Scores are only the start.
Fans need enough context to understand the game without digging through layers of generic sports navigation.
Studio project Football ’86
Football now, tuned like it’s 1986.
Football ’86 is a native iPhone scores app that brings current college and professional football into the visual world of a lost 1986 console game—without giving up the live scores, schedules, rankings, stats, and team context fans rely on.
Download for iOS
- Built for
- College and pro football fans
- What BRETD handled
- Product · Brand · iOS · Data
- Current stage
- Native app in active development
The opportunity
Sports data can be useful without feeling interchangeable.
Most score apps optimize for volume: more leagues, more modules, more dense surfaces. They can answer almost any question, but the experience often feels like reading the same dashboard in a different jersey.
Football ’86 starts from a different premise. Keep the information current and trustworthy, then give every score, matchup, ranking, and broadcast moment a world with personality.
Live data keeps moving.
Schedules, game states, rankings, team details, and statistics have to stay coherent as the season changes.
Retro cannot be a costume.
The interface has to behave like a modern iPhone app while every visual choice still belongs to the same arcade-era world.
One app, two leagues.
College and professional football need distinct structures, favorites, standings, and data without splitting the product in two.
The product strategy
Build a real sports utility inside a complete world.
The app separates the data foundation from the presentation layer. Current football information stays factual and resilient while the interface, original pixel artwork, sound-stage language, and ’86 identity create the personality.
- TuneChoose college or pro football, a favorite team, and the programs to follow.
- ScanMove through game days and see live, upcoming, delayed, and final states honestly.
- OpenStep into a matchup for scoring, leaders, recent plays, notes, and team context.
- WatchLet Channel 86 turn the live slate into an original pixel broadcast experience.
- FollowKeep favorite teams, rankings, standings, schedules, and alerts close all season.
Explore the app
One season. Three ways in.
Move from the day’s scores to the teams you follow, then tune the whole league through Channel 86. Each chapter keeps the same focused interface while revealing a different layer of the product.
01 / Game day
Scores first. Context one tap away.
The scores view keeps the day’s slate easy to scan, with week navigation, league filters, favorites, and Channel 86 close at hand. Opening a matchup adds quarter-by-quarter scoring and the play context behind the final.
- College and NFL modes with distinct favorites
- Live, scheduled, delayed, and final game states
- Game detail without leaving the visual world
02 / Your teams
Follow the season, not just the score.
Team discovery, favorites, schedules, records, rosters, and statistics turn the app into a season-long companion. College and pro structures stay separate where the sport demands it and consistent where the interaction should feel familiar.
- Fast search across college and professional teams
- Team overview, schedule, statistics, and roster views
- Favorites and recent results kept close
03 / Channel 86
The whole league becomes a broadcast.
The Control Room organizes rankings, conferences, divisions, and upcoming matchups. Channel 86 then turns the active slate into an original pixel broadcast—useful football context delivered with a little theater.
- Conference boards and NFL playoff position
- Live, upcoming, postgame, and off-air programming
- Original scenes grounded in verified game states
The direction
Current data. Classic character. One coherent product.
Football ’86 is becoming a focused alternative to generic score apps: quick enough for a score check, deep enough for the season, and distinctive enough to feel worth opening.
Game-day information is organized around the question a fan is most likely asking now.
Verified data, caching, and explicit game states keep presentation from outrunning reality.
The identity, art, interaction model, and data system were designed as one product—not assembled from a skin.
The bigger idea
Sports software does not have to sand away all its personality.
Football ’86 pairs the immediacy of a modern scores app with the atmosphere of a product that could only belong to this sport and this moment. The app is still in active development, with more of the product story coming as the iPhone experience takes shape.