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} }) </script> </div> </form> </fieldset> <article class="entryArticle content STeditorial"> <header class="entryHeader icon-theme"> <h1 class="entryTitle">Games and Sports </h1> </header><p class='tagLine'>Entry updated 14 June 2023. Tagged: Theme.</p><div class="browsingBtns"> <span> <input class="button PNI previous" type="button" onclick="window.location.href='/next.php?id=p&entry=games_and_sports'" value="Prev" /> </span> <span> <input class="button PNI next" type="button" onclick="window.location.href='/next.php?&entry=games_and_sports'" value="Next" /> </span> <span> <input class="button PNI incoming" type="button" onclick="window.location.href='/incoming.php?entry=games_and_sports'" value="About This Entry" title="What links to the entry; contributor initials explained; how to cite; other information" /> </span> </div><p style='float:right; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:10px; position: relative; top: 3px;'> <a href='/gallery.php?id=Lyons-Micronauts1.jpg' target='_blank'> <img src='https://x.sf-encyclopedia.com/gal/thumbs/Lyons-Micronauts1.jpg' alt='pic'></a></p> <p>This entry deals with games and sports as a theme within sf. Games based on sf are treated under a wide variety of headwords branching out from the <a href="/entry/games">Games</a> entry.</p> <p>Just as sf's concern with the <a href="/entry/arts">Arts</a> has been dominated by stories about the decline of artistry in a mechanized mass society, so its concern with sports has been much involved with representing the decline of sportsmanship. There was a marked tendency, in sf from the second half of the twentieth century, to assume that the audience-appeal of futuristic sports will be measured by their rendering of violence in terms of spectacle: the film <a href="/entry/rollerball">Rollerball</a> (<i>1975</i>), based on William <a href="/entry/harrison_william_neal">Harrison</a>'s short story "Roller Ball Murder" (September 1973 <i>Esquire</i>), is perhaps the clearest expression of this notion. The <i>Rollerball</i> scenario is echoed in the <a href="/entry/videogame">Videogame</a> series <a href="/entry/speedball">Speedball</a> (from <i>1988</i>).</p> <p>There are two forms of stereotyped competitive violence which are common in sf: the gladiatorial circus and the hunt. The arena is part of the standard apparatus of romances in the Edgar Rice <a href="/entry/burroughs_edgar_rice">Burroughs</a> tradition, and extends throughout the history of sf to such modern variants as that found in the <b>Dumarest</b> series by E C <a href="/entry/tubb_e_c">Tubb</a> (<b>1967</b> onwards). Combat between human and <a href="/entry/aliens">Alien</a> is the basis of Fredric <a href="/entry/brown_fredric">Brown</a>'s popular "Arena" (June 1944 <a href="/entry/asf">Astounding</a>) and a host of similar stories, while very many visions of a corrupt future society foresee the return of bloody games in the Roman tradition – Frederik <a href="/entry/pohl_frederik">Pohl</a>'s and C M <a href="/entry/kornbluth_c_m">Kornbluth</a>'s <i>Gladiator-at-Law</i> (June-August 1954 <a href="/entry/galaxy">Galaxy</a>; <b>1955</b>; rev <b>1986</b>) is a notable example. In the new century, Suzanne <a href="/entry/collins_suzanne">Collins</a>'s <i>The Hunger Games</i> (<b>2008</b>) revisits this <a href="/entry/dystopias">Dystopian</a> theme in a <a href="/entry/young_adult">Young Adult</a> context; this became the film <i>The</i> <a href="/entry/hunger_games_the">Hunger Games</a> (<i>2012</i>), with adaptations of novel sequels continuing the cinema franchise. The <b>BattleTech</b> <a href="/entry/shared_worlds">Shared-World</a> series (see also Robert <a