To License or Not to License: MMA Video Games Take the Test

There are certain kinds of products in which the official league or team license is essential.  Trading cards, jerseys and collectible figurines, for example, feel cheap without the official logos and marks.  For novelty items like bottle openers and coffee mugs, it might not make that much of a difference.

So where do video games fit in this?  I remember around 20 years ago playing Roger Clemens MVP baseball, which, obviously not having any MLB or MLBPA licenses, used city names with new nicknames and altered versions of player names (Pete Harnisch of the “Houston Mustangs” was “Harnsyl” , Greg Maddox of the “Chicago Swords” was “Gaddox”).  It was rudimentary, but the game play was fun, and we didn’t mind too much that the names were weird, since we knew who they were.

Here’s a fun list of the rosters for the 1991 version of the game.

Today it’s rare that a sports game is released without the official license, although there are a few exceptions.  I think the drive toward realism in the game play has made it tough for gamers to accept someone named “Jeetz” or “Arodguez” for the “New York Rebels” instead of the Yankees.

I bring this up because I have seen two recent items on two mixed martial arts games, one licensed by the UFC, the other not.  According to the announcement by UFC owner Zuffa and THQ, maker of UFC 2009 Undisputed, which uses more than 80 actual UFC fighters, the game has shipped more than 3.5 million units to reach high status on the Xbox 360 and Sony Playstation platforms.  In the other, sports gaming leader Electronic Arts announced it had added Dan Henderson to a growing roster on its MMA game that includes Randy Couture and Fedor Emeliananko and numerous others who either don’t compete in the UFC or, in the case of Couture, did not sign on to its licensing agreement.

The EA game has an agreement with Strikeforce, a reputable MMA outfit, but one whose influence is significantly behind that of the UFC, which is nearly synonymous with the sport in the eyes of fans and marketers.

I’ll be interested to see fans’ and gamers’ reactions to and reviews of the 2010 versions of both games when they come out.  And if the game play of the EA, non-UFC-licensed version is better, would that trump the ability to compete as Anderson Silva or Chuck Liddell.