Backyard Sports

''Backyard Sports'' (originally branded as ''Junior Sports'' and then ''Humongous Sports'') is a video game series released for consoles, computers, and mobile devices created by Humongous Entertainment. The series is best known for starring a diverse cast of fictional children as well as child versions of famous professional sports athletes, such as Albert Pujols, Paul Pierce, Barry Bonds, Tim Duncan, Clint Mathis, Kevin Garnett, Tom Brady, David Ortiz, Joe Thornton, and Andy Macdonald. The ''Backyard Sports'' series was previously licensed by the five major professional American sports leagues: Major League Baseball (MLB), Major League Soccer (MLS), the National Football League (NFL), the National Basketball Association (NBA), and the National Hockey League (NHL), as well as their affiliated players associations. The series has changed ownership and developers several times since Humongous's closure in 2005 and has endured a years-long hiatus from 2010 to 2024 (excluding a brief mobile game revival in 2015), when the franchise was revived by its current publisher Playground Productions.

The series includes five sub-series based on different team sports—'' Backyard Baseball'', ''Backyard Soccer'' (association football), '' Backyard Football'' (American football), '' Backyard Basketball'', and '' Backyard Hockey'' (ice hockey)—as well as the single game non-team sport-based ''Backyard Skateboarding''. In the games, players form a team consisting of Backyard Kids and (in most entries) professional athletes as children, which players take through a "Backyard League" season, attempting to become the champions of their chosen sport. Players can create their own custom characters, starting in ''Backyard Football'' (1999). An additional aspect of the games is the use of Power-Ups, allowing players to gain "Super-abilities". For instance, "Super-Dunk" allows a basketball player to make a dunk from nearly anywhere on the court, "Leap Frog" allows a football player to jump over the entire defensive line, and "Ice Cream Truck" causes the other team to be distracted for a brief period.

History

1997–2005: Under Humongous Entertainment

The series began in late 1997 when Humongous Entertainment, owned by GT Interactive, created the first game in the franchise: '' Backyard Baseball''. Later, GT Interactive was purchased by Infogrames and was renamed as Infogrames, Inc. Infogrames allowed Humongous Entertainment to expand the series, and Humongous later developed more titles such as ''Backyard Soccer'', '' Backyard Football'', '' Backyard Basketball'', '' Backyard Hockey'', and ''Backyard Skateboarding''. Following the buyout by Infogrames, these titles from the ''Backyard'' series were released for game consoles, including the GameCube, Game Boy Advance, PlayStation 2, Xbox 360, and Wii. In 2003, Infogrames, Inc. was renamed as Atari, Inc.

2005–2010: Under Humongous, Inc.

In August 2005, Atari, Inc. sold Humongous Entertainment to their majority parent Infogrames Entertainment SA for shares worth . After the sale, Infogrames shuttered Humongous Entertainment and secured the studio's assets to Humongous, Inc., a holding company formed solely for this purpose. With this point, newer ''Backyard Sports'' titles were developed by other studios for consoles and computers, with Atari, Inc. continuing to hold publishing rights to the series under license from Humongous, Inc. In March 2008, Infogrames purchased the remaining shares of Atari, Inc. that they didn't own and renamed itself to Atari SA the following year.Infogrames Entertainment S.A. and Atari, Inc. Announce Agreement to Merge: Financial News
Yahoo! Finance The two Atari businesses continued to release entries in the series within this time.

2013–2020: Post-sale and attempted relaunch

In July 2013, private equity firm The Evergreen Group bought the ''Backyard Sports'' franchise during the Atari bankruptcy proceedings for its portfolio company, Epic Gear LLC.

In February 2014, Day6 Sports Group acquired the franchise from Epic Gear. The company announced to relaunch the franchise in December with ''Backyard Sports NBA Basketball'' for smartphones and tablets, with Golden State Warriors point guard Stephen Curry as the cover athlete. Two mobile games, ''Backyard Sports: Baseball 2015'' and ''Baseball Sports: NBA Basketball 2015'', were released in February 2015, but Day6 did not release any further titles afterward, as the company was acquired by a European investment group in 2016 and later went out of business in 2020.

In April 2019, Humongous's social media pages tweeted an image of the original ''Junior Sports'' logo, hinting at a possible re-release of the original games and/or the developer having re-secured the rights to the series proper, but a week prior, Humongous replied to a Twitter post saying that they didn't own the rights to the franchise.

2020–present: New ownership and full brand relaunch

After Day6's closure in 2020, the franchise was purchased by Ari Pinchot and Stuart Avi Savitsky via Backyard Sports LLC in 2021. While Backyard Sports LLC owns the trademarks associated with the brand, in 2024, Playground Productions LLC began to work with Pinchot and Savitsky in relaunching the IP across gaming and other verticals. This collaboration was accompanied by an animated trailer featuring several of the Backyard Kids preparing to start a game of baseball.

The franchise regained media attention in January 2024, when NFL player Jason Kelce, in an episode of his and his brother Travis's podcast '' New Heights'', reminisced about playing ''Backyard Football'' and ''Backyard Baseball'', and stated his desire to purchase the rights to the brand to develop a new game in the series. It received further attention that August when Bobby Witt Jr. of the Kansas City Royals used a baseball bat themed after Pablo Sanchez, a popular character in the series, to hit a home run against the Cincinnati Reds during Major League Baseball's Players' Weekend.

Playground Productions and developer Mega Cat Studios began the revival of ''Backyard Sports'' with a series of remastered classic titles, starting with '' Backyard Baseball '97'', which was released on October 10, 2024, exactly 27 years after the original ''Backyard Baseball'''s release. Playground Productions plans to bring the remasters to mobile devices while developing a new original ''Backyard Sports'' title, which is expected to release in 2026.

In early 2025, Playground Productions confirmed to ''Rolling Stone'' that they had signed over 60 athletes to rejoin or debut in the franchise, including Barry Sanders, Lisa Leslie, Dan Marino, and Mark McGwire.

Games in the series

Other media

In 2002, a live-action animated hour-long special based on the '' Backyard Football'' games entitled ''Backyard Basics'' aired on CBS on November 16, featuring the then quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles, Donovan McNabb.

In 2016, Cross Creek Pictures and Crystal City Entertainment were reportedly in development of a film based on ''Backyard Sports'' with producers Brian Oliver and Ari Daniel Pinchot. No news about the film has been revealed since.

Playground Productions announced in 2024, along with the announcement of a new ''Backyard Sports'' title, that they have plans to expand the franchise into film.

Notes

References

External links

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Backyard Sports Series
Atari games
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Fantasy sports video games
Humongous Entertainment games
Infogrames games
Video game franchises
Video game franchises introduced in 1997
Video games developed in the United States