href="/entry/thurston_robert">Thurston</a>) moves the formula on to a galactic stage. Ordinary hunting is extrapolated to take in alien prey in such stories as the <b>Gerry Carlyle</b> series by Arthur K <a href="/entry/barnes_arthur_k">Barnes</a> (stories June 1937-Winter 1946 <a href="/entry/tws">Thrilling Wonder</a>; coll <b>1956</b> as <i>Interplanetary Hunter</i>), and <a href="/entry/miniaturization">Miniaturizing</a> oneself to battle ferocious micro-organisms is a common future pastime in William <a href="/entry/tenn_william">Tenn</a>'s "Winthrop was Stubborn" (August 1957 <a href="/entry/galaxy">Galaxy</a> as "Time Waits for Winthrop"; vt in <i>Time in Advance</i>, coll <b>1958</b>).</p> <p>A familiar variant features human protagonists as the victims rather than the hunters; examples include <i>The</i> <a href="/entry/most_dangerous_game_the">Most Dangerous Game</a> (<i>1932</i>; vt <i>Hounds of Zaroff</i>), <i>The Sound of His Horn</i> (<b>1952</b>) by <a href="/entry/sarban">Sarban</a>, <i>Drag Hunt</i> (<b>1969</b>) by James <a href="/entry/broom_lynne_james">Broom Lynne</a>, <i>Come, Hunt an Earthman</i> (<b>1973</b>) by Philip E <a href="/entry/high_philip_e">High</a> and many works by Robert <a href="/entry/sheckley_robert">Sheckley</a>, ranging from "Seventh Victim" (April 1953 <a href="/entry/galaxy">Galaxy</a>) and "The Prize of Peril" (May 1958 <a href="/entry/fsf">F&SF</a>) – with its anticipation of associated reality <a href="/entry/television">Television</a> – to such later novels as <i>Victim Prime</i> (<b>1986</b>) and <i>Hunter/Victim</i> (<b>1987</b>); the original short "Seventh Victim" was adapted for <a href="/entry/cinema">Cinema</a> as <i>La</i> <a href="/entry/decima_vittima_la">Decima Vittima</a> (<i>1965</i>; vt <i>The Tenth Victim</i>) directed by Elio Petri. A notable series of relevant theme anthologies is the three-volume <b>Starhunters</b> series (1988-1990) edited by David A <a href="/entry/drake_david_a">Drake</a>. The oft-presumed equivalence between the spectator-appeal of sport and that of dramatized violence reached a 1970s peak in Norman <a href="/entry/spinrad_norman">Spinrad</a>'s "The National Pastime" (in <i>Nova 3</i>, anth <b>1973</b>, ed Harry <a href="/entry/harrison_harry">Harrison</a>) and the film <a href="/entry/death_race_2000">Death Race 2000</a> (<i>1975</i>), later remade as <a href="/entry/death_race">Death Race</a> (<i>2008</i>). Further film examples include <i>The</i> <a href="/entry/running_man_the">Running Man</a> (<i>1987</i>) directed by Paul Michael Glaser, <a href="/entry/existenz">eXistenZ</a> (<i>1999</i>) directed by David <a href="/entry/cronenberg_david">Cronenberg</a> and <a href="/entry/gamer">Gamer</a> (<i>2009</i>) directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor.</p> <p>An opposing trend is one which suggests that the people of the future might substitute rule-bound <a href="/entry/wargame">Wargames</a> for actual <a href="/entry/war">Wars</a>, thus avoiding large-scale slaughter of civilians. The idea was first mooted by George T <a href="/entry/chesney_george_t">Chesney</a> in <i>The New Ordeal</i> (<b>1879</b>). Sf versions of it include "Occupation: Warrior" (March 1959 <a href="/entry/science_fiction_adventures">Science Fiction Adventures</a> UK) by James <a href="/entry/white_james">White</a>, "Mercenary" (April 1962 <a href="/entry/analog">Analog</a>; exp vt <i>Mercenary from Tomorrow</i> <b>1968</b>) and its sequel <i>The Earth War</i> (<b>1963</b>) by Mack <a href="/entry/reynolds_mack">Reynolds</a>, <i>The Cold Cash War</i> (<b>1977</b>) by Robert Lynn <a href="/entry/asprin_robert_lynn">Asprin</a>, the <b>Gamester War</b> series begun with <i>The Alexandrian Ring</i> (<b>1987</b>) by William R <a href="/entry/forstchen_william_r">Forstchen</a>, <i>Surface Detail</i> (<b>2010</b>) by Iain M <a href="/entry/banks_iain_m">Banks</a> and also a number of films, including <a href="/entry/gladiatorerna">Gladiatorerna</a> (<i>1968</i>) and <a href="/entry/robot_jox">Robot Jox</a> (<i>1990</i>).