作者：Jake Shapiro

近来大家都密切关注着索尼公司即将发行的棒球模拟游戏《MLB 13：The Show》，因为这是其首次推出的棒球类电子游戏。曾经每种体育类别都具有许多竞争激烈的游戏，但是现在，几乎每种运动只拥有一款相对应的经典游戏。例如说到NFL我们便会想到《Madden》；说到曲棍球则是《NHL 13》。不少人担心，缺乏竞争性会导致游戏工作室趋于懒惰，然后年复一年地推出相类似的作品，从而导致用户所面对的选择也越来越匮乏。

让我们回顾过去十年里有关体育类电子游戏的评价。以往，游戏市场充斥着大量体育游戏，但是许多作品都驰能维持一至两年；而过去10年来该市场一直维持着这种状况。通常，我不会根据某款游戏的总体评价与分数去判断其质量，但年度体育游戏则属于独特的类型——并且比起其它游戏类型我们更能够有效地完善这类型游戏。本文所涉及的数据均来自GameRankings.com。

美式足球

我们一直坚信竞争环境能够催生创意。没有人喜欢垄断。这是一种简单的经济模式。最典型的例子便是EA Sprots所推出的大型体育游戏《Madden NFL》系列。虽然该系列在EA购买NFL特权后开始走下坡路，但从体育游戏市场的竞争结果看来，这并不是一种普遍现象：

关于足球游戏的竞争好像就发生在昨天似的，但《Madden》却已经诞生了10年之久。虽然经历了坎坷的发展道路，但是它却再也回不到过去的辉煌岁月。许多玩家对于EA的愤怒之情是源于其竞争对手2K Sports以巅峰之作《ESPN NFL 2K5》终结了自己的的足球游戏生涯。

棒球

是EA斥资数百万美元而扼杀了2K Sports的足球游戏业务。那么2K又做出何种选择呢？他们决定对EA发动反击，即买下另一种大型的美国体育运动——美国职棒大联盟（MLB）的专有使用权。但与EA购买NFL不同的是，2K并未考虑到他们只能获得MLB的第三方特权。而其它主机制造商仍能够创造他们自己的棒球游戏，就如索尼那样。

2K尝试着去击败EA的《MVP Baseball》——游戏产业中的佼佼者。但其《MLB 2K》系列却并未受到太多的瞩目，反而让索尼的《MLB: The Show》占据上风。尽管只发行在PlayStation主机平台上，但《The Show》已沉重打击了《MLB 2K》。这种效果十分极端，以致于当索尼在3月推出新作时，2K甚至无法推出一款竞争作品。由此可以预见，在未来，如果你没有购买索尼的PlayStation主机，你将无法体验棒球游戏。尽管2K拥有专有特权，但从目前的发展状况来看，在2013年索尼将会垄断棒球游戏领域。

曲棍球

虽然EA以不光彩手段排挤了NFL类型的竞争对手，但在曲棍球游戏中他们着实以真正有效的方式获取了胜利。

似乎每次出现新的主机时，平板电脑总会因为竞争类体育游戏而发生改变。主要的改变是发生在2005至2006年期间即Xbox 360，PlayStation 3与Wii刚刚发布时。曲棍球游戏是这些平台的典型作品。就像EA以《NHL’94》这类佳作在Super Nintendo/Sega Genesis 时代占据上风，2K Sports也以《NHL 2K》系列在PlayStation/Nintendo 64时代占据优势。接着，在2005至2006年，EA再次稳超其竞争对手，此时，2K已停止发行曲棍球游戏。但这并非由于EA从中作祟，而是因为2K推出的游戏都不够优秀。在《NHL 2K》走向末路之后几年，EA的系列作品仍以其高品质独占鳌头。

