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Subject: OT: How to create a fantasy sports game?
Posted by: beebop
- [36528124] Fri, Jun 12, 2009, 05:28
Hi guys. Im looking at creating some new fantasy games for sports in Australia as the whole concept is only now starting to grow.
The only problem is, i really do not know exactly what is needed to get this set up.
Ive never even created my own website.
Im guessing im going to need some of, or all of the following: authorisation from the real life leagues to use the players names, team names etc in the game, advertising, somewhere to host the site, server, some sort of coding to draw the statistics from the official websites to the fantasy site and translate that into the fantasy teams etc.
I have done a few searches in google to try and find out what i need to setup, but theres not much return on those searches.
Does anyone know where a good place to start is, or what i would need to get this up and running? |
| 1 | KrazyKoalaBears
ID: 721308
Fri, Jun 12, 2009, 09:33
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Programming, programming, programming. You're going to need a lot of it. Whether you do it yourself or not is another matter, but without a solid code platform, you'll have a hard time attracting loyal customers because your site will be difficult to use and constantly crashing and/or having bugs.
If you've never created a web site, I'd encourage you to start looking for a web development company to build your site. It took me close to a decade to get to the point where I know I can write stable code for my On the Clock draft program. 5 years into that, I thought I was doing good stuff, but looking back on it I know it was just "kiddie scripts" that never would have survived the onslaught of many thousands of users at a time.
Hosting the site will also be important. You'll need to find a legitimate company that is willing to provide you with real support in the event of problems. You'll want to look into dedicated hosting if you're looking at anything more than a couple thousand users, which I would suspect you are. Dedicated hosting means you're not sharing the server with other people who have the potential to bring the server down at any given moment... thereby crashing your site as well as theirs.
After that, you'll need to be licensed by the appropriate organization for the team names and, possibly, player names. This is going to be tough because a good number of organizations actually want to know how you're going to use the licensing. They're not just going to hand over licensing because you have an idea. They want to make sure you're going to use that license in a way that still upholds whatever standards they have.
You can (mostly) forget advertising. It's been shown to not be a legitimate business model for internet companies. If you're going to rely on advertising, you may as well plan on not being in business in a couple of years without any other method of revenue. You'll need to figure out (ahead of time) how you're going to create a game that generates revenue. A lot of people balk at TSN charging for their games, but it's really about the only way they were going to stay around. Either that, or TSN was going to have to take a loss and treat the games as marketing for their revenue-generating products and that just doesn't seem like a good business model.
You can also forget scraping sites for statistics. To create a legit game, you'll need to work with a stats provider to provide you reliable stats on a regular (daily?) basis.
All in all, the three major issues you're going to face in all of this are:
1. You don't know how to design/program a web site
2. You will need proper licensing
3. You will need legitimate stats
Those three issues are going to cost you the most both in terms of time and in terms of money.
Just with these three things alone, I could see your initial start-up costs being well over $100k.
Just in terms of web development, if I had outsourced On the Clock to a firm in India (about $20/hour), it would have cost over $50k. But, that's just my actual development time over the course of several years. If I add in all the communication, planning, testing, etc. that would have to go into it if someone else, like a firm in India, had developed it, I could see just the web development cost approaching $100k.
Thankfully, I do that sort of thing for a living and enjoy doing it for fantasy sports in my free time. Otherwise, it wouldn't exist.
Please understand that I'm not trying to discourage you from this idea; I'm just trying to be as real as possible about it so that you know exactly what you're facing. The worst thing you could do is dump money into something like this and head down the wrong path and lose everything. You'll need to be realistic and know that you won't be able to get this running with a very small investment unless you have a LOT of friends with a LOT of favors to call in.
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| 2 | Seattle Zen
ID: 275151212
Fri, Jun 12, 2009, 16:21
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Are you thinking about Fantasy Footie, beebop? That would be cool. I think there are two ways you could go about creating a game, one modeled after Draft Bug, the other more like Yahoo baseball/football.