</p> <p>The sf sports story is almost entirely a post-World War Two phenomenon, although the pre-World War Two pulps did feature Clifford D <a href="/entry/simak_clifford_d">Simak</a>'s "Rule 18" (July 1938 <a href="/entry/asf">Astounding</a>) – in which one of the ever-popular "all-time great" teams is actually assembled – and one or two rocket-racing stories, such as Lester <a href="/entry/del_rey_lester">del Rey</a>'s "Habit" (November 1939 <a href="/entry/asf">Astounding</a>); and much earlier van Tassel <a href="/entry/sutphen_van_tassel">Sutphen</a> had included a couple of golfing-sf stories in his <i>The Nineteenth Hole: Second Series</i> (coll <b>1901</b>). Many early post-World War Two stories are accounts of man/machine confrontation (see <a href="/entry/machines">Machines</a>; <a href="/entry/robots">Robots</a>). Examples include the golf story "Open Warfare" (May 1954 <a href="/entry/galaxy">Galaxy</a>) by James E <a href="/entry/gunn_james_e">Gunn</a>, the boxing stories "Title Fight" (December 1956 <a href="/entry/fantastic_universe">Fantastic Universe</a>) by William Campbell Gault and "Steel" (May 1956 <a href="/entry/fsf">F&SF</a>) by Richard <a href="/entry/matheson_richard">Matheson</a>, the <a href="/entry/chess">Chess</a> story "The 64-Square Madhouse" (May 1962 <a href="/entry/if">If</a>) by Fritz <a href="/entry/leiber_fritz">Leiber</a>, and the motor-racing story "The Ultimate Racer" (November 1964 <a href="/entry/if">If</a>) by Gary Wright (1930-2004), who also wrote a fine bobsled-racing sf story in "Mirror of Ice" (June 1967 <a href="/entry/galaxy">Galaxy</a>). The numerous games played in Piers <a href="/entry/anthony_piers">Anthony</a>'s <b>Apprentice Adept</b> <a href="/entry/science_and_sorcery">Science-and-Sorcery</a> sequence include, in <i>Blue Adept</i> (<b>1981</b>), a version of American football with human-led teams of uncreatively obedient <a href="/entry/androids">Android</a> players. Rowdier ball games feature in Terry Pratchett's <i>Unseen Academicals</i> (<b>2009</b>), in which the <b>Discworld</b> <a href="/entry/cities">City</a> of Ankh-Morpork tries to impose rules on the traditional violent scrummage of street football; and Lois McMaster <a href="/entry/bujold_lois_mcmaster">Bujold</a>'s <i>Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen</i> (<b>2015</b> ebook; rev <b>2016</b>), whose "boot polo" is a violent game originating in the military, played on rough terrain with three teams, awkwardly placed goals (one underwater), and the added distraction of hostile alien fauna both inhabiting and being released at intervals into the playing area.</p> <p>The changing role of the automobile in post-World War Two society provoked a number of bizarre extrapolations, including H Chandler <a href="/entry/elliott_h_chandler">Elliott</a>'s violent "A Day on Death Highway" (October 1963 <a href="/entry/galaxy">Galaxy</a>), Roger <a href="/entry/zelazny_roger">Zelazny</a>'s story about a car-fighting matador, "Auto-da-Fé" (in <i>Dangerous Visions</i>, anth <b>1967</b>, ed Harlan <a href="/entry/ellison_harlan">Ellison</a>), and Harlan <a href="/entry/ellison_harlan">Ellison</a>'s "Along the Scenic Route" (August 1969 <i>Adam</i> as "Dogfight on 101"; in <i>The Beast That Shouted Love at the Heart of the World</i>, coll <b>1969</b>). C M <a href="/entry/kornbluth_c_m">Kornbluth</a>'s <i>The Syndic</i> (December 1953-March 1954 <a href="/entry/science_fiction_adventures">Science Fiction Adventures</a>; <b>1953</b>) features a macho form of polo in which armoured vehicles replace horses and the armoured ball is moved by bursts of fire from assault weapons.