree. But I think sports games as a whole are great.

[sisko]

Well, I really don't care for the Final Fantasy series either, though I think the differences between say Final Fantasy 7 and Final Fantasy 8 are MUCH broader than the differences between Madden 97 and Madden 98. Yes they have new characters, but they also have a completely different story, and completely different engines nearly altogether. Madden has what? A tweaked engine and new rosters/stats? Not a fair comparison at all.

[mregashu]

JibbaJabba, I know that thread wasn't necessarily attacking sports games, it just kind of got my mind rolling to past attacks I've seen.

As for the Final Fantasy thing, while stories DO change from one installment to the next, the basic themes don't change much. Also, I agree there is a big change in the engine between VII and VIII, so much so that it is better to comapre to Madden 98 and Madden, when they switched from sprites to polygons. In that case, I think yes, the change between FF VII and VIII and Madden 98 and 99 IS rather close.

Again, I'm a fan of both series, so nothing against FF. I just find some irony in it.

[Nature Boy]

Forget the changes in the game from year to year. That's not the driving reason behind (most) year to year purchases I'll bet. It's the roster updates.

If you're a big fan of a sport and enjoy playing the video game equivalent of it you'll know what I'm talking about. Yes you can keep your roster up to date with trades, but you don't necessarily have the time (especially if it's not the only game you're playing).

Now I personally don't buy a new baseball game every year, but I'll buy one every 2 or 3 years. And when I buy I choose whichever franchise appeals to me at the time (I currently have World Series Baseball for Xbox, I'm thinking of getting MVP Baseball 2004). But it's the fun of having up to date rosters that keeps me buying.

[tholly]

sports games and final fantasy games dont really change between years, and i personally think both suck, but they are making money and people like them, so i guess thats all that really matters

[SoulBlazer]

BRAVO, Mregashu!

You're a man after my own heart.

I buy the new Madden games every year BECAUSE they have a new roster and small changes (like the owner mode in this years one). And it's a lot easier to do that then mess with it yourself.

There's a defentily a anti-sports attitude here, but there's also a bunch of people who hate FF, so it's all cool.

[lendelin]

mregashu, overall I agree with you completely. There is indeed a tendency of enthusiastic gamers to belittle sports games, in particular the one year updates of the most popular sport genres in the US. The main reason is pretty simple: they are incredibly successful, and they attraact a wider audience beyond the 'hardcore' gamers. They symbolize something which a lot of gamers feel uncomfortable about, namely the big business aspects of the game industry, on top the business giant EA, and the appeal to casual gamers. (latest example: Steven Kent in GI who wrote a very interesting column about it; interesting read, but he got it wrong on a lot of accounts)

It's indeed strange to separate the 'real' or 'true' games from the lightweights which supposedly attract the mainstream crowd, which means also that there are 'true' gamers and, well, the not-so-true gamers. I don't know what true games are, and I never knew what true gamers are. This is especially disturbing because 1) sports games were always out there and sold well, even to the best Atari times, 2) the sports genre is one of the most competitive genres in the industry today, 3) traditional sports games profited the most from 3D and offer rich gameplay in the meantime (which wasn't the case in the pre-16bit eras). Might it be that sports games became so good in the meantime that they became even acceptable for a brodened demographic of gamers?

I nver liked traditional sports games, but I have to say that racers since GT3 and some snowboarding games delivered the most immersive game experiences in the Dreamcast and post-Dreamcast era....and Virtua Tennis and Tennis 2K2 are anyways among the best games ever produced.

Challenge, immersive artificial worlds, figuring out strategies, and exploration are the main basic reasons why we play games, and that nver changed in the last four decades, and it applies for all genres from the geekfest-heavy RPGs (which I prefer) to sports gamers which attract more gamers.

Individual games should be belittled, but not entire genres; and economic success isn't a very good reason to doubt game quality and this goes for unsuccessful sales figures for specific games as well.