Why Maximum Football went F2P in the traditionally premium sports game space

With few exceptions, the sports genres in video games are dominated by triple-A franchises put out by major publishers. Whether it be 2K’s NBA and NHL series, Sony’s MLB: The Show, or EA Sports’ redoubtable list, when most people want to play a sport video game, they usually reach for one of these games — which are always premium titles, usually with yearly iterations. So how does a free-to-play game compete in that same space? Maximum Entertainment believes it’s found a way with its upcoming title, Maximum Football.

At this point, it’s practically a meme in the games industry that sports games come out every year, demand a princely price, and yet don’t change very much or add much new content in each successive year. This has not stopped player demand for football games — in July alone, EA Sports College Football 25 was the best-selling game in America (and the second-best, thanks to sales of the MVP bundle). Maximum, however, has a different approach: Launching a game in free-to-play, then iterating on it with feedback from the fans.