After nearly two decades without a Gaelic football video game worth talking about, Belfast-based studio Buck Eejit Games is finally changing that. Their debut title, Gaelic Football Laochra, is heading to PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam, with a release expected in May 2026.
The game is being published by Tru Blu Games, and while the Steam page currently lists “coming soon” rather than a locked-in date, the studio has indicated a May 28th window. Given the history of this project, nobody would begrudge them a bit of caution on exact dates.
It’s a genuinely long time coming. The last Gaelic football games were produced by Australian studio Transmission Games, back in 2005 and 2007. They sold well enough in Ireland, but they weren’t exactly beloved. Peadar McMahon, founder of Buck Eejit Games, was one of the players who experienced both titles first-hand during his university years and came away thinking he could do better.
After a failed Kickstarter in 2018, he formally set up the studio in May 2022 with a team of seven developers and got to work.
What’s in the game
The modes on offer cover the obvious bases. There’s a Quick Match option for solo or two-player local games, a Tournament mode built around real competitions, and a Career Mode where you manage a county across multiple seasons. A Creator Suite lets you build custom players, teams, stadiums, colours, and crests, with plans for a sharing platform to let the community swap their creations.
One interesting design decision is the step count. The official four-step rule felt too restrictive in playtesting, so the developers allow around six steps before requiring a bounce or solo, depending on the situation. It’s a sensible call; making the game feel good to play matters more than strict simulation.
Animation was another major challenge. Buck Eejit Games initially explored motion capture using Queen’s University Belfast’s Innovation Lab during the Kickstarter phase, but found it expensive, restrictive, and not particularly effective. For Laochra, they invested in a full-body motion capture suit instead, giving them the freedom to record anywhere, at any time. With over 50 hours of capture time needed, it was one of their own team members, a current Gaelic football player, who ended up wearing the suit for most of it.
Online play and what to expect at launch
Online multiplayer won’t be available at launch. Local two-player is fully supported from day one, and online play is on the roadmap, but there’s no timeline confirmed for when that arrives. It’s worth knowing upfront if that’s a dealbreaker for you, though the lack of it at launch isn’t unusual for a small indie studio shipping their first game.
Why it matters
There’s something genuinely meaningful about a Belfast-based independent studio taking this on. The GAA has a massive audience in Ireland and among the diaspora, and the absence of a quality video game representation for this long has been a real gap. Titles like FIFA and the various rugby games have had decades of iteration and massive budgets behind them; Gaelic football has had almost nothing.
Laochra won’t be competing on those terms, but it doesn’t need to. If it plays well, captures the atmosphere of county football, and gives fans something they can actually enjoy, that’s more than enough of a starting point. The Gaelic Football Laochra Steam page is live now if you want to add it to your wishlist ahead of release.