</p> <p>Other popular sf themes are often combined with sf sports stories. Gambling of various kinds appears in many <a href="/entry/esp">ESP</a> stories, for obvious reasons, and superhuman powers are occasionally employed on the sports field, as in Irwin Shaw's "Whispers in Bedlam" (February 1969 <a href="/entry/playboy">Playboy</a>) and George Alec <a href="/entry/effinger_george_alec">Effinger</a>'s "Naked to the Invisible Eye" (May 1973 <a href="/entry/analog">Analog</a>). Stories which examine the possible impact of biotechnology on future sports include Howard V Hendrix's "The Farm System" (in <i>Full Spectrum</i>, anth <b>1988</b>, ed Lou <a href="/entry/aronica_lou">Aronica</a> and Shawna <a href="/entry/mccarthy_shawna">McCarthy</a>) and Ian <a href="/entry/mcdonald_ian">McDonald</a>'s "Winning" (in <i>Zenith 2</i>, anth <b>1990</b>. ed David S <a href="/entry/garnett_david_s">Garnett</a>). Full-length novels about future sport are relatively rare; examples include <i>The Mind-Riders</i> (<b>1976</b>) by Brian M <a href="/entry/stableford_brian_m">Stableford</a>, about boxing, and <i>The Last Man Is Out</i> (<b>1969</b>; vt <i>The New Atoms Bombshell</i> <b>1980</b> as by Robert Browne) by Marvin <a href="/entry/karlins_marvin">Karlins</a>, about <a href="/entry/baseball">Baseball</a> (which see for many further examples).</p> <p>Cricket is relatively rarely encountered, though Lord <a href="/entry/dunsany_lord">Dunsany</a> wrote several short <a href="/entry/fantasy">Fantasies</a> of supernatural or diabolical intervention in the game – including the <b>Jorkens</b> tale "The Unrecorded Test Match" (in <i>Jorkens Borrows Another Whiskey</i>, coll <b>1954</b>) – and Maurice <a href="/entry/richardson_maurice">Richardson</a>'s <i>The Exploits of Engelbrecht: Abstracted from the Chronicles of the Surrealist Sportsman's Club</i> (stories June 1946-April 1950 <i>Lilliput</i>; coll of linked stories <b>1950</b>; exp <b>2000</b>) features the challenge of facing a literal demon bowler (this collection also offers surreal distortions of football, golf, wrestling and other sports). Andrew <a href="/entry/weiner_andrew">Weiner</a>'s "The Third Test" (Summer 1982 <a href="/entry/interzone">Interzone</a> #2) posits that a particular cricket innings is Earth's chief attraction for visiting <a href="/entry/aliens">Aliens</a>, while Douglas <a href="/entry/adams_douglas">Adams</a> wove the game's paraphernalia into an absurdist <a href="/entry/space_opera">Space Opera</a> plot in <i>Life, the Universe and Everything</i> (<b>1982</b>); this storyline was originally submitted to <a href="/entry/doctor_who">Doctor Who</a> <i>circa</i> 1976 as "The Krikkitmen", but rejected by the current script editor. Tennis, like cricket, has few sf treatments: Aldous <a href="/entry/huxley_aldous">Huxley</a>'s <i>Brave New World</i> (<b>1932</b>) offers a throwaway line about the importation of <a href="/entry/mathematics">Mathematics</a> into the game with people of the year 623 After Ford playing tennis on a Riemann surface, while Keith <a href="/entry/roberts_keith">Roberts</a>'s "Sphairistike" (February 1984 <a href="/entry/fsf">F&SF</a>) features a Wimbledon Centre Court player who may be an <a href="/entry/androids">Android</a>. In <a href="/entry/comics">Comics</a>, Alan <a href="/entry/moore_alan">Moore</a>'s <a href="/entry/mad_scientist">Mad Scientist</a> character <b>Abelard Snazz</b> invents giant <a href="/entry/robots">Robot</a> tennis-players in "The Multi-Storey Mind Mellows Out" (March 1982 <a href="/entry/2000_ad">2000 AD</a>); unfortunately their personalities derive from the "bio-chips" of temperamental twentieth-century players, to disastrous effect.