篮球

从篮球和曲棍球领域来看，我们认为在现代游戏领域，2K Sports不可能再创造出高品质的体育类游戏。尽管如此我们却不能忽视其过去在篮球游戏领域的出色表现。

这不仅是近10年来从未失去优势的体育运动，同时EA高成本打造的《NBA Live》的衰败更是推动着主要对手《NBA 2K》的飞速发展。EA已多次尝试重新发展篮球模拟游戏，但近3年来它却始终未能推出一款作品。所以我们特别好奇在未来EA将制作出怎样的篮球游戏。

足球

足球可以说是当今体育游戏市场唯一具有竞争性的类型。奇怪的是，这种竞争模式并不是发生在EA与2K或其中一家第一方游戏公司之间，而是EA与日本发行巨头Konami的竞争。

当提到电子游戏授权时，足球游戏应该是最受开发者欢迎的，他们不再需要争抢唯一顶级联赛的专有权——因为世界上存在着许多顶级的足球联赛，并且许多合作都是建立在俱乐部的基础上。并且他们还可以购买国家队的使用权。如今，EA的《FIFA》系列以其高预算以及拥有更多联赛的授权而大大超越了Konami的《Pro Evolution Soccer》。但最近几年，《Pro Evo》已卷土重来，我们也十分期待今后几年该游戏在市场中的发展。

在此我只涉及了有关这5种体育项目的模拟游戏。美式足球与篮球同样也会突出团队合作。而且更引人注目的是，体育游戏市场还存在街机类游戏，如《NFL Blitz》与《NBA Street》。当发行商苦苦挣扎于模拟类型时这类型游戏也不断涌现出来；就像2K在其《MLB 2K》系列没落期间便推出了街机篮球游戏《The Bigs》——因为他们并不了解如何有效地创造出一款优秀的棒球模拟游戏，EA也在其模拟游戏《NBA Live》陷入低潮期时推出了街机游戏《NBA Street: Homecourt》。

授权问题并非是造成年度体育游戏竞争逐渐淡化的原因。每一种体育项目都存在自身的影响因素。而共同的原因则是最优秀的游戏可以轻而易举地打败其它品质较差的产品。10年前，即使是劣质游戏也还能够存在于市场中，但随着AAA电子游戏制作成本的提升，不少小型发行商已经难以负担起这笔费用。

即使缺少足够的竞争，但是现在的体育游戏在品质方面却比过去更胜一筹。在60美元的电子游戏时代，体育游戏之间总是相互竞争着。一些非体育游戏的玩家总是会说，体育游戏只是让玩家为了某些更新内容而不断花钱购买同一款游戏。但是这也能推动开发商不断完善游戏。不像MMO游戏——如果你打算继续体验游戏便需每月支付15美元，体育游戏只需玩家每年支付60美元（如果你不想获得后来的更新内容的话便无需为此多花钱）。与MMO游戏不同的是，玩家还可以永久地体验之前所购买的体育游戏内容。除此之外开发者还必须想办法吸引玩家去获得更多更新内容。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

What modern sports games tell us about competition in the market

by Jake Shapiro

The following blog was, unless otherwise noted, independently written by a member of Gamasutra’s game development community. The thoughts and opinions expressed here are not necessarily those of Gamasutra or its parent company.

There’s been hubbub lately about Sony’s upcoming baseball simulator MLB 13: The Show being, for the first time, the only baseball video game on the market. Sports video games, once a genre full of games made by competing companies in each sport, are nearly now down to a single game per sport. Want some NFL? Better play Madden. Want hockey? Better play NHL 13. Many people worry that this lack of competition in the annual sports game market will lead to studios getting lazy and publishing the same product year after year, since consumers have no other choice if they want to enjoy their preferred sport in virtual form.

Let’s take a closer look at the last ten years of critical reception to sports video games. Any farther back and the market gets veritably flooded with other competing sports game franchises, many of which lasted only a year or two; the last decade has seen a relatively consistent market. I normally don’t look at aggregate review scores to judge the quality of games, but annual sports games are a unique genre–objective improvement is slightly more conceivable here than in other types of games. All my statistics in this article are taken from the review aggregator site GameRankings.com.

