''Chaos League'' is a 2004

fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction that involves supernatural or Magic (supernatural), magical elements, often including Fictional universe, imaginary places and Legendary creature, creatures. The genre's roots lie in oral traditions, ...

-based

sports management game A sports video game is a video game that simulates the practice of sports. Most sports have been recreated with video games, including team sports, track and field, extreme sports, and combat sports. Some games emphasize playing the sport (such ...

developed by Cyanide Studios and published by

Digital Jesters Digital Jesters was a British video game publisher, based in Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire. The company was founded in 2003 by veterans from CDV UK (after the UK office was shut by CDV), and their first UK-releases were TrackMania and Virtu ...

. The game is a spin on

American football American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular American football field, field with goalposts at e ...

, the violence of the

Medieval football Medieval football is a modern term used for a wide variety of the localised informal football games which were invented and played in Europe, England during the Middle Ages. Alternative names include folk football, mob football and Shrovetide fo ...

with no rules and

rugby Rugby may refer to: Sport * Rugby football in many forms: ** Rugby union: 15 players per side *** American flag rugby *** Beach rugby *** Mini rugby *** Rugby sevens, 7 players per side *** Rugby tens, 10 players per side *** Snow rugby *** Tou ...

-style of sports yet set in a

world with teams being made up of fantasy races such as dwarves,

elves An elf (: elves) is a type of humanoid supernatural being in Germanic folklore. Elves appear especially in North Germanic mythology, being mentioned in the Icelandic ''Poetic Edda'' and the ''Prose Edda''. In medieval Germanic-speakin ...

orcs An orc (sometimes spelt ork; ), in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth fantasy fiction, is a race of humanoid monsters, which he also calls "goblin". In Tolkien's ''The Lord of the Rings'', orcs appear as a brutish, aggressive, ugly, and malevol ...

and

undead The undead are beings in mythology, legend, or fiction that are deceased but behave as if they were alive. A common example of an undead being is a cadaver, corpse reanimated by supernatural forces, by the application of either the deceased's o ...

, along with the use of magic and other fictional elements during a "match". The tone of the game is

satirical Satire is a genre of the visual arts, visual, literature, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently Nonfiction, non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ...

with comedic

color commentary A color commentator or expert commentator is a sports commentator who assists the main (play-by-play) commentator, typically by filling in when play is not in progress. The person may also be referred to as a summariser (outside North America) ...

and adverts for fictional in-game universe products. An official expansion was later released in 2005 bundled with the original, titled ''Chaos League: Sudden Death'' that added new features and gameplay tweaks. While not a direct video game adaption, ''Chaos League'' bears resemblance to

Games Workshop Games Workshop Group (often abbreviated as GW) is a British manufacturer of miniature wargames, based in Nottingham, England. Its best-known products are ''Warhammer (game), Warhammer'' and ''Warhammer 40,000''. Founded in 1975 by John Peake ...

's ''

Blood Bowl ''Blood Bowl'' is a miniatures board game created by Jervis Johnson for the British games company Games Workshop as a parody of American football. The game was first released in 1986 and has been re-released in new editions since. ''Blood ...

'' tabletop

board game A board game is a type of tabletop game that involves small objects () that are placed and moved in particular ways on a specially designed patterned game board, potentially including other components, e.g. dice. The earliest known uses of the ...

, which is also about fantasy sports. Cyanide Studios would later develop the video game version of ''Blood Bowl'' in 2009, which itself utilizes certain features from ''Chaos League''.

Gameplay

''Chaos League'' falls into a multiple genre category, both

real time strategy Real-time strategy (RTS) is a subgenre of strategy video games that does not progress incrementally in turns, but allow all players to play simultaneously, in "real time." By contrast, in turn-based strategy (TBS) games, players take turns to pl ...

and

sports games A sports video game is a video game that simulates the practice of sports. Most sports have been recreated with video games, including team sports, track and field, extreme sports, and combat sports. Some games emphasize playing the sport (such ...

as the game involves war based tactics like unit positions and fighting strategies however the main goal of the game to score points by getting a pig skin ball to the opposite end zone, very much like the same rules found in

American Football American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular American football field, field with goalposts at e ...

and

. Players are given a choice of 10 different fantasy based races (13 in Sudden Death) to play as their team, each with their own style of play, skill and tactics. The player then has to handle the team's finances in order to hire different players like Linemen, Quarterbacks etc. after of which can name them individually to their liking. When gameplay starts, players are given 1 minute to set up their formation, after game starts in real time. The player can click on individual teammates and give them an order like attack opponent and pick up and/or throw. Each game lasts 10 minutes, after players can be upgraded to gain extra speed or strength or to add new skills or magic abilities, all from gaining experience during the last game they played like scoring or crippling an opposing teammate. Other aspects that differ from normal sports games include causing player knock outs, injuries or even deaths. ''Chaos League'' also includes rather crude options like stamping on downed players, intervening

hooligans Hooliganism is disruptive or unlawful behavior such as rioting, bullying and vandalism, often in connection with crowds at sporting events. A hooligan is a person that engages in illicit reckless behaviors and is a public nuisance. Etymology ...

, drugging players before games and bribing or assaulting the referee when the rules are broken. The main basis of the game's comical style is from the commentary, done by a pair of dysfunctional ''Chaos League'' enthusiasts that would insult both each other, the fans and the players in the current game. The Sudden Death add on expanded the features to include team clans to help during gameplay, fighting the ref, and aging players over time, requiring new players every few seasons.

''Blood Bowl''

According to

Eurogamer ''Eurogamer'' is a British video game journalism website launched in 1999 alongside parent company Gamer Network. In 2008, it started in the formerly eponymous trade fair EGX (Eurogamer Expo until 2013) organised by its parent company. Fr ...

, Cyanide originally pitched the game idea to

in hopes of developing a licensed ''

'' video game. When they were rejected, they developed Chaos League independently. Besides the obvious connections to the style of the game itself, both being violent fantasy sports, minor similarities were also noticeable to ''Blood Bowl'' fans. Most notable were the recurring skills in both like "Mighty Blow", "Bulldoze" and "Projectile". Even during a loading menu in after games, a well known red sun with an Orc face, usually found on Games Workshop inks can be seen in the background. Games Workshop has announced that Cyanide Studios now have a license to create computer games based on ''Blood Bowl'' and that "Any differences between Games Workshop and Cyanide have been amicably settled for an undisclosed sum, and as part of the settlement the Chaos League title has been assigned to Games Workshop". The game ''

'' was released in Q3 2009 for the PC,

PlayStation Portable The PlayStation Portable (PSP) is a handheld game console developed and marketed by Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Computer Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on December 12, 2004, in North America on March 24, 2005, and in PA ...

Nintendo DS The is a foldable handheld game console produced by Nintendo, released globally across 2004 and 2005. The DS, an initialism for "Developers' System" or "Dual Screen", introduced distinctive new features to handheld games: two LCD screens worki ...

and

Xbox 360 The Xbox 360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. As the successor to the Xbox (console), original Xbox, it is the second console in the Xbox#Consoles, Xbox series. It was officially unveiled on MTV on May 12, 2005, with detail ...

References

{{Cyanide 2004 video games Cyanide (company) games Digital Jesters games Fantasy sports video games Focus Entertainment games Multiplayer and single-player video games Orcs in popular culture Sports management video games Video games developed in France Windows games Windows-only games