What happened to the competition for sports games?

[Vamos Rafa]

I know EA has this exclusive contract with the NFL so 2K has their hands tied. But for other sports, I do remember having choices during the Xbox/Ps2 days. You had EA's NHL (insert year), 989's/Sony's NHL Face-off, and Sega Sports' NHL 2K. EA and Sony were still making NBA games. MVP baseball, anyone? Even Microsoft had their own MLB game in 2003 (MLB Inside Pitch) to compete with MVP and MLB 2K.

Click to read more...

 

[Blitzkrug]

Because the competition isn't good enough sadly.

Baseball: The Show is pretty much unchallenged since it's a first party developer putting resources into it. 2K sucked. Baseball not really profitable because of this.

Football: That one is simply because EA controls the license. No one is going to buy a football game without the NFL name on it unless it's like Mutant League or something.

Basketball: 2K untouched, EA is garbage

Hockey: Sad truth is no one is touching this because it's simply not profitable enough to make a hockey game. 2K realized it and pulled out of the market. EA will likely be the only game in town for years to come.

 

[guinness]

Most baseball games just pale in comparison to the Show. It's like half the reason I wanted a PS4.

Haven't played the NHL series in forever, but hasn't EA just mailed it in the past couple years? Maybe the costs of licencing and developing AAA sports titles are too cost prohibitive for most studios.

 

[GlassesJacketShirt]

Pretty much what Blitzkrug said. Outside of soccer with PES vs. FIFA, which has the global market to mine (plus they are both pretty good series in their own right), all the other sports have either been dominated by a high quality series (2K's basketball, Sony's baseball), have a licensing agreement to quell competition (football) or it simply has too little a market for two competitive franchises (hockey).

I do wonder if football would ever have a chance of competition should the NFL allow 2K to give it another shot, but I think the goodwill that NFL 2K5 had might be gone by this point in time. Shame, 2K5 really felt ahead of its time.

 

[Blitzkrug]

The only other thing i will say in regards to baseball games is it would probably be a lot easier to have two games compete because of sony's exclusivity.

The Xbox market gets jack **** for licensed baseball games outside of those god awful RBI baseball reboots. It would probably be a lot easier to justify another competitor jumping in knowing there's a whole console market basically ripe for the picking.

 

[Vamos Rafa]

The only other thing i will say in regards to baseball games is it would probably be a lot easier to have two games compete because of sony's exclusivity.

The Xbox market gets jack **** for licensed baseball games outside of those god awful RBI baseball reboots. It would probably be a lot easier to justify another competitor jumping in knowing there's a whole console market basically ripe for the picking.

Microsoft needs to revive their MLB Inside Pitch series. Well, not sure if series is the right word since it was only a one-time thing.

 

[awesomo]

NHL 2K was a really great simulation series. Was pretty sad to see that one go. NHL improved a lot with the move to next gen but have really plateaued ever since, just small changes now.

Up until this year, i wouldve said FIFA was EAs best. But i think right now Madden is the best - theyve improved Madden a lot i feel from a couple years ago - especially gameplay to make defence more fun.

FIFA IMO got beat out by PES this year, which is a good thing because itll get them to step up their game.

NBA 2K and MLB the show are in a league of their own. It would take a long time for another company to catch up to these 2. They are top class sport games.

 

[Le Tricolore]

I'm pretty sure EA hasn't had the exclusive license for NFL games for years.

edit: seems like I'm wrong. Oh well. NFL 2K5 was the best.

 

[John Price]

There's been monopolies on them for some time now. Madden started it around 2005 when they got rid of 2k. This isn't new.

 

[Beantown Beatdown]

Would certainly welcome a baseball game back on the Xbox. I remember logging hours upon hours playing MVP 2004 online. That game was great. Even had a lot of fun playing the NCAA editions.

 

[MayDay]

It was better when there was competition.

Monopolies are never a good thing for consumers.

 

[Morozov]

There's been monopolies on them for some time now. Madden started it around 2005 when they got rid of 2k. This isn't new.

NFL is the only sport where there's an actual licensed monopoly.

While we previously had more competition, a lot of that competition wasn't actually very good and was often just trying to cash in on these licenses.

Blitzkrug summed up nowadays pretty well.

NFL - EA got the rights so it's a one horse race.
MLB - The Show decimates anything, 2K's offerings were a joke.
NBA - 2K decimates anything, killed EA to the point that they had a game go gold and then didn't even release it.
NHL - 2K packed its bags and went home leaving only one player in the game.
Football - Actually has two great franchises in FIFA and PES. But it's also the biggest sport in the world with a much bigger market.

