Developers of the hugely popular gaming app Stick Cricket have responded to the tragic death of Phillip Hughes by removing a sensitive animation from the game.
Made famous by a combining a simple, slog-heavy and wildly addictive cricket experience for smartphones and tablet gamers, Stick Cricket has emerged as the world’s most popular cricket game boasting more than 15 million downloads and nearly 800,000 Facebook ‘Likes’.
Makers of the game, Stick Sports, have decided to remove to the Stick Cricket’s ‘head blow’ animation, which sees the batsman crumble violently to the ground after being stuck on the helmet by bouncer deliveries.
The move comes in response to the death of Australian batsman Phillip Hughes, who collapsed and later died after being struck by an errant bouncer during a Sheffield Shield match at the SCG in late November.
Following the devastating incident, the Stick Cricket team quickly gathered to change the sequence.
“We felt that the landscape had changed,” creative director Colin Rowe told News Ltd.
“It was there for comedic value, and when we first made Stick Cricket, no one had ever died from a head blow in professional cricket, so we felt justified to add the comedy.
“It’s sobering now and no longer funny, so we had a team meeting the day Phillip Hughes died and put plans to change the game with the very next update.”
The new update, which now sees the ball travel harmlessly past the batsman’s head, has already been applied to Stick Cricket Premier League (SPL) and will soon reach the franchise’s other three platforms.
“The bouncer has not yet been removed from all Stick Cricket mobile apps,” Rowe confirms.
“It’s only from the Stick Cricket Premier League version at this stage.
“Some updates, that include the removal of the head blow dismissal among other things, are still pending in other versions of the game. We have four Stick Cricket apps in the market and only SPL has been pushed out so far.”
Thumbs up Stick Cricket for showing some respectful initiative.
Image: YouTube.
