Tecmo Classic Arcade: Tecmo Bowl (1987, 2005, Xbox)

I know this is cheating a little, but bear with me…

I’ve spent most of this blog mourning. I’ve lamented the lost arts of obstacle placement and locomotion and the developer psychology of player psychology and of caring. Now I write about a game where nobody cared about any of these things, least of all caring. And it’s a great game precisely because they didn’t.

Don’t get me wrong. I maintain that all first-person shooter developers should aspire to Takahashi Meijin no Bouken Jima’s mastery of enemy placement and to Compile’s inventiveness and re-inventiveness. But that’s not to say these are necessary ingredients to a great game. Happy accidents can and have happened. The move cancelling mechanic that defined Street Fighter II and, as a result, all 2D fighting games, was a glitch. In 2002, the discovery of another Street Fighter glitch, roll-canceling to give moves unintended invincibility, reinvigorated a stagnant Capcom vs. SNK 2 scene, turning CvS2 into an entirely new game. In 1987, a game of serendipitous accidents would be released in arcades. It would be buried by the legacy of its sequels and forgotten until its 2005 Tecmo Arcade Classics release. Then it would be forgotten again.

 

That game is Tecmo Bowl (1987). Not the NES Tecmo Bowl (1989), the original arcade game. Tecmo Bowl was a relative arcade success, but on the rare occasion when it finds its name in print today, is typically written off as an ugly stepping stone on the way to the greatness that is the worshipped Tecmo Super Bowl series. But do not be seduced by Tecmo '89's licensed NFL teams or selectable plays or differentiable players or, uh, field goals, because Tecmo '87 holds up to competitive player better than any of the console Bowls because of its free-wheelin’, no-playbook-havin’ spontaneity--not being tethered to a scripted play kindles creativity. It’s also more balanced than '89: you don’t lose a down because your opponent successfully guessed one of your four available plays, and both teams—yes, there are only two teams—are identical. It’s also more intense: the inability to punt or attempt field goals makes every 4^th down a white knuckle affair. It's also more skill-based: fumbles weren’t coded into the game, mitigating luck’s influence.

The exclusion of fumbles, punts, field goals, and play books is what makes Tecmo great. These were not conscious, progressive design choices. These were mechanics that, as legend has it, were omitted because the developers didn’t understand them. The Japanese programmers at Tecmo weren’t football fans. Supposedly, their only reference point for the game was a rulebook. Dimitri Criona, former director of sales and marketing for Tecmo USA, testifies:

The guys who did the game literally sat down with an NFL rulebook and read the rules of football. And because of that, they were able to program a game without bias. If you take an American programmer, he is going to have some biases about the game. But if you take a Japanese programmer, he’s going to create a program that follows the rules. (Power Up, 219)

The idea of a football game without elective kicking being “a program that follows the rules” aside, there is something to be said for unfamiliarity, removal, and leaving oneself open to inspiration (more on this later), which I think is what Criona means by “unbiased.” An under-contrived game is less likely to be a good game than an over-contrived one, but it’s also less likely to be boring. Sure, Day Z and its ilk are objectively better multiplayer games, but what’s honestly more appealing: collecting sticks and rocks for use in heavy-handed crafting systems, or hurling a so-high-it-leaves-the-screen 4^th-and-28 Hail Mary to your buddy as he freestyles a route on his way to the end zone? Both games are about using limited resources creatively and the liberation of constraint (see also: writing poetry that conforms to meter). But I’ve seen a friend empty a celebratory beer over his head while playing only one. See if you can guess which.

It was the second thing. It was Tecmo.

 Highest Recommendation