Let's say you know a guy. Could be a lady, but it's most likely a guy. This guy owns a video game console or two, but he only uses for one thing: to play sports games.
It's like he has a complex or something. He'll play a ton of video games, and spend a good portion of his free time doing it, but it's never Battlefield, or Portal, or World of Warcraft. It's just Madden, or FIFA, or NBA2K.
This makes him a gaming myopic, sure, but thankfully if he's a special someone in your life, it also makes him a very easy person to buy Christmas presents for. The gifts outlined here assume that this person already owns the latest version of the latest big series, so we're trying to look a little past that.
Your average sports gamer may own every version of the big names like Madden, but there's a good chance they've totally missed the awesome College Lacrosse games, available on the Xbox Live Indie Channel. Sure, the production values aren't quite to EA Sports' standards, but for the size of the team and the cost of the game, it's pretty great.
($5)
FIFA 98: Road to the World Cup
Ask a FIFA fan what their favourite entry in the entire series is, and many may actually say this one. It was one of the last to feature a full editing suite, but more importantly, was the only FIFA game to include an indoor soccer mode. Which was more fun than the actual World Cup campaign the game was made for.
($5)
Mad Catz's licensed controllers for both 360 and PS3 are available in the livery of all 32 NFL teams. They're not to the standard of a first-party pad, sure, but you can't get first-party pads with giant Chicago Bears logos all over them.
($40)
Hah, what? You read this right. Modern sports games have big career modes, which are all about creating a character, picking their attributes, then improving those stats through repeated action. Just like an RPG. Just like this RPG, in fact.
($60)
Puma African Cup of Nations Jersey
If he likes to rock a badass and, for the most part neutral sports jersey, surprise him one of these babies. Puma's new 2011/12 kits for African nations each feature giant textured patterns based on the country they're representing. It's not often you get to buy official sports jerseys with enormous elephants and pumas all over them.
($80)
You can contact Luke Plunkett, the author of this post, at plunkett@kotaku.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.