</p> <p>Games are used as a key to social advancement and control in a number of stories, including <i>The Heads of Cerberus</i> (15 August-15 October 1919 <a href="/entry/thrill_book">Thrill Book</a>; <b>1952</b>) by Francis <a href="/entry/stevens_francis">Stevens</a>, <i>World Out of Mind</i> (<b>1953</b>) by J T <a href="/entry/mcintosh_j_t">McIntosh</a>, <i>Solar Lottery</i> (<b>1955</b>; vt <i>World of Chance</i>) by Philip K <a href="/entry/dick_philip_k">Dick</a>, <i>Cosmic Checkmate</i> (<b>1962</b>) by Katherine <a href="/entry/maclean_katherine">MacLean</a> and Charles V <a href="/entry/de_vet_charles_v">de Vet</a>, and the <b>Apprentice Adept</b> <a href="/entry/science_and_sorcery">Science-and-Sorcery</a> sequence by Piers <a href="/entry/anthony_piers">Anthony</a>, beginning with <i>Split Infinity</i> (<b>1980</b>). Some sf stories produce future or alternate worlds where games are fundamental to the social fabric, as in Hermann <a href="/entry/hesse_hermann">Hesse</a>'s <i>Das Glasperlenspiel</i> (<b>1943</b>; trans M Savill as <i>Magister Ludi</i> <b>1949</b>; preferred trans Richard and Clara Winston as <i>The Glass Bead Game</i> <b>1969</b>) and Gerald <a href="/entry/murnane_gerald">Murnane</a>'s <i>The Plains</i> (<b>1982</b>). A vicious games-based alien empire (whose incredibly complex game is called "azad") is successfully challenged by the protagonist of Iain M <a href="/entry/banks_iain_m">Banks</a>'s <b>Culture</b> space opera <i>The Player of Games</i> (<b>1988</b>), who believes himself alone in this endeavour but is an unwitting pawn of his own Culture. In other novels by Philip K Dick, including <i>The Game-Players of Titan</i> (<b>1963</b>) and <i>The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch</i> (<b>1965</b>), games function as levels of pseudo-reality. Still other works deploy games not as a central theme but as both local colour and a metaphor giving insight into the culture, as with the territorial game "kol" played in the fiercely competitive society of Donald <a href="/entry/kingsbury_donald">Kingsbury</a>'s <i>Courtship Rite</i> (<b>1982</b>; vt <i>Geta</i> <b>1984</b>), or the vaguely reversi-like "Ochmir" which explicitly mirrors the alien political background of Mary <a href="/entry/gentle_mary">Gentle</a>'s <i>Golden Witchbreed</i> (<b>1983</b>). Sf writers who have shown a particular and continuing interest in games or sports include Barry N <a href="/entry/malzberg_barry_n">Malzberg</a>, who often uses surreal games to symbolize frustrating and ultimately unbeatable alienating forces – as in the apocalyptic <i>Overlay</i> (<b>1972</b>) and <i>Tactics of Conquest</i> (<b>1974</b>), and in the quasi-allegorical <i>The Gamesman</i> (<b>1975</b>) – George Alec <a href="/entry/effinger_george_alec">Effinger</a>, who also uses game situations as symbols of the limitations of rationality and freedom, notably in "Lydectes: On the Nature of Sport" (December 1975 <a href="/entry/fantastic">Fantastic</a>) and "25 Crunch Split Right on Two" (April 1975 <a href="/entry/fsf">F&SF</a>), and Piers <a href="/entry/anthony_piers">Anthony</a>, who often uses games to reflect the structures of his plots, notably in <i>Macroscope</i> (<b>1969</b>), <i>OX</i> (<b>1976</b>), <i>Steppe</i> (<b>1976</b>) and <i>Ghost</i> (<b>1988</b>).