S2 E11 Episode Title: From Reviving to Thriving with Backyard Sports featuring Lindsay Barnett and James Deighan
How do you take once-beloved family games – source code lost to the ages – and revive them for new generations? And what about today’s video game market might make the timing better than ever for an accessible, co-op, family friendly sports game? Playground Productions CEO Lindsay Barnett, a former educator, went on a quest for educational games during the pandemic that took her all the way to acquiring the rights to the Backyard Sports franchise, headed by Backyard Baseball – and then she teamed up with Mega Cat Studios CEO James Deighan to start bringing the suite of the 6 original Backyard Sports games to life. We explore retro gaming and the art of reverse engineering to restore original games developed by Humongous Entertainment, the modern community response to these classic games, and how the folks at Playground and Mega Cat are now applying what they’ve learned from their community to build a modern Backyard Baseball release that is designed to withstand the test of time, thriving season after season with accessible controls and pricing and downloadable content. This conversation gives us a chance to explore Motivators of Play like immersion, education, comfort, and of course companionship and competition – and captures a unique moment in time between the demo of Backyard Baseball and its release in July 2026. Don’t miss this exciting conclusion to Season 2 of Enduring Play and its exploration of themes like community, self-expression, and education. We are better together – as a baseball team, as a game development team, and as an industry. Game on.
This is the final episode of Enduring Play Season 2 – catch up on the episodes you missed and follow the podcast on your favorite platform so you don’t miss a minute of Season 3 when it launches late this year!
Listen to Enduring Play Season 2 Episode 11
Enduring Play Season 2 Episode 11 Transcript
AI disclosure: While no AI is used in the production of this podcast aside from background removal on some guest photos, Otter.ai is used to assist in transcription of these episodes as I have a physical disability that would prevent manual transcription in time for broadcast. I review these transcripts to catch major inaccuracies, but they may still be somewhat inaccurate. Please report major issues to info@ideaplatz.com.
Featured in this Episode
Lindsay Barnett [she/her]
CEO, Playground Productions
Lindsay Barnett founded Playground Productions after spending nearly a decade teaching second grade in a Chicago Public School. During the pandemic, she set out to find high-quality video games and media for her students, seeking alternatives to the violent and inappropriate content they were often encountering.
That search sparked her mission to revive her favorite childhood franchise: Backyard Sports. When the intellectual property proved difficult to trace, Barnett hired a private investigator to locate the IP and ultimately acquired the rights.
Over the past two years, Barnett and the Playground Productions team have successfully revived Backyard Sports, beginning with the relaunch of six classic titles: Backyard Baseball ’97, Backyard Soccer ’98, Backyard Football ’99, Backyard Baseball ’01, Backyard Basketball ’01, and Backyard Hockey ’02. Each title hit top positions on the gaming charts.
The team also produced Backyard Sports: Animated Special, which surpassed one million views on YouTube and was later picked up by Amazon. The commercial success of the relaunch has driven major partnerships with Wilson Sporting Goods, Louisville Slugger, EvoShield, Homage, Dave & Buster’s, and Baseball Lifestyle 101.
In addition, Playground is currently producing and publishing a brand-new Backyard Baseball title set to launch this summer across Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, PC, and Mac.
James Deighan [he/him]
CEO, Mega Cat Studios
James Deighan is the CEO of Mega Cat Studios, an independent game dev and publishing house that makes games players genuinely love. From original IP to licensed globally beloved properties, Mega Cat does it all. Their last four games were all global top sellers, with some of the games as the highest-rated games in the their franchise’s history. James has been building games and building studios his entire career, and he’s still as fired up about it as day one.
