While some say it’s a result of being sports fans themselves, that seems to be the exception rather than the rule. More representative is Greg Lobanov, maker of Chicory and Wandersong, games about art and music respectively – “things I already knew a fair bit about” – who is now tackling the world of sport, in the forthcoming Beastieball. Lobanov acknowledges that he’s coming at the topic from an outsider, “fish out of water” perspective. While he went to a high school that prioritised athletic scholarships, he “didn’t fit in at all”, being less interested in the real thing than with its depiction in anime and manga, where sport is a popular subgenre. “I grew up on Prince Of Tennis,” he recalls But for years he has wanted to make a game, initially inspired by his experiences cycling across the US, that focused on community and cooperation. “A game about building a team.” Something that allowed the player to put together a roster and strategise around their individual strengths and weaknesses. “And sport seemed like a really natural fit for that idea.” As for how’d he present it, Lobanov looked at a world typically driven by split-second decisions and reflexes, and landed on a perhaps unlikely answer: a turn-based tactics game. “I wanted a game where you win or lose based on your understanding of the players in your team and how they work together.” The easiest way to represent that was through player stats, he reasoned, and that in turn lent itself to a game of strategy. And remarkably, Lobanov is not the first developer to come to this conclusion.
A year before Beastieball was unveiled at 2023’s Day Of The Devs event, the same summer showcase introduced us to Ustwo Games’ Desta: The Memories Between. Asked why a developer best known for creating newcomer-friendly mobile puzzle games would de
