In my opinion. A licence-free game 100% editable would be a dream.
Look what modders do on Pc.
No real faces, callnames, leagues.... No problem. Just give us the tools to create as much as we want and you invest all your money in the game improvement.
But....what about online? Would it be just playable with fake names? That is the point.
If you are an offline player, my option mentioned above would be just the perfect dream.
Exactly, the modding community would thrive as would the community itself as a result, provided the game was great, right?
The problem for this idea is that there would need to be a massive shift of focus from the current attention on the more superficial things associated with the game towards the more fundamental things associated with the computer game itself i.e. The stuff that really matters. Sadly, given the current trends I just don't think that's something the marketing or sports industries would want to see happen.
Similar to the music industry, the whole idea of branding in sport (and in general) is to increase exposure, particularly given that so much money is paid to top players it is now essential for sponsors and teams to earn more from the 'status' of elite sporting personalities - it's a terrible circle and one that I feel really tarnishes the nature of sport.
One of the biggest reason this focus won't shift anytime soon is because sport games (and all games in general) are being aimed more and more at younger audiences. This age demographic simply buys into this aspect of marketing a lot easier than its older counterparts i.e. us - again similar to the music industry (I'm sure Justin Bieber didn't make his millions off us lot - certainly not, he made it through utilizing marketing mechanics within the industry to help influence/sedate/control consumer choice and overall who are the easiest people to control? Young people.
The same can be said of the sports industry. Leading Brands such as Nike, Adidas etc and leading teams (now brands themselves) Real Madrid, Barcelona, Man Utd etc, all do the same attempt to control consumer choice - those with children of a certain age will have heard them beg for a certain brand at one point or another, why is this?
It is because that brand have spent xxxx to control consumer choice, and lets just say Nike are doing a very good job in the playground which in turn is establishing a legacy of artificial brand loyalty. The same can be said with teams. 10 years ago there was much more variation in team selection in football games whereas now that variation would focus a lot more sharply around a small handful of teams, I don't need to name names, again more artificial blind loyalty.
Take my son (13) as an average example of their target demographic, he likes football (as does nearly every child), he has asked on multiple occasions for the full kit of his favourite team - Real Madrid, ok fair enough sounds like what most kids would do, right?
So at nearly £100/140 euro/$150+ for the kit I have to ask myself a few questions before shelling out. Namely, how well does my son like this team and I guess, out of interest, why this team in particular?
Well, it is no surprise that when asked he can't answer the second question but I sort of knew that all along (well it's because every kid in the street and at school and in PES/FIFA are picking Real Madrid as their team).
So what about the first question, well I asked him to name me some players from the team and have a guess which player(s) he could name?
You guessed it, Mr Ronaldo and no one else.
I also asked....
Had he watched any Real Madrid matches? Nope.
Did he know which league they were in? Nope.
Did he know which country their league was in? Just about.
Did he know where they were in the league? Nope.
Did he know any history of the club at all? Nope. (Ok so I'm being a little harsh with this one).
Does this make him a real fan or just a kid who has been duped? Well, I think the latter.
Anyway back to the point - This stuff serves to highlight not only the power of branding but what is happening, not only in the industry of sport but the industry of games as well - The monopolization of choice and it is sadly something that I don't think will change anytime soon, not unless the majority (i.e. the kids) change their minds - but given the trend it's clear that this is being made up for them.
So back to my original point, I don't see the idea I suggested being implemented anytime soon (unless by some independent developer) but it doesn't stop me from hoping.
P.S. Perhaps Konami could take a risk get back to basics and do something like this, personally I think it would be brilliant it would be great for the community as a whole (a great game eventually sells itself) and the only people who would stand to lose out are those who are irrelevant to the nature of sport anyway.
