Of course fencing, especially at the higher levels, is much more a sport than a form of combat. I'm only intimately familiar with saber, but there the rules play a very important role. Having the right of way changes everything, and a lot of blade contact is about getting the right of way rather than actually preventing your opponent from doing something. If you have the right of way, you don't care about being hit as long as you hit your opponent sufficiently quickly after that--I don't think real sword fights work that way :).
All this makes fencing more fun and interesting, but also more of a game. This really affects the tactics people use.
Also, foil works the same way with a very similar set of rules about the right of way. There are some minor variations, but the basic idea is the same--if you have the right of way, you get the point even if you hit after your opponent. Epee is different, with no right of way, but I never really liked it so can't comment much. If anything, it seems epee is less focused on footwork than saber, but it could just be my inner saber biases showing.
Fencing, while awesome, is a poor proxy for actual sword fighting. If you were actually facing something sharp, you would be much more worried about getting hit at all and so would probably parry more.
Parry with a sword was actually really uncommon last resort for the most of history. Viking blades for example dented really bad if they clashed. There is a saga about combatants beating several wooden shields to splinters until the blades clashed and both swords broke.
For samurai, the same is true. For heavily armored knight's, well they tried to poke each other in the eye mostly.
Me and my little brother with boffer-swords? Same story again. I found first hand experience that usually it's lot more usable to dodge the blow while simultaneously trying a counter blow than to parry. And the more you need footwork the more you have opponents.
Parrying only works with heavy, slow weapons. The unfortunate reality is that with a light, fast weapon, you do not have the time or reaction speed to actually parry. "Parrying" doesn't really happen. Getting the f* away with your feet is the only option.
So yes I suppose it does matter what you mean by "real swordfighting." If you mean standing there decked out in 50lbs++ of metal armor with a giant sword & shield, footwork is less important. If you mean the kind of swordfighting that took off from 17th century on - dueling with rapiers, not mass combat, then it's footwork all the way down.
And yes, for the record, I think that realistic dueling would make for a very boring video game. I would be 100% behind more realistic sword & shield combat though, that could be incredibly awesome.
I don't know. As I said earlier, I only really have experience with fencing (and mostly with saber), but real parrying does happen there. And sabers are extremely light and fast. (It feels a little silly to bring fencing up as the example when I just talked about how it isn't entirely applicable to the real world, but I think this part is.)
It isn't just parrying in a vacuum--it also involves good timing, footwork and some forethought. It's definitely not based entirely on reaction time. For example, if you're moving backwards while parrying, you get significantly more time. Also, having a good idea of where somebody will attack (for example, you feign an opening) helps. And, of course, you do a ton of drills about how to parry so the different parries are burned into your mind.
It still isn't anything like the movies, of course, but it is still significant. It also affects the right of way, but only if the opponent does not get through your parry, so parrying well is important even in the framework of the rules.
Usually parry is done with a return attack. It's more like knocking the opponent sword off balance and thrust mine in. There are much more control with light weapons like foil or sabers to do parry and return than heavy sword.
The same goes for Katanas (which are about as much as I can handle for more than a few minute, so for me they're heavy). You sort of 'catch' the opponent's blade and you can flick it to the side by turning your blade, leaving your opponent open.
The unfortunate reality is that with a light, fast weapon, you do not have the time or reaction speed to actually parry. "Parrying" doesn't really happen. Getting the f away with your feet is the only option.*
I don't agree with this. I practice eskrima and we block/parry a lot. It's a lot easier to move a 0.2kg stick than your whole body (50-100kg).
But blocking/parrying is not a substitute for footwork, it's a complement to it. If your footwork is good, your opponent might only be able to attack you from 1-2 directions. Blocking 2 directions is far easier than blocking 12 (8 in competition [1]).
[1] For safety reasons, thrusting and knee strikes are not allowed. Nor are strikes to the back of the head.
I get the feeling that a swordfighting game as described in the article is going to pander more towards "be a medieval knight/brigand/samurai" than "be an Enlightenment dandy/fop"
Fencing raises another good point: realistic swordfighting is actually pretty boring compared to movie swordfighting. (If it weren't, then movie swordfighting wouldn't need to be so unrealistic).
If I'm gonna play a swordfighting video game I wanna be Errol Flynn, not Benjamin Kleibrink. [Who? 2008 Olympic foil champion. Yes, I had to look that up, that's the point.]
Fencing has only a few moves so people don't know the game won't enjoy it as much as a spectator. But it's an extreme competitive sport. As with any competitive sport, it's lots of fun for the participants.
See: relatively little blade contact in extremely high level fencing.