"The Last Super Bowl" by George R. R. Martin, A Review By The Bastards of Kingsgrave

<p><a href="https://bastardsofkingsgrave.wordpress.com/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow"><em>Amin and the Vassals</em></a><em> review George R. R. Martin’s "The Last Super Bowl" in a spoiler &nbsp;filled discussion that was recorded before the Super Bowl, which thus explain their pro-Seahawks hopes.</em></p> <p>Sports are universally beloved. Geographically, athletic competitions take on various forms; the NFL, NBA, MLB are strong in&nbsp;America; NHL in Canada; Premier League in Europe; and Cricket in India.</p> <p>But the now legendary George R. R. Martin wrote about the downfall of &nbsp;them all in “The Last Super Bowl,” a fantastically written short story &nbsp;in February 1975’s issue of Gallery Magazine, a men’s magazine.</p> <p>The story is actually two tales, as he covers the last Super Bowl &nbsp;which&nbsp;takes place in January 2016 and interjects the depiction of that Super Bowl, between the Green Bay Packers and the Hoboken Jets, and the &nbsp;downfall of real sports. Real sports, in the 2016 of Martin’s fictional &nbsp;world, have been overtaken in popularity by simulated sports.</p> <p>Simulated sports are controlled by a computer that can put any team, &nbsp;from any era, against any other for the enjoyment of the spectators. The technology he describes in the computers that control the simulated &nbsp;sports may have been a thing of science fiction in 1974, when I assume &nbsp;he wrote the piece, but here in 2022, our computers are &nbsp;powerful enough to create those simulations. Just look at video games &nbsp;like Electronic Arts’ Madden and FIFA series.</p> <p>The implications that computer simulated games would overtake the &nbsp;real thing isn’t so far fetched now, but back in 1975, Martin was &nbsp;looking to a future where the complexities of computers and their power &nbsp;seemed infinitely abundant.</p> <p>The last Super Bowl – just think about it. No more National Football&nbsp;League, no more National Basketball Association, no more Major League Baseball, the players all replaced by p