American football

We want to believe competition breeds innovation, right? Nobody likes monopolies. It’s simple economics. The posterchild for this is the biggest sports game franchise in the United States, EA Sports’ colossal Madden NFL series. While the series has gone downhill since 2004 when EA bought the exclusive rights to NFL video games, this may be the exception, not the rule, when it comes to the results of competition (or lack thereof) in sports games:

We talk about competition in football videogames like it was yesterday, but Madden has had nearly a decade on its own now. It’s been a bumpy road that’s never quite reached the glory days of a bygone gaming era. Much of players’ anger directed at EA stems from the fact that rival 2K Sports ended its football career on a high note–the final game in the series, ESPN NFL 2K5, is considered by many fans to be the pinnacle of virtual gridiron.

Baseball

2K Sports’ pigskin franchise was a life cut tragically short by EA’s multimillion dollar deal. So what did 2K do? They fired back, of course, by buying the exclusive rights to the next-biggest American sports league: Major League Baseball. But unlike EA’s NFL deal, 2K didn’t take into account that they only got exclusive third-party rights to MLB. The major console manufacturers are still allowed to internally develop their own pro baseball games, and that’s exactly what Sony has done. Let’s take a look:

2K managed to knock out EA’s industry-leading MVP Baseball. But their MLB 2K series became lethargic, and Sony took advantage with its MLB: The Show franchise. Despite only being released on Sony’s PlayStation consoles, The Show has effectively manhandled MLB 2K. The butt-whooping has been so extreme that when Sony releases its new game this March, 2K won’t even publish a competitor. For the foreseeable future, you won’t be able to play baseball in videogame form unless you own a Sony PlayStation. Despite 2K’s exclusive license, it now seems Sony will have the monopoly on baseball in 2013.

Hockey

While EA nudged out the competition in NFL games by playing dirty, they’ve conquered the competition the honest way when it comes to hockey:

It seems every time a new console generation is introduced, the tables are turned when it comes to competing sports games. In each of these charts, major changes occur between 2005 and 2006–the years that the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii were launched. Hockey games are the classic example of this. While EA had the upper hand in the Super Nintendo/Sega Genesis era with classics like NHL ’94, 2K Sports took the advantage in the PlayStation/Nintendo 64 era with their NHL 2K series. Then, as we’ve seen since 2005-2006, EA steadily outpaced its competition once again, to the point where 2K stopped publishing hockey games last year. This isn’t because of some devious scheme by EA, but simply because 2K delivered a vastly inferior product. In the years since the decline of NHL 2K, EA’s series has remained steadfast in its quality.

Basketball

Between baseball and hockey, we would be led to believe 2K Sports simply can’t create great sports video games in the modern era. But when it comes to virtual basketball, they’ve always known how to get it done.

Not only is this the only sport without a single change of advantage in the last decade, but the demise of EA’s big-budget NBA Live made its already-dominant rival NBA 2K skyrocket in quality. This chart looks like a Newton’s cradle, where the rising momentum of the struggling EA franchise in its dying years seems to carry over to 2K’s series as NBA Live dies. EA has tried to reboot its basketball sim numerous times, but it’s failed to deliver a product for the last three years. It’ll be interesting to see if they can create something in the future.

Soccer

The only sport that still has continuous competition in annual sports games is soccer. Strangely, instead of a battle between EA and 2K or one of the first-party companies, it involves EA and… Japanese publishing giant Konami.

Soccer is an interesting sport when it comes to videogame licenses, because there’s not just one top league to acquire the rights to–there are dozens of top soccer leagues in the world, and many of them negotiate rights on a club-by-club basis. And then there are national teams to license, too. Today, EA’s FIFA series has the advantage due to a much larger budget and the licenses for many more leagues than Konami’s Pro Evolution Soccer. But Pro Evo has been making a comeback in recent years, and it’ll be interesting to see what this market looks like a few years from now.