</p> <p>The game which has most frequently fascinated sf writers is <a href="/entry/chess">Chess</a>, discussed at length in its own entry. Fritz <a href="/entry/leiber_fritz">Leiber</a>'s slight "Knight's Move" (December 1965 <i>Broadside</i>; vt "Knight to Move" in <i>The Book of Fritz Leiber</i>, coll <b>1974</b>) uses two-dimensional battle games like chess and one-dimensional track games like Ludo to symbolize the opposing factions and ideologies of his <b>Change War</b> series (see <a href="/entry/changewar">Changewar</a>). Solitaire games tend to be frowned on in sf as the domain of obsessives. A crossword enthusiast, for example, is so fascinated by the grid possibilities of Martian words in Evelyn E <a href="/entry/smith_evelyn_e">Smith</a>'s "BAXBR/DAXBR" (in <i>Time to Come</i>, anth <b>1954</b>, ed August <a href="/entry/derleth_august">Derleth</a>) that he barely notices their context of imminent Martian <a href="/entry/invasion">Invasion</a>; another, in Arthur <a href="/entry/sellings_arthur">Sellings</a>'s "One Across" (May 1956 <a href="/entry/galaxy">Galaxy</a>), is lured by <a href="/entry/basilisks">Basilisk</a> clues into visualizing a crossword diagram in four <a href="/entry/dimensions">Dimensions</a>, throwing him into a fraught <a href="/entry/alternate_worlds">Alternate World</a>; he escapes with difficulty and is "cured" of crossword addiction. The typically tricky hero of Eric Frank <a href="/entry/russell_eric_frank">Russell</a>'s "Now Inhale" (April 1959 <a href="/entry/asf">Astounding</a>) will be killed by <a href="/entry/aliens">Aliens</a> once he either wins or loses a game of his choice, and opts for a competitive version of "Tower of Hanoi" which, though strictly finite, requires an unfeasible 2<sup>64</sup>-1 moves to complete. Life, a solitaire game rooted in the <a href="/entry/mathematics">Mathematics</a> of cellular automata and popularized in Martin <a href="/entry/gardner_martin">Gardner</a>'s <b>Mathematical Games</b> column for <i>Scientific American</i>, features in Piers <a href="/entry/anthony_piers">Anthony</a>'s <i>OX</i> (<b>1976</b>) and more subtly in Greg <a href="/entry/egan_greg">Egan</a>'s <i>Permutation City</i> (<b>1994</b>); the topological pencil-and-paper game Sprouts played in Anthony's <i>Macroscope</i> (<b>1969</b>; cut <b>1972</b>) was another Gardner "discovery" announced in his column. Both Life and Sprouts were invented by UK mathematician John Horton Conway (1937-2020) and his associates.</p> <p>In the late twentieth century the rapid real-world evolution of electronic arcade <a href="/entry/videogame">Videogames</a> and home-computer games sparked off a boom in stories and films where such games become too real for comfort. Often these are directed at adolescents: a game is used to conscript a space pilot in <i>The</i> <a href="/entry/last_starfighter_the">Last Starfighter</a> (<i>1984</i>), for example, and Michael Scott <a href="/entry/rohan_michael_scott">Rohan</a> offers an early example of the arcade game that is more than it seems in "Vurfing the Gwrx" (in <i>Peter Davison's Book of Alien Monsters</i>, anth <b>1982</b>, ed anon Richard <a href="/entry/evans_richard">Evans</a>). <i>Space Demons</i> (<b>1986</b>) by Gillian <a href="/entry/rubinstein_gillian">Rubinstein</a> is not untypical in sucking its protagonists into a ruthless computer-games world, much as in the film <a href="/entry/tron">Tron</a> (<i>1982</i>). (See also <a href="/entry/cyberspace">Cyberspace</a>.)