Disappointing AFL video games are one of life’s certainties, but is a lack of investment in their development the only problem?

There is a uniquely bittersweet feeling in watching EA Sports unveil its latest instalment of the Fifa series. As a football fan, post-September 26th I’m guaranteed to waste away hours in this fictional universe of handcrafted sporting entertainment.

On the other hand, whilst observing Fifa storming ahead with its ever evolving simulation engine, my homegrown sporting love remains in eternal gaming limbo. There are three certainties in life; death, taxes and the inevitable disappointment at an AFL video game.



As a result of globalisation, the modern Australian sporting fan is likely to have diverged from the ‘footy in the winter, cricket in the summer’ ethos of their parents or grandparents. Alongside the average age of gamers rising, the market for sports games globally is a gold mine for EA Sports.



Even though football with a worldwide audience has greater resources backing game development, is that the sole reason why Aussie Rules in an era of radical gaming evolution has missed the boat? Does the answer lie within previous attempts at an Aussie Rules game, or do difficulties exist in recreating the flow of an AFL match in a virtual setting?



The history of Aussie Rules as a video game begun humbly in 1991, with the release of ‘Aussie Rules Footy’ released on NES (Nintendo Entertainment System). This 8-bit pocket of fun would have been revolutionary at the time for many reasons, perhaps mostly for predicting an 18 team competition without shafting Fitzroy.



Over the next 10 years there would be two more AFL games produced on consoles (AFL 98 & 99) with signs of growing sophistication. Both were EA Sports produced and seemed to be quite satisfactory in quality comparison to its Fifa counterparts.



Three more years passed and EA Sports’ priorities changed, leaving IR Gurus (now Transmission Games) tasked with carrying on the torch with their first Aussie Rules title. Based in Melbourne they oversaw arguably the most accomplished era of the flawed format, starting with AFL Live 2002 and finishing up with AFL Premiership 2007.



Whilst bugs were persistent (issues with player awareness, a dire smother bug in AFL 2006 and insinuations that a rather bulked up Joe Misiti was running foul of the WADA code) the career mode and general playability was decent enough to see the series under IR Gurus have a decent play-life.



According to a PALGN comment section Q&A seven years ago, lead artist and designer on AFL Premiership 2007 Mark Houareau conceded limited resources strangled the ability of IR Guru’s developers in making a sophisticated product.



“At the moment, our development team of 15 people are spread thin in certain areas, and it can affect the final product when compared to budgets and development team numbers of the companies that make the Fifas, Maddens and Pro Evos out there.”



When discussing the future, Houareau responded to questions addressing the shift from the PS2 format, to the then next-gen PS3 and handhelds (PSP). He hinted towards investment from management, saying he was “confident of a very strong showing in future titles”.



AFL Premiership 2007 was the last AFL game IR Gurus would create, leaving consumers a four year hiatus until Australian gaming publisher Tru Blu Entertainment enlisted Big Ant Studios to develop AFL Live in 2011. IR Gurus shifted their focus to larger markets with other genres, until at some point the business ceased operation.



Big Ant Studios’ attempt remains true to the format, positive attributes (radically improved graphics) undermined by flaws in general playability (lack of a detailed career mode and a steep learning curve required in order to learn controls).



Last year’s sequel AFL Live 2, improved the career mode of the game dramatically, but issues with general playability only worsened. This time around, Wicked Witch was brought in to develop the game at the expense of Big Ant Studios.



Many fellow gamers felt that one of the issues surrounding the latest two iterations was the expectation of paying premium retail price ($70+) for a product that was suspect in quality. Like many other gamers at the time, I relented from buying the latest AFL title and spent the money on buying a premium quality game instead.



Indie game developers are always fighting an uphill battle in this department, with the rapid increase of development costs in the industry putting incredible pressure upon publishers to make retail cost high. The structure of the industry rewards those who continue producing intellectual property that is not only profitable, but is able to draw in gamers as a long term franchise. The more successful franchises a publisher has, the greater the ability it has to absorb the developments costs of a commercial failure.



Current suggested innovations for smaller developers, like crowd-sourcing and feedback from players over the internet during the development phase, are untested but valid solutions to the cost problem.



Aesthetically, there’s an argument that AFL isn’t as easy as football or basketball to recreate on a gaming system.



One of the main flaws within AFL games is the failure to recreate artificially intelligent player movement on game day. As one fellow AFL-following gamer argued quite well, the evolving pattern of the game over the last 15 years has removed stationary positions (which AFL games insist on having for some bizarre reason), like the stay-at-home full forward.



However, the difficulty involved in writing successful code with such different variables for 44 players at all times, must be incredibly challenging with limited budgets and resources. Perhaps the lack of inspiration in AFL video games is always linked back to the issues of cost constraint.



It could be that expectations are too high, but the dream will always remain alive. A detailed AFL game with rich environment and smooth gameplay is something that Aussie rules fans across generations crave. There are obvious, complex and frustrating reasons why this can only be a pipedream for now, but as an Aussie Rules diehard, one can only hope those days are numbered.