Show Notes
Guest Links
Reference Material
| The Motivators of Play in Chapter 1 of The Game Development Strategy Guide (Sample Chapter) | https://rosenfeldmedia.com/sample-chapter-game-development-strategy-guide/ |
| Original Credits: Backyard Baseball 97 [Mobygames] | https://www.mobygames.com/game/56578/backyard-baseball/credits/windows/ |
| Pablo Sanchez: Backyard Sports Wiki | https://backyardsports.fandom.com/wiki/Pablo_Sanchez |
| The Secret Weapon’s Legacy: How Backyard Baseball Impacted a Generation to Love the Game [Medium] | https://medium.com/beyond-the-scoreboard/the-secret-weapons-legacy-f90f29ae4524 |
| Entertainment Software Association: 2025 Power of Play Report | https://www.theesa.com/resources/the-global-power-of-play-report/ |
| Altering perception: the case of action video gaming (Current Opinion in Psychology, October 2019, Vol 29, pp 168-173) | https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2019.03.004 |
| NYTimes Opinion: You Can’t Game Your Way to a Real Education | https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/19/opinion/schools-edtech-laptops-games-learning.html |
| Using Video Games to Improve Capabilities in Decision Making and Cognitive Science: A Literature Review (Procedia Computer Science, Vol 179, 2021) | https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procs.2020.12.027 |
| Wikipedia: SCUMM | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCUMM |
| ScummVM | https://www.scummvm.org/ |
| What SCUMM actually looked like: Forum post on MixnMojo | https://forums.mixnmojo.com/topic/200688-what-scumm-actually-looked-like/ |
| Fandom Inside Gaming 2024 | https://about.fandom.com/news/fandom-explores-the-growing-importance-of-gaming-self-expression-in-2024-inside-gaming-report |
| Fandom Inside Gaming 2023 | https://about.fandom.com/insights/inside-gaming-2023 |
| ESA Accessible Games Initiative | https://accessiblegames.com/ |
| The Spectrum of Gaming Graphics from The Game Development Strategy Guide (image) | https://www.flickr.com/photos/rosenfeldmedia/54616770323/ |
| List of iPhone Models: TelemetryDeck | https://telemetrydeck.com/survey/apple/iPhone/models/ |
| SQ Magazine: Android Statistics | https://sqmagazine.co.uk/android-statistics/ |
| Backyard Baseball Preview: It’s Back and It’s Got Something for the OG Players Who Are Now All Grown Up [IGN] | https://www.ign.com/articles/backyard-baseball-preview-pax-east |
| First Look at ‘Backyard Baseball’ and Exclusive Details on New Game Dropping in July [Sports Illustrated] | https://www.si.com/mlb/first-look-at-backyard-baseball-exclusive-details-on-new-game |
| ‘Backyard Baseball’ Video Game Lands First Ever Adaptation With Tiffany Haddish, Arturo Castro & More All-Stars Voicing Animated Special | https://deadline.com/2025/10/backyard-baseball-video-animated-special-voice-cast-1236596471/ |
Show Outline
| Episode Preview 1 | 0:22 | James Deighan |
| Episode Preview 2 | 0:49 | Lindsay Barnett |
| Show Intro | 1:23 | Episode Description |
| Podcast Start | 3:24 | Introductions |
| Level 1 | 6:00 | Introducing Backyard Sports |
| Tutorial Level | 9:36 | Education and Video Gaming |
| Level 2 | 12:09 | Building a Retro Games Studio |
| Tutorial Level | 14:25 | The Motivators of Play in the Backyard |
| Level 3 | 16:37 | Uniting 2 teams with shared vision |
| Level 4 | 18:06 | Finding the fun in game dev |
| Level 5 | 20:39 | Thriving by reviving lost games |
| Tutorial Level | 24:06 | The SCUMM Engine |
| Level 6 | 25:46 | Someone’s Favorite Game |
| Host commentary | 29:57 | Cross-platform mobile challenges |
| Level 7 | 31:43 | Learning from a loyal community |
| Level 8 | 35:17 | Companionship through couch co-op |
| Level 9 | 38:05 | The spirit of fun in sports |
| Level 10 | 40:40 | Centering accessibility for every fan |
| Tutorial Level | 44:01 | The Spectrum of Gaming Graphics |
| Level 11 | 45:51 | From Retro Art to Classic Games |
| Level 12 | 49:16 | For the love of the game |
| Host Commentary | 52:11 | Publisher – developer relations |
| Level 13 | 53:33 | Authenticity as audition |
| Level 14 | 57:14 | We’re like, business married |
| Level 15 | 59:25 | Space for psychological safety |
| Level 16 | 1:03:47 | Modern without micro-transactions |
| Level 17 | 1:07:08 | Secret success criteria |
| Final Boss Level | 1:09:29 | Building a transmedia sports universe |
| Final podcast level | 1:12:29 | Links and follow-up |
| Season recap | 1:13:47 | Reviewing themes |
Bonus Content: The Backyard Sports Animated Episode!
For more content, check out the full Backyard Sports Youtube channel.
Bonus Content: The Spectrum of Gaming Graphics
In this episode of Enduring Play, we explore how the “retro” or “classic” gaming aesthetic has a continued role in the game economy. How can we objectively discuss a game’s aesthetic choices so “good” can apply to more than just how realistic a game is, and compare apples to apples instead of apples to oranges?
In Chapter 8 of the Game Development Strategy Guide, author Cheryl Platz walks readers through what it takes to build immersive interactive worlds – visually and narratively. As part of this exploration, she introduced a new tool for objectively describing the aesthetic choices made by game developers: The Spectrum of Gaming Graphics. The games discussed today sit in quadrants 3 (the retro re-releases) and 2 (the new Backyard Baseball title).
To learn more, pick up a copy of The Game Development Strategy Guide from Rosenfeld Media or your favorite online bookseller. See below for a discount code!
The Game Development Strategy Guide
Enduring Play is the companion podcast to The Game Development Strategy Guide: Crafting Modern Video Games that Thrive. Season 1 features the interviews that inspired the book, and Season 2 expands our understanding of how to create sustainable gaming experiences. The book is available at all major online booksellers and at publisher Rosenfeld Media’s website.
Use code ENDURINGPLAYS2 at RosenfeldMedia.com to get 15% off your order – and all physical orders at Rosenfeld Media receive a free ebook. Podcast Season 2 offer expires July 31, 2026.
DISCOUNT CODE
ENDURINGPLAYS2