The Draft Bug game is much simpler and in my mind an easier game to start with. It's a salary cap game based on points. For Footie, you could easily come up with a scoring system: 6 points for a goal, 1 for a behind, 1 for a mark, .5 for a disposal, etc... You could have one contest a week or daily contests as not every AFL game is played on a single day. It's easy to understand from a fan point of view. As you gain in popularity, then you may want to branch out in future years to roto-style season-long games.
KKB gave you an honest look at the daunting challenge facing someone who wants to create even the simplest of websites. I imagine Alex from Draft Bug could also give you some pointers. What I gathered from KKB's experience is if you are not a talented programmer yourself, you have better be very wealthy.
Personally, I would love for someone to create a Aussie Rules version of Goal Line Blitz. I think Footie would be easier to code the game and is actually more suited for this type of MMORPG as players have to be much more rounded in all skills than in American Football. And when you consider that GLB has brought in well over $1 million in it's first year, there is some money to be made.
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| 3 | KrazyKoalaBears
ID: 721308
Fri, Jun 12, 2009, 16:43
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"if you are not a talented programmer yourself, you have better be very wealthy"
Or able to sell your business plan to a bank that will lend you money.
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| 4 | blue hen
Dude
ID: 710321114
Fri, Jun 12, 2009, 17:52
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While I agree with KKB's sentiments, I don't think you need all of that at the start. I have several friends who have created interesting games and added on to them as they grew. It's a workable model, but it helps to have expertise or money or both.
KKB is actually a good example. As noted, he had some failings when he started out and has since improved on them. I don't think you have to be where he is now to put a stake in the ground.
Of course, KKB was helped out by the fact that his site was a really, really good idea. That will help you too, if yours is also good.
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| 5 | Alex
ID: 3217239
Sun, Jun 14, 2009, 06:59
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A lot of this is going to depend on what your goals are. Are you just looking to set up a game, so that you can have some fun playing 'fantasy aussie rules football', or are you viewing this as a potential business?
If it's the former, you can probably get something up and running pretty easily...possibly without any of things that previous posters mentioned. Just created a website, post rules for picking teams, and manually update standings once in a while.
However, if you're viewing it as a business, you'll need to think about all of the items people have mentioned...and more.
One real challenge if people in Australia haven't mostly played fantasy sports is that you'll be educating the market. That probably means that signing up new players will be much harder than you'd think...nobody is going to come looking for a game like yours, and you'll need to explain to each potential player why it would be fun.
Before you go ahead with anything, you should probably think about who your potential players are, how many of them are there, and how you'll make money from them - answering those questions may help you begin to figure out some of the other details.
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| 6 | blue hen
ID: 8115717
Sun, Jun 14, 2009, 14:23
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Good point. You need look no further than the wrestling posts on this very forum to see the evolution of a fantasy game. It started out VERY simple and has progressed to something pretty amazing. If you're just in this for the "love of the game" then that's a great example for you.
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| 7 | Guru
ID: 330592710
Mon, Jun 15, 2009, 12:52
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If you are thinking big, you might want to contact RotoHog. Their latest business model is to operate and develop custom branded fantasy sports games for other clients using their salary-cap/stock-market engine, which is pretty potent. A recent press release indicates that they are looking into international markets. With this approach, you could get something up and running pretty quickly, I'd think. I have no idea as to the cost involved, but presumably, you could use their existing platform and infrastructure.
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| 8 | beebop
ID: 175552221
Mon, Jun 15, 2009, 18:32
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Thankyou so much for everyones help. Looks like ive got alot of work ahead of me.
I was thinking bigger than just "a few friends" playing it. I was also thinking of NRL instead of AFL at first as i like the sport more. We already have a NRL fantasy game that is a salary cap points based game, and i was thinking of setting up a roto style yahoo game as the people i have spoken to like the idea of only 1 team able to select the player.