</p> <p>Further notable examples of computer games in sf include "Dogfight" (July 1985 <a href="/entry/omni">Omni</a>) by Michael <a href="/entry/swanwick_michael">Swanwick</a> and William <a href="/entry/gibson_william">Gibson</a>, <i>Octagon</i> (<b>1981</b>) by Saberhagen, <i>True Names</i> (<b>1981</b> dos) by Vernor <a href="/entry/vinge_vernor">Vinge</a>, <i>Ender's Game</i> (August 1977 <a href="/entry/analog">Analog</a>; exp <b>1985</b>) by Orson Scott <a href="/entry/card_orson_scott">Card</a>, <i>God Game</i> (<b>1986</b>) by Andrew M <a href="/entry/greeley_andrew_m">Greeley</a>, <i>Only You Can Save Mankind</i> (<b>1992</b>) by Terry <a href="/entry/pratchett_terry">Pratchett</a> and <i>Bedlam</i> (<b>2013</b>) by Christopher <a href="/entry/brookmyre_christopher">Brookmyre</a> (see also <a href="/entry/virtual_reality">Virtual Reality</a>). Stories of space battles whose protagonists are revealed in the last line to be icons in a computer-game "shoot 'em up" seemed for a time to have succeeded <a href="/entry/shaggy_god_story">Shaggy God Stories</a> as the archetypal folly perpetrated by novice writers – although Fredric <a href="/entry/brown_fredric">Brown</a>'s similarly plotted "Recessional" (March 1960 <i>Dude</i>), where the protagonists are chessmen, has been much anthologized (see <a href="/entry/chess">Chess</a>). Many computer-<a href="/entry/games">Game</a> scenarios are, of course, science-fictional (see <a href="/entry/videogame">Videogame</a>), as are many of the scenarios used in <a href="/entry/role_playing_game">Role Playing Games</a> (see also <a href="/entry/game-worlds">Game-Worlds</a>).</p> <p>When it comes to inventing new games, sf writers have had limited success. There have been one or two interesting descriptions of sports played in low-gravity or gravity-free conditions, but these are usually incidental to the real concerns of the stories in which they occur; stories set in <a href="/entry/space_habitats">Space Habitats</a> frequently include descriptions of "<a href="/entry/flying">Flying</a>" games played in the vicinity of the rotational axis, and Robert A <a href="/entry/heinlein_robert_a">Heinlein</a>'s "The Menace from Earth" (August 1957 <a href="/entry/fsf">F&SF</a>) centres on flying as a leisure activity in an atmospheric storage cavern on the <a href="/entry/moon">Moon</a>. Sling-gliding, in which gliders are accelerated by massive steel whips, is a plausible and dangerous sport featured in <i>The Jaws that Bite, the Claws that Catch</i> (<b>1975</b>; vt <i>The Girl with a Symphony in her Fingers</i>) by Michael G <a href="/entry/coney_michael_g">Coney</a>. The team sport of hussade, which plays a major part in Jack <a href="/entry/vance_jack">Vance</a>'s <i>Trullion: Alastor 2262</i> (March-June 1973 <a href="/entry/amazing">Amazing</a>; <b>1973</b>), is not wholly convincing; the vaguely similar (in that play takes place over a water tank into which opponents are toppled) two-man combat game "kosho" in <i>The</i> <a href="/entry/prisoner_the">Prisoner</a> seems overtly parodic. The <a href="/entry/board_game">Board Game</a> vlet in Samuel R <a href="/entry/delany_samuel_r">Delany</a>'s <i>Triton</i> (<b>1976</b>) is cleverly presented, but the details of play are necessarily vague. This game was first written about by Joanna <a href="/entry/russ_joanna">Russ</a> in "A Game of Vlet" (February 1974 <a href="/entry/fsf">F&SF</a>). In <i>The Shockwave Rider</i> (<b>1975</b>), John <a href="/entry/brunner_john">Brunner</a> gave full rules for the board game "fencing" – a roughly Go-like game of territorial enclosure on geometric principles – but learned to his dismay that game-theory analysis rendered its seeming complexities trivial. The film <a href="/entry/quintet">Quintet</a> (<i>1979</i>) revolves around the eponymous board and/or real-life game. Terry <a href="/entry/pratchett_terry">Pratchett</a>'s later <b>Discworld</b> books feature the board game Thud, resembling <a href="/entry/chess">Chess</a> in that it is a game of stylized battle (here between dwarfs and trolls); the game was designed by Trevor Truran and is central to Pratchett's <i>Thud!</i> (<b>2005</b>).