Of course, I’m only taking into account simulation-style games of the top professional leagues of each of these five team sports. American football and basketball also feature games based on college teams. And more notably, there are also the arcade-style sports games like NFL Blitz and NBA Street. Many games like this pop up when a publisher’s sim-style franchise is floundering; 2K published its arcade baseball game The Bigs in the dying years of its MLB 2K series because they couldn’t seem to figure out how to get simulation baseball right, and EA pushed its arcade NBA Street: Homecourt when its simulation NBA Live series was falling apart.

Exclusive licenses aren’t the reason competition in annual sports games is coming to an end. Really, that’s just Madden. For every sport, there’s a unique story behind the narrowing of its playing field. But the common thread seems to be that superior products simply triumph over inferior franchises. Ten years ago, it was much easier for inferior series to stay alive, but with the increasing production costs of AAA videogames, many smaller publishers can’t afford to.

Many of today’s sports games are better than ever, even without competition from other franchises. In the age of $60 videogames, sports game franchises are competing against themselves. Non-fans of sports games often point out the fact that you’re essentially buying the same game every year for a roster update and a couple tweaks. But this very paradigm can force developers to improve themselves. Unlike an MMO, where you’re forced to pay $15 per month if you want to continue playing at all, sports games warrant a $60 purchase once a year–and if you don’t want to upgrade to this year’s game, you don’t have to. Unlike in MMOs, you can keep playing last year’s sports game forever if you want. Developers need to give players a reason to update, and that’s a good thing.(source:gamasutra)

