No 'Mario & Sonic' for Paris 2024 due to the International Olympic Committee

This year we were left without a game for consoles and PC related to the Olympic Games. A trend that we have had since Barcelona ‘92 and that collected several of the Olympic sports to bring the experience to our homes. While the explanation we reported yesterday had a strong support, this morning the official details were revealed pointing to the International Olympic Committee.

According to a report from Eurogamer, the IOC has decided to end its relationship with Nintendo and SEGA “in order to explore deals with new partners, NFTs, and esports.” This not only ends the 17-year run of Mario & Sonic, but also the many Olympics-inspired titles.

“They wanted to look at other partners and NFTs and esports,” mentioned Producer Lee Cocker, a veteran who worked on the series. “Basically the IOC wanted to bring [it] back to themselves internally and look at other partners so they would get more money.” This internal change by the IOC was a game called Olympics Go! Paris 2024, published by nWay, which includes an “officially licensed, commemorative Paris 2024 NFT digital pin collection”.

Other details to consider

While the decision for these games was made by the International Olympic Committee, there is also the perspective of the developers. This week, Christopher Paul, professor of communication and media at Seattle University, explained another perspective behind the lack of games this year.

“Sports games are extremely time-sensitive products that are only bought at the start of the sporting season. With Olympic video games, it’s even worse: The publisher only has a two-month window every four years during which it can hope to sell it,” he explained. Other factors, such as the high cost and development time, as well as the payment of an official license, make the number of copies needed to recover an investment impossible when this competition lasts only about 17 days.