3 Games That Would Never Work As An Esport

Esports have a certain set of unwritten rules that many gamers would bat an eyebrow over at the thought of them. Games with high amounts of luck are often looked down upon in a competitive scene, and for good reason too! Games that rely too much on luck can easily mitigate skill which can turn away even the most avid of Esports fans. Luck also has the chance to make for some hilarious moments but for the sake of competition, these games just wouldn’t work. Here are some of our favorite games that would just flat out never work in the Esports scene.

Mario is unequivocally one of the most recognizable characters in gaming and single-handedly saved a dying industry with Super Mario Bros on the NES. The plumber is no stranger when it comes to branching out to different genres and after trying his hand with kart racing and other sports he wound up settling down with board games. The Mario Party franchise has spanned over 10 entries at this point in time and it has seen its fair share of ups and downs. There are many reasons why this game just flat out wouldn’t work and the bulk of them have to do with luck playing its part in the game. As a brief overview, the game has several boards with different gimmicks and each player moves with a dice block. The dice block alone is a huge factor in terms of player success. If you don’t roll well enough you simply can’t compete against the others. There are ways to help mitigate this by purchasing items with coins, the same currency used to buy stars, the games ultimate end goal. Coins can be earned by either landing on blue spaces, random event spaces, and mini-games. The mini-games are easily the most skill-intensive aspect of Mario Party and doing well on these can give you a significant edge against your opponents. This is however offset by a specific event known as chance time. Chance time has the chance to completely switch stars and coins with any rival. Something like this can bring someone from first to last place in the span of a single turn which is extremely exciting for one player but terrifying for the other. In a game like Rocket League that would be the equivalent of flipping a coin halfway through the match and whoever wins gets 10 free goals. It can be impossible to make a comeback due to something like this which can be hilarious yet heartbreaking. Truth be told, we’ve seen players take this game pretty seriously which has the unwanted side effects of losing a friendship over a star but we digress. While the game is extremely entertaining, luck doesn’t make it consistent enough for many players, but if poker is can be a professional sport then maybe Mario party could have a future in Esports.

As if Mario wasn’t enough, the blue blur himself also made his own foray into the board game genre. What sets apart Sonic Shuffle is that rather than dice players use a plethora of cards for their movement. Players are able to see their own cards but can’t see their opponents, they can however still use other players cards. As if that weren’t enough there are combat mechanics to the game where players gain items by fighting on battle spaces. Sonic Shuffle doesn’t have as extreme luck as Mario Party’s chance time but that doesn’t take away from how powerful items and events are. Board games are inherently a power struggle and can make even something as simple as keeping your resources difficult. Sonic Shuffle offers unique abilities for each character which can further complicate balance but also make it more dynamic. The mini-games also range from skill-based challenges to complete guessing which will inevitably lead to upsets. In some aspects, Sonic Shuffle does more to balance things compared to Mario Party but we still don’t think it qualifies as an Esports ready game.

Now we know what you’re thinking, Smash Bros is an awesome Esports game, how could it be on the list? What we know as competitive Smash is a completely different game compared to what Smash was intended to be. Smash was never intended to be a highly competitive game and items are one of the largest contributors to that. Items can range from being fairly tame such as giving a player a cool beam sword to fight with to flat out invincibility and extra lives. In a game where every stock counts, this can seriously make matches lopsided depending on the items in play. Some of the other culprits are items like the master ball and certain assist trophies which summon allies to help out the player during a fight. These extra characters can make gaining a lead far easier than you’d expect as they can do the work while a player can sit back and run away. Competitive Smash aims to minimize luck as much as possible and given that items can appear at any given time, it can make things very erratic for both parties. Stages are also a pretty big factor for Smash as an Esport. Stages are capable of being just as random as items in that they can have effects that are unpredictable (but reactable) for players such as Spear Pillar’s inverted controls and laser beam attacks. Moving stages are also not typically seen in Smash as an Esport due to the unusual situations it can lead to. Most stages that are tournament legal lack a moving component for specifically this reason. Smash is one of the few games where components of it had to be removed for the sake of competition but thankfully we’ve managed to find a healthy balance that allows for skilled players to show their prowess.

Luck has it’s own place and these games are just some examples of some hilarious situations that can occur within video games. Esports need to be able to strike this balance for the sake of competition and we believe these games are exciting but they probably wouldn’t work as well because of the lack of balance. What are some games out there that you think wouldn’t work in the Esports scene? Be sure to let us know below!

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