分析现代体育游戏中的竞争状况

作者：Jake Shapiro

近来大家都密切关注着索尼公司即将发行的棒球模拟游戏《MLB 13

：The Show》，因为这是其首次推出的棒球类电子游戏。曾经每种

体育类别都具有许多竞争激烈的游戏，但是现在，几乎每种运动只

拥有一款相对应的经典游戏。例如说到NFL我们便会想到《Madden》

；说到曲棍球则是《NHL 13》。不少人担心，缺乏竞争性会导致游

戏工作室趋于懒惰，然后年复一年地推出相类似的作品，从而导致

用户所面对的选择也越来越匮乏。

让我们回顾过去十年里有关体育类电子游戏的评价。以往，游戏市

场充斥着大量体育游戏，但是许多作品都驰能维持一至两年；而过

去10年来该市场一直维持着这种状况。通常，我不会根据某款游戏

的总体评价与分数去判断其质量，但年度体育游戏则属于独特的类

型——并且比起其它游戏类型我们更能够有效地完善这类型游戏

。本文所涉及的数据均来自GameRankings.com。

美式足球

我们一直坚信竞争环境能够催生创意。没有人喜欢垄断。这是一种

简单的经济模式。最典型的例子便是EA Sprots所推出的大型体育游

戏《Madden NFL》系列。虽然该系列在EA购买NFL特权后开始走下坡

路，但从体育游戏市场的竞争结果看来，这并不是一种普遍现象：

关于足球游戏的竞争好像就发生在昨天似的，但《Madden》却已经

诞生了10年之久。虽然经历了坎坷的发展道路，但是它却再也回不

到过去的辉煌岁月。许多玩家对于EA的愤怒之情是源于其竞争对手

2K Sports以巅峰之作《ESPN NFL 2K5》终结了自己的的足球游戏生

涯。

棒球

是EA斥资数百万美元而扼杀了2K Sports的足球游戏业务。那么2K又

做出何种选择呢？他们决定对EA发动反击，即买下另一种大型的美

国体育运动——美国职棒大联盟（MLB）的专有使用权。但与EA购

买NFL不同的是，2K并未考虑到他们只能获得MLB的第三方特权。而

其它主机制造商仍能够创造他们自己的棒球游戏，就如索尼那样。

2K尝试着去击败EA的《MVP Baseball》——游戏产业中的佼佼者

。但其《MLB 2K》系列却并未受到太多的瞩目，反而让索尼的

《MLB: The Show》占据上风。尽管只发行在PlayStation主机平台

上，但《The Show》已沉重打击了《MLB 2K》。这种效果十分极端

，以致于当索尼在3月推出新作时，2K甚至无法推出一款竞争作品。

由此可以预见，在未来，如果你没有购买索尼的PlayStation主机，

你将无法体验棒球游戏。尽管2K拥有专有特权，但从目前的发展状

况来看，在2013年索尼将会垄断棒球游戏领域。

曲棍球

虽然EA以不光彩手段排挤了NFL类型的竞争对手，但在曲棍球游戏中

他们着实以真正有效的方式获取了胜利。

似乎每次出现新的主机时，平板电脑总会因为竞争类体育游戏而发

生改变。主要的改变是发生在2005至2006年期间即Xbox 360，

PlayStation 3与Wii刚刚发布时。曲棍球游戏是这些平台的典型作

品。就像EA以《NHL’94》这类佳作在Super Nintendo/Sega Genesis

时代占据上风，2K Sports也以《NHL 2K》系列在

PlayStation/Nintendo 64时代占据优势。接着，在2005至2006年

，EA再次稳超其竞争对手，此时，2K已停止发行曲棍球游戏。但这

并非由于EA从中作祟，而是因为2K推出的游戏都不够优秀。在《NHL

2K》走向末路之后几年，EA的系列作品仍以其高品质独占鳌头。

篮球

从篮球和曲棍球领域来看，我们认为在现代游戏领域，2K Sports不

可能再创造出高品质的体育类游戏。尽管如此我们却不能忽视其过

去在篮球游戏领域的出色表现。

这不仅是近10年来从未失去优势的体育运动，同时EA高成本打造的

《NBA Live》的衰败更是推动着主要对手《NBA 2K》的飞速发展。

EA已多次尝试重新发展篮球模拟游戏，但近3年来它却始终未能推出

一款作品。所以我们特别好奇在未来EA将制作出怎样的篮球游戏。

足球

足球可以说是当今体育游戏市场唯一具有竞争性的类型。奇怪的是

，这种竞争模式并不是发生在EA与2K或其中一家第一方游戏公司之

间，而是EA与日本发行巨头Konami的竞争。

当提到电子游戏授权时，足球游戏应该是最受开发者欢迎的，他们

不再需要争抢唯一顶级联赛的专有权——因为世界上存在着许多

顶级的足球联赛，并且许多合作都是建立在俱乐部的基础上。并且

他们还可以购买国家队的使用权。如今，EA的《FIFA》系列以其高

预算以及拥有更多联赛的授权而大大超越了Konami的《Pro

Evolution Soccer》。但最近几年，《Pro Evo》已卷土重来，我们

也十分期待今后几年该游戏在市场中的发展。

在此我只涉及了有关这5种体育项目的模拟游戏。美式足球与篮球同

样也会突出团队合作。而且更引人注目的是，体育游戏市场还存在

街机类游戏，如《NFL Blitz》与《NBA Street》。当发行商苦苦挣

扎于模拟类型时这类型游戏也不断涌现出来；就像2K在其《MLB 2K

》系列没落期间便推出了街机篮球游戏《The Bigs》——因为他

们并不了解如何有效地创造出一款优秀的棒球模拟游戏，EA也在其

模拟游戏《NBA Live》陷入低潮期时推出了街机游戏《NBA Street:

