Sports Games: Electric Football
By Stephen Turk
A key factor in the creation and purpose of a sports game is simulation. Different games do this different ways, but miniaturizing the sport is an effective way to do this. As such, one would be remiss not to include one of the strangest, yet most entrancing sports games ever created. That game is electric football.
1947 saw Tudor Games release what was essentially a vibrating table on which little football men would move around.
Electric football was a very interesting game because there really is no way play a game, as there was absolutely no way to control the players. There was a dial to intesify or quell the vibration of the field, and the players had tabs on their bases which could control their speed, but that was about the extent of it. Players also broke any number of football rules, including illegal contact, illegal block in the back, excessive spinning, off-sides, and scoring in the wrong end zone amongst others. Still, in its heyday the game sold an incredible amount and is admired to this day.
The evolution of the game followed the simplest of rules, bigger is better. It came on the market featuring a relatively small board and very small, lightly detailed monochromatic players. It was, however, instantly popular owing to the fact that it was automated and high toy technology at the time.
As with any good idea, there were followers. Namely, Gotham Pressed Steel, where Tudor found its biggest competitor. Size, as said before, was the first thing to change. Oddly enough, it took until 1958 for Tudor to come up with fully 3D figures. Nonetheless players were made bigger and more detailed. The running back could carry the ball in a little slot in his arm, so that was progress.
Gotham came up with my favorite innovation and it’s purely asthectic and has no functional 
application; the stadium attachment. With this, kids could hook on a set of metal grandstands, which would provide painted spectators to watch the action and a whole new level of realism for miniature football.
As the popularity of the NFL grew throughout the 1960s (see previous posts!) the popularity of electric football grew along with it. In 1966 Tudor obtained the NFL license, unveiling a new generation of figures which had all the details that a young sports aficionado would be looking for like face masks, thigh pads, and accurate logos.
The 70s saw continued success of electric football, with grandstands growing to gargantuan sizes and the NFL license being very lucrative. New bases were created that gave players at least a degree of control over the figures and the invention of the Triple Threat Quarterback added a spring loaded arm, allowing you to pass to pretty much no one. The spring loaded leg, however, did work well for field goals.
For all that sustained success, electric football couldn’t hold out with the rise of video games, despite the fact that they are far less charming than the little plastic gridiron heroes of electric football.
There is still an active electric football community, though today it is more along the lines of the niche hobby rather than popular Christmas present. People paint their own favorite teams (real or imaginary), there are sideline figurines, refs, cheerleaders, you name it. You got to admire that kind of ingenuity.
So while video game football is the top of the top, there is that unmistakable desire to simulate sports displayed about as literally as possible in electric football: shrink the thing down, and do whatever you want with it.
P.S. There is an Electric Football Super Bowl, so don’t ever think that the electric football community isn’t serious about what it does. Check out www.miggle.com for more info, and to see where most of the info for this post came from.
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