Despite the lack of competition, the quality of the likes of The Show and 2K is phenomenal. There's no room for people to just jump in the race nowadays like there once was, if you can't compete with these elite franchises then you you won't be successful.

 

[Trap Jesus]

Despite the lack of competition, the quality of the likes of The Show and 2K is phenomenal. There's no room for people to just jump in the race nowadays like there once was, if you can't compete with these elite franchises then you you won't be successful.

I was going to say, the monopoly of a specific sport really hasn't affected the quality of NBA 2K or The Show. Those two franchises actively look to get better and better every year. Don't think it's a coincidence that NHL and Madden are the ones that seem to get minimal improvements (if that) year after year. I guess FIFA has a better rep as an EA game, but still, 2K and The Show are in a league of their own.

 

[Butchered]

What a few others have said. There is no competition to be had. Games are either not very profitable to make so there isn't a lot of competition, and the ones that are (Football/Basketball) are locked down by EA and 2K respectively. Just not much room out there for multiple games anymore.

I honestly doubt we ever see Hockey, Baseball or Football put out by other companies again. EA still tries to do basketball occasionally for some reason.

 

[Big McLargehuge]

All of the reasons have been laid out here. Ultimately the biggest reason, aside from the NFL, simply comes down to cost/benefit...as games get more expensive to produce it becomes harder to carve a niche for yourself. Throw in The Show and NBA2k being so good that there's basically no room for competition to get started and it is what it is. There'd be a competitor to NHL if there was enough money to be had, but there isn't, so there won't be.

There is a competition for soccer games, but it's a significantly larger global market...and even then PES gets curb-stomped by FIFA in sales basically everywhere despite being as good, if not better than FIFA.

 

[Vamos Rafa]

PES 2017 is a great game. But the cheatibg AI can be frustrating, like the defender always catching up to an attacking player and your passes easily getti g intercepted. Not to mention that you can hardly control your own passes, as you don't make the logical passes. Ex: you want to pass it to your center forward on the attack, instead, the CPU's AI targeted your other winger.

 

[aleshemsky83]

In hockey and basketball, one company just made a much better game. NFL they bought the license.

Soccer and baseball I don't know. There's nothing special about fifa that wasn't there in games 20 years ago. I would assume that one is just the marketing dollars being too much to overcome.

 

[flyingkiwi]

I wonder how much the market for NFL, NHL, and MLB games dry up outside North America? Of course there are pockets of interest worldwide, but of the main sports games out there only football and basketball have any real claims to being true international sports.

 

[Big McLargehuge]

I wonder how much the market for NFL, NHL, and MLB games dry up outside North America? Of course there are pockets of interest worldwide, but of the main sports games out there only football and basketball have any real claims to being true international sports.

The NHL games are prevalent in hockey-playing nations (at least the ones I've been to)...otherwise you're mostly talking about ex-pats playing those games abroad more than anything.

I imagine MLB The Show does about as well in Europe as Don Bradman Cricket does here.

 

[dogbazinho]

Sports games have been dead to me once they stopped making NCAA games. I still don't understand how they can't randomize names/players to avoid any legal issues by using student likeness. I understand people will make roster files but that's on the user community.

 

[Chimaera]

The money put in makes many of these options unprofitable. Unless you use a core engine with minimal changes, the production on some of these games isn't cheap.

If you're not a tentpole, it's hard to get into the market. 2k has the NBA division locked down, so even though EA puts out a product, I can't think they make a ton of money. That's also some of the reason their product is bad. They can't go out and justify the budget. Hockey's market is so small that there's no real reason for 2k or some competitor to get into the game. Baseball is what it is, and they're not making money off of it.

Really, the only sports games where companies are making a killing are Madden, FIFA, and to an extent NBA2k. Even Madden sales have been on a decline.

 

[Morozov]

Soccer and baseball I don't know. There's nothing special about fifa that wasn't there in games 20 years ago. I would assume that one is just the marketing dollars being too much to overcome.

This really isn't true about FIFA at all.

 

[awesomo]

This really isn't true about FIFA at all.

FIFA has changed a lot. Prolly because PES made amazing simulation games for a really long time.

Then FIFA changed over their gameplay and it became GREAT and then PES popularity went down a bit and the gameplay wasnt as good. But PES is back now which is good because FIFA is starting to slow down on their improvements

 

[SpookyTsuki]

I want a good NHL game

 

[SpookyTsuki]

Sports games have been dead to me once they stopped making NCAA games. I still don't understand how they can't randomize names/players to avoid any legal issues by using student likeness. I understand people will make roster files but that's on the user community.

Those were the best football games