Homecourt》。

授权问题并非是造成年度体育游戏竞争逐渐淡化的原因。每一种体

育项目都存在自身的影响因素。而共同的原因则是最优秀的游戏可

以轻而易举地打败其它品质较差的产品。10年前，即使是劣质游戏

也还能够存在于市场中，但随着AAA电子游戏制作成本的提升，不少

小型发行商已经难以负担起这笔费用。

即使缺少足够的竞争，但是现在的体育游戏在品质方面却比过去更

胜一筹。在60美元的电子游戏时代，体育游戏之间总是相互竞争着

。一些非体育游戏的玩家总是会说，体育游戏只是让玩家为了某些

更新内容而不断花钱购买同一款游戏。但是这也能推动开发商不断

完善游戏。不像MMO游戏——如果你打算继续体验游戏便需每月支

付15美元，体育游戏只需玩家每年支付60美元（如果你不想获得后

来的更新内容的话便无需为此多花钱）。与MMO游戏不同的是，玩家

还可以永久地体验之前所购买的体育游戏内容。除此之外开发者还

必须想办法吸引玩家去获得更多更新内容。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载

，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

What modern sports games tell us about competition in the

market

by Jake Shapiro

The following blog was, unless otherwise noted,

independently written by a member of Gamasutra’s game

development community. The thoughts and opinions expressed

here are not necessarily those of Gamasutra or its parent

company.

There’s been hubbub lately about Sony’s upcoming baseball

simulator MLB 13: The Show being, for the first time, the

only baseball video game on the market. Sports video games,

once a genre full of games made by competing companies in

each sport, are nearly now down to a single game per sport.

Want some NFL? Better play Madden. Want hockey? Better play

NHL 13. Many people worry that this lack of competition in

the annual sports game market will lead to studios getting

lazy and publishing the same product year after year, since

consumers have no other choice if they want to enjoy their

preferred sport in virtual form.

Let’s take a closer look at the last ten years of critical

reception to sports video games. Any farther back and the

market gets veritably flooded with other competing sports

game franchises, many of which lasted only a year or two;

the last decade has seen a relatively consistent market. I

normally don’t look at aggregate review scores to judge the

quality of games, but annual sports games are a unique

genre–objective improvement is slightly more conceivable

here than in other types of games. All my statistics in

this article are taken from the review aggregator site

GameRankings.com.

American football

We want to believe competition breeds innovation, right?

Nobody likes monopolies. It’s simple economics. The

posterchild for this is the biggest sports game franchise

in the United States, EA Sports’ colossal Madden NFL

series. While the series has gone downhill since 2004 when

EA bought the exclusive rights to NFL video games, this may

be the exception, not the rule, when it comes to the

results of competition (or lack thereof) in sports games:

We talk about competition in football videogames like it

was yesterday, but Madden has had nearly a decade on its

own now. It’s been a bumpy road that’s never quite reached

the glory days of a bygone gaming era. Much of players’

anger directed at EA stems from the fact that rival 2K

Sports ended its football career on a high note–the final

game in the series, ESPN NFL 2K5, is considered by many

fans to be the pinnacle of virtual gridiron.

Baseball

2K Sports’ pigskin franchise was a life cut tragically

short by EA’s multimillion dollar deal. So what did 2K do?

They fired back, of course, by buying the exclusive rights

to the next-biggest American sports league: Major League

Baseball. But unlike EA’s NFL deal, 2K didn’t take into

account that they only got exclusive third-party rights to

MLB. The major console manufacturers are still allowed to

internally develop their own pro baseball games, and that’s

exactly what Sony has done. Let’s take a look:

2K managed to knock out EA’s industry-leading MVP Baseball.

But their MLB 2K series became lethargic, and Sony took

advantage with its MLB: The Show franchise. Despite only

being released on Sony’s PlayStation consoles, The Show has

effectively manhandled MLB 2K. The butt-whooping has been

so extreme that when Sony releases its new game this March,

2K won’t even publish a competitor. For the foreseeable

future, you won’t be able to play baseball in videogame

form unless you own a Sony PlayStation. Despite 2K’s

exclusive license, it now seems Sony will have the monopoly

on baseball in 2013.

