Sports anime is one of the more popular subgenres of the medium, thanks to many great shows like Kuroko’s Basketball, Yuri!!! on Ice and Haikyuu!!. These shows, among many others, take popular sports and give them that kind of unique flair that only anime can really provide.
Fictional sports in anime take this idea and makes it even more interesting. Without having to adhere to real-world rules, a lot of these fictional sports end up looking interesting enough that fans wonder what it would be like if these sports existed in real life. While that’s nice to think about, there are some sports that just can’t — or shouldn’t — cross over to the real world.
10 Could Exist: Motorball Is Playable With Some Tweaks
Motorball is the premiere sport of the Scrapyard in Battle Angel Alita, as seen in the 1998 short CG film Gunnm 3D Special. Functionally, the sport is the same as Rollerball, except it’s a free-for-all, the playing field is like a big obstacle course, and the contestants are robots, meaning that their whole bodies could be destroyed with minimal consequence.
Obviously, replicating robotic contestants isn’t feasible, but a contact sport where players have to carry a ball across an obstacle course while avoiding other players sounds like a fun time for everyone. Naturally, there would need to be more safety measures in place compared to the Motorball matches in Battle Angel Alita, but it could definitely work.
9 Couldn’t Exist: Kakegurui’s Gambling Is Unhinged
Kakegurui takes place in a high school where gambling decides each student’s social standing. Students that lose too many bets are considered “pets” and must act as servants to the students they owe money to.
Even ignoring the problems that arise when a school facilitates placing a bunch of high schoolers in a situation like this, the games themselves are completely unhinged, often involving the risk of bodily harm or death for the players. The most notable deadly games in the anime are the Tower of Doors, the Finger Cutting Guillotine, and an actual game of Russian Roulette.
8 Could Exist: Prince Of Stride Is Basically Extreme Parkour
The sport of Stride, as it exists in the anime Prince of Stride: Alternative, is effectively a relay race across town with parkour elements to it. The anime envisions a world where the sport is covered by a wide range of news outlets, and high schoolers will move from far away places just to compete in Stride.
A sport like this could flourish in the real world. Parkour has been and continues to be a viral sport, and seeing professionals handling obstacles differently with the same kind of teamwork and coordination required for a relay race could be something genuinely amazing to watch.
7 Couldn’t Exist: Cheating Craft Rewards Academic Dishonesty
Cheating Craft is a show where university exams are such a fundamental aspect of social hierarchy that students are sectioned into two categories: Learning types who study as rigorously as possible to perform well, and Cheating types who don’t study at all and cheat to win. Those who get good grades get a good life, while those who don’t will endure a life of suffering. This leads to an engaging battle of wits where Learners try to outsmart Cheaters and vice versa.
While the constant battle to see who can get ahead would be extremely interesting in real life, it’s hard to imagine any college or university would sign off on glorified cheating competitions.
6 Could Exist: Air Gear Takes Rollerblading To A New Level
Air Gear was an anime from 2006 that glorifies the skater culture that went mainstream in the late ’90s to early 2000s. The show is about the sport Air Trek, which is like rollerblading, only the rollerblades are outfitted with motors to maximize speed and air time. In the show, there are limiters that keep the riders from any real danger, but thrill seekers modify their gear so that they can go as fast as they want.
Air Trek riders form teams and race through the streets to see who is the fastest. This kind of sport would easily work in real life, and it would likely be pretty popular thanks to the inherent thrills involved.
5 Couldn’t Exist: My Hero Academia’s U.A. Sports Festival Is A Showcase Of Superpowers
In the world of My Hero Academia, a certain percentage of the population manifests some kind of superpower, called a Quirk, when they’re young. Pretty soon, the world adapted, allowing for hero programs and special schools for kids with Quirks to hone their abilities. U.A. is one of these schools, and it holds a Sports Festival every year to showcase its talented students.
Student sports festivals are a thing throughout anime series, but the U.A. Sports Festival has an extra layer of danger thanks to the students’ abilities. It’s difficult to imagine any high school that would endorse their students running an obstacle course that incorporates a minefield.
4 Could Exist: Fastest Finger First Makes Quizzing Interesting
Fastest Finger First adds a certain flair to quiz challenges in a way that only anime can. The series focuses on high school quizzing competitions where contestants must answer certain questions as fast as possible to succeed.
High school quiz games do already exist, but they are more often games that classes play in order to prepare for tests, whereas the anime features quiz bowl competitions against rival schools to obtain quiz glory. The popularity of trivia-based game shows over the years proves on its own that a quizzing competition in Fastest Finger First‘s format could definitely work in real life.
3 Couldn’t Exist: SK8 The Infinity Is Just Too Dangerous
In the world of SK8 the Infinity, passionate skateboarders test their skills in an illegal underground skateboarding race called “S.” There are no rules in this particular race, other than “come out on top.”
Racers try to beat their opponents with the special moves that they can perform, the augmented boards that they race on, or even foreign objects that they bring with them. Everything is allowed, and one can imagine the dangerous injuries that racers can suffer when things get underway. It makes sense why S is illegal; real life skateboarding leagues would never endorse a competition this dangerous.
2 Could Exist: Gundam Build Fighters Has An Imaginative Sport At Its Core
Gundam Build Fighters takes Gunpla, or Gundam plastic models, and pits them against each other for battle inside virtual reality in a Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots meets Bakugan type of game. Gundams are scanned in and players control what their Gundam does in real time as the battle progresses from inside virtual reality cubicles.
The game itself turns its players into legitimate Gundam pilots, and the technology for it doesn’t seem entirely out of reach. The concept of scanning real world objects into a game has been done several times, and games on the level of Gundam Build Fighters may seem pretty far off, but definitely not impossible.
1 Couldn’t Exist: Pokémon Battles Have Miles Of Baggage
The world of Pokémon has Trainers capturing Pokémon in the wild and battling with other trainers to be named one of the best. To that end, each region has Gyms with their own respective Gym Leaders that traveling Pokémon Trainers travel to and challenge to earn their badges.
The moral issues with this kind of competition in real life are well documented and still being debated to this day. To its credit, the anime has gone to great lengths to establish that the relationship between Pokémon and their Trainers is mutual and that they share a genuine bond, but it’s just hard to imagine critics believing that.
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