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Backyard Sports will be relaunching a popular video game series for children in the coming months
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Backyard Sports will be relaunching a popular video game series for children in the coming months

Grab your yellow baseball cap and some gum, because the Backyard Sports crew, a staple of kids’ computer games in the ’90s and early 2000s, are returning in upcoming video games, movies, and TV shows.

Playground Productions, a children’s and family entertainment company founded by former elementary school teacher Lindsay Barnett, plans to relaunch the iconic franchise “in the coming months,” according to an announcement Tuesday. The production company also released a trailer announcing the game’s return, and several characters from the original series make an appearance.

Stephanie Morgan blowing her signature pink bubble, Achmed Khan with his oversized headphones, and red-headed speedster Pete Wheeler are the first to appear. Hitter Kiesha Phillips hangs out in the kids’ treehouse, and a dramatic gust of wind blowing leaves across the baseball field heralds the appearance of Backyard Baseball GOAT Pablo Sanchez, who stares at Morgan in anticipation of her pitch.

The re-release is the first installment in the Backyard Sports series since the release of a mobile app version in 2015. Since 1997, when the original Backyard Baseball was available exclusively as a computer game, 38 games have been released across multiple sports (including football, basketball, hockey and soccer) and game consoles.

“We’re incredibly excited to introduce Backyard Sports to a new generation of gamers,” said Chris Waters, Chief Product Officer of Playground Productions. “We’re taking great care to preserve the look and feel that made the original games so special, while updating them with modern features and gameplay that today’s audiences expect. I can’t wait to show fans what we’re building at Playground.”

Former Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce and current Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce are among the millions of fans of Backyard Sports, and the brothers talked about their love of the games on an episode of their podcast “New Heights” in February. Jason said he “secretly looked to see if anyone owned the rights to Backyard Football and Backyard Baseball” because he wanted to buy them to revive the franchise.

“That was the best game ever,” he said. “It was so much fun. It was so electrifying.”

Although the Kelce brothers are not involved in this installment of the Backyard Sports saga, it looks like Sanchez and his teammates will be back in action soon.

(Photo: Courtesy of Playground Productions)

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