What if Esports was a Thing in the ‘90s: Video Games that Would’ve Benefited Most

The 90’s was an impactful year in the world of video games. During this decade, arcades fell by the wayside and home consoles began its reign of dominance, which it still maintains two decades afterward.

Now just imagine if Esports or competitive gaming was prevalent back then like it is today? What games would’ve captured the attention of hardcore gamers like Counter-Strike and League of Legends do in 2020?

Welp, that’s the very subject of our article. We’ve gone back in time to guess what 90’s classics would have benefited most from this competitive landscape. Let’s start, shall we?

Street Fighter II

What if Esports was a Thing in the ‘90s: Video Games that Would’ve Benefited Most

“Street Fighter II aux Geek Faëries 2016” by zigazou76 is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Perhaps no video game has ever influenced a game genre quite like Street Fighter II did to fighting games. Seemingly ever fight game born after it borrowed from the Capcom-produced hit.

The game’s introduction of a combo system — a first for the entire genre — made for uber intense matchups in both arcade machines and home systems. In fact, large-scale Street Fighter II tournaments were hosted back then, long before Esports entered the lexicon.

Even almost three years after its initial release, the game continues to be re-made and modernized on current consoles. That tells you everything you need to know about Street Fighter II’s legacy.

Mortal Kombat II

No doubt about it, Mortal Kombat owes much of its success to the Street Fighter franchise. But like any great game, it innovated upon the foundation that Street Fighter set, not just recycled the same old concept.

Of course, any conversation about MK2 begins with violence. The game’s excessive use of blood and “fatality” finishing moves sparked massive controversy at the time, but proved to be ahead of the “rated M for mature” curve that continues to peak in popularity nowadays.

As one of the best-selling games in video game history, there’s no doubt MK2 would’ve been devoured even more in an Esports landscape. Heck, the controversy surrounding the franchise could’ve brought extra attention to the whole sport of competitive gaming, jump starting its adoption.

Doom

First-person shooters dominate the video game industry (and with that, the Esport landscape) in 2020, but that was far from the case in the early ‘90s. That is until Doom effectively put the genre on the map and started a game revolution.

The game first dropped in 1993 for PC, equipped with 3D graphics while home consoles remained in 2D land. Within a year, an online multiplayer (on Internet dial-up) was also introduced, another rarity industry-wide.

Doom’s innovative ways don’t stop there, though. Another industry-defining feature was its free-of-cost model — which modern-day games like Fortnite and Apex Legends have capitalized off of. The insane popularity of those freebies games is ample evidence why Doom would have flourished in an Esports world.

007 Goldeneye

“007 Goldeneye” by whatleydude is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Goldeneye took Doom’s first-person formula and perfected it for the 64-bit era of consoles. For many non-PC gamers, the James Bond film-to-game adaptation was their first taste at the FPS genre — and it did not disappoint.

But what especially made Goldeneye a classic was its expansive multiplayer, specifically its split-screen local mode (up to four players). Up until then, no single game crowded groups of people around a single TV screen quite like Goldeneye, which would’ve lent itself well to the Esports era.

Goldeneye also introduced other concepts that would later become staples of the first-person shooter — headshots, context-sensitive wounds (e.g. bullets to the leg do less damage than body shots), a huge selection of weapons and maps, and over-the-top cheat codes (the iconic big head mode, for example).

Gran Turismo

Back in 2018, the FIA-Certified Gran Turismo Championships was established. The game developer studio behind Gran Tursimo, Polyphony Digital, opened the Esport league for its massively-popular racing game.

Now imagine if such a league existed in 1997 when the first-ever Gran Turismo game was released? The game would go on to become the original PlayStation’s top-selling game ever — at over 10 million units sold — and spark countless head-to-head competitions with gamers worldwide.

All these years later, each of these five games have stood the test of time. If Esports was then what it is today, there’s no question they’d be forever immortalized in video game lore.

Galit Gordon

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I'm a published author and proud US Army veteran who happens to be a gamer, so I decided to combine the two and love every minute of it! Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments and I'll be sure to get back to you.