If you’re a fan of football games, you’ll know they’re likely a familiar affair at this point. A continuous river of annual releases, slight upgrades, and the prioritisation of simulating a real game of footy over anything too drastic. This might even be a bit of a stretch, with the majority of football fans starting and ending with EA Sports FC.
Enter Rematch, which has proven exceptionally popular since its release last month. The game managed to find a gap between the big-budget defenders and snuck in a shot on goal. CEO of developer Sloclap, Pierre Tarno, told Eurogamer that this current sports game ecosystem offered the perfect opportunity to tap into a vast community.
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Although it turns out, not necessarily football fans! Eurogamer is home to some big fans of Sloclap’s moreish sports game, but even we can’t deny that the Rematch players are sometimes infuriating, which now is a lot easier to understand. Tarno claims: “There was a space, clearly. I do think however that our fans go further than those of sports games. In fact, we see via data, currently the core audience of Rematch lean towards those who play online competitive games rather than those who are fans of football.”
This is true of the developers themselves, too. It may surprise you that even the developers at Slapclap aren’t a collective of football fanatics. Tarno would go on to explain: “Loads of people in the team don’t really care about football at all. But quite early on in the project, team mates who weren’t super convinced by it – [after] when we ran internal tournaments – told me ‘I get it now. I don’t give a s**t about football, but this really struck something in me.’ The dynamics, the team play, I think those are what make it interesting for players even if they don’t like or play football games.”
Tarno’s reasoning for why the Rematch community has broken out this way is a simple one: “First of all I think it’s something that’s going to evolve. I think the main reason is the main portion of our untapped audience are players who are not as savvy about games, are perhaps not hardcore gamers, and are as such less aware of new releases. They may not inform themselves as much as core gamers who follow the news, monitor new releases, and will jump on games as they come out.”
It’s this ocean of sports fans that Slowclap aims to dive into through Rematch. Doing so, however, will take time: “They play FIFA, but they don’t read Eurogamer. Maybe they play FIFA and Call of Duty! But they’re just waiting for their annual release. To reach them it’s about word of mouth, continuing to communicate, and keep rolling out updates.”
As with all competitive games, the play styles in fashion change over time, new players become more familiar with the mechanics and a more established audience is cemented for the longhaul. Maybe, if we get our wish, goalies will stop trying to flick the ball over their head from inside their own area. We can hope.