</p> <p>Gambling <a href="/entry/card_game">Card Games</a>, often only vaguely described, appear with some frequency. Examples include Bluff in Philip K <a href="/entry/dick_philip_k">Dick</a>'s <i>The Game-Players of Titan</i> (<b>1963</b>), the improvised Fizzbin in the original-series <a href="/entry/star_trek">Star Trek</a> episode "A Piece of the Action" (<i>1968</i>), raffles in Alexei <a href="/entry/panshin_alexei">Panshin</a>'s <i>Star Well</i> (<b>1968</b>), Sabacc in the <a href="/entry/star_wars_franchise">Star Wars</a> universe, Damage in Iain M <a href="/entry/banks_iain_m">Banks</a>'s <i>Consider Phlebas</i> (<b>1987</b>) – preliminary card-play is also of importance in the hugely complex game central to Banks's <i>The Player of Games</i> (<b>1988</b>) – Cripple Mister Onion in Terry <a href="/entry/pratchett_terry">Pratchett</a>'s <b>Discworld</b> sequence, in particular <i>Witches Abroad</i> (<b>1991</b>) and Tall Card in <a href="/entry/firefly">Firefly</a> (<i>2002</i>).</p> <p>Games and sports are also very common in <a href="/entry/fantasy">Fantasy</a> and <a href="/entry/science_fantasy">Science Fantasy</a>, especially that set in <a href="/entry/post-holocaust">Post-Holocaust</a> or primitive worlds, as in Piers Anthony's early trilogy (1968-1975) collected as <i>Battle Circle</i> (omni <b>1977</b>), or <i>Eclipse of the Kai</i> (<b>1989</b>) by Joe Dever and John <a href="/entry/grant_john">Grant</a>, which features vtovlry, a rugby analogue played triangularly and with throwing-axes. Indeed, the metaphoric nuances of games enliven fantasy of all sorts, from the croquet and <a href="/entry/card_game">Card Games</a> in Lewis <a href="/entry/carroll_lewis">Carroll</a>'s <b>Alice</b> books to the game systematization of <a href="/entry/psi_powers">Psi Powers</a> in Sheri S <a href="/entry/tepper_sheri_s">Tepper</a>'s <b>True Game</b> series; in both cases the arbitrary and obsessive nature of games-playing becomes an image of life itself.</p> <p>Relevant theme anthologies include <i>Arena: Sports SF</i> (anth <b>1976</b>) edited by Barry N <a href="/entry/malzberg_barry_n">Malzberg</a> and Edward L <a href="/entry/ferman_edward_l">Ferman</a>, and <i>Future Pastimes</i> (anth <b>1977</b>) edited by Scott <a href="/entry/edelstein_scott">Edelstein</a>. [BS/PN/DRL]</p> <p><b>see also:</b> <a href="/entry/leisure">Leisure</a>.</p> <p><b>previous versions of this entry</b></p> <ul><li><a href='https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/games_and_sports' target='_blank'>Internet Archive</a></li></ul><br /><br /></article></div> <div class="sideBarsWrapper"> <div class="sideBarsColsWrapper clearfix"> <div class="column sideBar12 clearfix"> <div class="columnForm"><aside id="blogFeed" class="widget"> <div class="content STeditorial clearfix"> <h2>Recently visited entries<span style="background:url(/images/thingSFE2.png) !important"></span></h2><ul style='width: 50%; float: left;'> </ul> <p align=center style="float:right; padding-top:20px; padding-bottom:20px;">ISSN 3049-7612<br /> <a href="/facts.php?id=logo"> <img src="/images/VitMan.gif" width=150 height=150 title="Click for larger version of this SFE logo"></a><br /> <b><a href="/donate.php"><img src="/images/Paypal-Donate.gif" WIDTH="92" HEIGHT="26" BORDER="0" /></a><br /><a href="/">Home/Welcome page</a></b></p><div style="margin-bottom:10px;"></div></div> </aside><aside id="blogFeed" class="widget"> <div class="content STeditorial clearfix"> <h2><i>SFE</i> Special Features<span></span></h2><p style="margin-top: 10px;"><input type="button" value="What’s New" style="width: 150px !important;" class="button primary" onclick="window.location.href='/whatsnew.php'">  Latest entries; 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