Virtually foul or virtually fair? FIFA, fair play and video gaming

Abstract

The current explosion in the popularity of video games has lead to a burgeoning academic study of games and gaming. To date, the majority of empirical research has focused on the social and psychological effects of gaming, whilst the textual and narrative analyses of specific games and games genres have drawn on the techniques more often associated with critical film and literature studies. This chapter uses totally different techniques to analyse football video games and gaming. It draws on legal theory and notions of rule obedience to explore some possible problems that could be associated with the range of FIFA licensed video games in their current form. It focuses in particular on the ability to cheat in the virtual world of the video game and the lack of any reference in these FIFA licensed products to the Code of Conduct, the Laws of Football or indeed to any contextualising of fair play at all. This is contrasted with FIFA’s ever-growing emphasis on fair play and sporting conduct and its grandiose visions for the sporting enlightenment of footballers. The symbolic impact on FIFA’s fair play drive is analysed in the light of its most popular licensed product seemingly encouraging the use of instrumental violence to achieve victory when FIFA itself is attempting to punish more severely these precise forms of conduct when perpetrated in ‘real’ games. Underpinning this discussion is the continual prospect of litigation for sports injuries and whether a failure to promote or enforce adequately a Code of Conduct such as FIFA’s could lead to a governing body’s liability for injuries caused during participation. Post Watson v British Boxing Board of Control, this could now be a point of more than mere academic interest as governing bodies can, in certain circumstances, find themselves legally responsible for the safety of those playing their sport.