I was also thinking of setting up a V8Supercar game similiar to the TSN Nascar game.
Thanks Guru, i dont have the resources myself just yet, so ill get in contact with RotoHog and see where that leads me.
Im just not sure what step to take first. Do i approach NRL to see what i can do about licensing, or do i try and get the game setup first to show the NRL before i get licensing? Or does it not matter too much which way i go?
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| 9 | KrazyKoalaBears
ID: 12353217
Mon, Jun 15, 2009, 19:52
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Do i approach NRL to see what i can do about licensing, or do i try and get the game setup first to show the NRL before i get licensing? Or does it not matter too much which way i go?
It's a little tricky. A friend and I decided to try to make a particular fantasy game that we knew was going to need licensing. We worked through all aspects of the game and had it all sketched out paper. We went about creating some initial portions of the game so that we could do a "proof of concept" and finally approached the company about licensing.
Unfortunately, our idea was pretty much dead on arrival. They said they already had their own ideas and that was that... even though four years later they don't have anything even remotely close to what we pitched to them.
Thankfully, we didn't spend as much time as we would have if we had created the entire game that was workable, but we also put a good amount of time (a couple hundred hours) into it just to get to a good "proof of concept" with a solid plan for where to go if the idea was accepted.
One thing you might do is contact NRL to find out what their requirements are for licensing. Just let them know that you're thinking about creating a fantasy game (I wouldn't get into details on initial contact) and want to know the basics of what they'll need if you want to formally get the licensing.
What I, personally, wouldn't do is create a full game (something up and running for customers, even if it's just "beta") before knowing what will be involved in licensing.
Best of luck!!!
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| 10 | Seattle Zen
ID: 65481519
Mon, Jun 15, 2009, 20:48
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I was also thinking of NRL instead of AFL at first as i like the sport more.
Oh, forget about it. You can't be that bright ;) Snicker.
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| 11 | beebop
ID: 175552221
Mon, Jun 15, 2009, 23:41
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Haha, thanks for the comment Zen. I do think AFL has a bigger fan base in Australia too, i just have not researched their fantasy games yet.
Im going to email NRL today to find out what they need. At the moment it is part-owned by Mr Murdoch, so it already has very close ties with Fox Sports, Daily Telegraph etc. and other NewsLimited sources. So i was worried about telling them the exact concepts of the game as they would most likely set it up themselves instead of allowing me a license. The other thing is, we are halfway through the season, so it would have to wait until the 2010 season and im impatient. ;)
Ill also contact AFL as i think there may be a massive opportunity there too.
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| 12 | KrazyKoalaBears
ID: 721308
Tue, Jun 16, 2009, 08:50
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So i was worried about telling them the exact concepts of the game as they would most likely set it up themselves instead of allowing me a license.
I would definitely recommend AGAINST telling them the exact concepts of the game. I would use broad language that simply indicates you are interested in creating a game (I don't even know if I would say it was a "fantasy game" or explain what "fantasy sports" is) based on the entities of their league and just indicate interest in generic information they would need for you to obtain licensing.
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| 13 | beebop
ID: 4640253
Sat, Jul 25, 2009, 04:40
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Just as an update:
Ive currently set up a site using weebly.com to do a trial with three friends. It was really spur of the moment type of thing. Its a test to try and see what categories would work for roto style and if the categories I have would massively favour a position over another. Im still working on it, but you can check it out at http://fantasyrugbyleague.weebly.com
Im using html coding(still learning and using tutorials on the web), however i cant get the borders on the tables to show. When im editing it shows, however when i check the site itself, it does not. Im using this: [TABLE cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=4 width="100%" border=12 bordercolor=black]
Is there something wrong with this?
Thanks again guys. Ill keep you updated on further developments.
Ive found i do need licenses if i am to use the logos, team names and player names are fine, so i might be able to do this without it being "official"
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