The Games of the Future — a competition that combines traditional sports with e-sports played on a computer — have touched down in greater Mexico City for a three-day run.
From Friday through Sunday, professionals and amateurs will be competing in phygital soccer, phygital basketball, dance simulation and tactical combat at Soccer City, a sports complex in the municipality of Tlalnepantla in México state.
Both teams and individuals will be seeking to qualify for the second edition of the Games of the Future, to be held in November in the United Arab Emirates.
Last year, the event made its debut in Kazan, Russia with more than 310 teams from 116 countries, according to Games of the Future CEO Igor Stolyarov. The two-week competition drew 3.2 billion views online, according to the sports website Inside the Games.
“Young people, who were our target audience, enjoyed the format, and we also received positive feedback from around the world,” Stolyarov said last year, when the prize pool totaled US $10 million and the opening ceremony was attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin and leaders from Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.
Phygital Games México will feature at least four categories out of the 21 that were contested in Russia. “Phygital” is a mashup of “physical” and “digital,” and the main objective is scoring the most points in the two formats.
“Get hyped for the ultimate mash-up of physical skills and digital thrills as the world’s best athletes and gamers collide in what’s shaping up to be an epic, futuristic showdown,” the Games of the Future writes on its website.
In Mexico City, the marquee sport will be phygital soccer, which starts with two three-minute halves of EA Sports video soccer on PlayStation 5; after that, there will be a physical 5-on-5 soccer match lasting 10 minutes.
Two players with experience in Mexico’s top professional league, Liga MX, are expected to be part of the Mexican team, which goes by the nickname Quetzales: Jorge “Burrito” Hernández, 35, and Edy Brambila, 39. Two other Liga MX veterans, Melvin Brown, 45, and Joahan Rodríguez, 49, are slated to be coaches.
Last year in Russia, the Quetzales squad placed third in phygital football behind the Peñarol team from Uruguay and the Lokomotiv squad from Moscow.
Another competition in Mexico City is phygital basketball. It includes a game to 19 points on the NBA 2K video game, and then a 2-on-2 IRL game until 39 points (IRL stands for “in real life”).
The dance competition includes following steps in the arcade video game Just Dance; and tactical combat includes teams facing off in the video game Counter-Strike 2 followed by a physical game of laser tag in which teams seek to defuse a virtual bomb.
Last year’s Games of the Future in Russia also included popular e-sports titles such as Dota 2 and World of Tanks, alongside physical sports such as skateboarding, martial arts and cycling. Drone racing and robot battles were also part of the mix, although phygital soccer and phygital basketball received the bulk of last year’s prize money: US $1.25 million each.
In Mexico City, 250 competitors from throughout the country (and beyond) are expected to participate, and organizers think 2,000 or so spectators will attend. The competitions will be held from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. each day, with finals slated to begin at 6 p.m. Sunday.
The festival is expected to position Mexico as an emerging leader in phygital sports.
In recent years, Russia has taken the reins, showing a high level of interest and investment in both e-sports and phygital sports.
This has caused some concern for Mexico’s northern neighbor, according to a letter that Sen. Mitt Romney sent last year to U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan. It expressed concerns that Russia’s growing influence in the e-sports arena could pose a “significant threat to America.”
With reports from Milenio and Noticias Neo