Hockey

While EA nudged out the competition in NFL games by playing

dirty, they’ve conquered the competition the honest way

when it comes to hockey:

It seems every time a new console generation is introduced,

the tables are turned when it comes to competing sports

games. In each of these charts, major changes occur between

2005 and 2006–the years that the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3,

and Wii were launched. Hockey games are the classic example

of this. While EA had the upper hand in the Super

Nintendo/Sega Genesis era with classics like NHL ’94, 2K

Sports took the advantage in the PlayStation/Nintendo 64

era with their NHL 2K series. Then, as we’ve seen since

2005-2006, EA steadily outpaced its competition once again,

to the point where 2K stopped publishing hockey games last

year. This isn’t because of some devious scheme by EA, but

simply because 2K delivered a vastly inferior product. In

the years since the decline of NHL 2K, EA’s series has

remained steadfast in its quality.

Basketball

Between baseball and hockey, we would be led to believe 2K

Sports simply can’t create great sports video games in the

modern era. But when it comes to virtual basketball,

they’ve always known how to get it done.

Not only is this the only sport without a single change of

advantage in the last decade, but the demise of EA’s big-

budget NBA Live made its already-dominant rival NBA 2K

skyrocket in quality. This chart looks like a Newton’s

cradle, where the rising momentum of the struggling EA

franchise in its dying years seems to carry over to 2K’s

series as NBA Live dies. EA has tried to reboot its

basketball sim numerous times, but it’s failed to deliver a

product for the last three years. It’ll be interesting to

see if they can create something in the future.

Soccer

The only sport that still has continuous competition in

annual sports games is soccer. Strangely, instead of a

battle between EA and 2K or one of the first-party

companies, it involves EA and… Japanese publishing giant

Konami.

Soccer is an interesting sport when it comes to videogame

licenses, because there’s not just one top league to

acquire the rights to–there are dozens of top soccer

leagues in the world, and many of them negotiate rights on

a club-by-club basis. And then there are national teams to

license, too. Today, EA’s FIFA series has the advantage due

to a much larger budget and the licenses for many more

leagues than Konami’s Pro Evolution Soccer. But Pro Evo has

been making a comeback in recent years, and it’ll be

interesting to see what this market looks like a few years

from now.

Of course, I’m only taking into account simulation-style

games of the top professional leagues of each of these five

team sports. American football and basketball also feature

games based on college teams. And more notably, there are

also the arcade-style sports games like NFL Blitz and NBA

Street. Many games like this pop up when a publisher’s sim

-style franchise is floundering; 2K published its arcade

baseball game The Bigs in the dying years of its MLB 2K

series because they couldn’t seem to figure out how to get

simulation baseball right, and EA pushed its arcade NBA

Street: Homecourt when its simulation NBA Live series was

falling apart.

Exclusive licenses aren’t the reason competition in annual

sports games is coming to an end. Really, that’s just

Madden. For every sport, there’s a unique story behind the

narrowing of its playing field. But the common thread seems

to be that superior products simply triumph over inferior

franchises. Ten years ago, it was much easier for inferior

series to stay alive, but with the increasing production

costs of AAA videogames, many smaller publishers can’t

afford to.

Many of today’s sports games are better than ever, even

without competition from other franchises. In the age of

$60 videogames, sports game franchises are competing

against themselves. Non-fans of sports games often point

out the fact that you’re essentially buying the same game

every year for a roster update and a couple tweaks. But

this very paradigm can force developers to improve

themselves. Unlike an MMO, where you’re forced to pay $15

per month if you want to continue playing at all, sports

games warrant a $60 purchase once a year–and if you don’t

want to upgrade to this year’s game, you don’t have to.

Unlike in MMOs, you can keep playing last year’s sports

game forever if you want. Developers need to give players a

reason to update, and that’s a good thing.

(source:gamasutra)

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/JakeShapiro/20121205/182946/

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