The Best Sports Games On Pc
Sports games come in many shapes and sizes. Football Manager and Rocket League have almost nothing in common, but they’re both undeniably sports games. Meanwhile Fifa has added a story driven campaign, and Pyre is a fantasy RPG that plays like a sport.
To try and help, I’ve broken this list down into four broad
categories. Sports Simulations, which attempt to realistically depict a sport,
Sports Management games (self explanatory), Arcade Sports, which depict a
stylised version of a real sport, and Fantasy Sports, which are wholly
invented.
There’s obviously a lot of crossover, since even Rocket
League is loosely based on football, but hopefully this will help you tell your
QWOPs from your Fifas.
SPORTS SIMS
Fifa Developer: EA Sports
Release Date: Sep 2017
EA's annual football series is on a high right now, with the
addition of a surprisingly compelling single player story mode. Unlike PES,
Fifa's strength is in a Xavi-esque short, quick passing game. If you’re looking
to play online, Fifa will be your football sim of choice, as a strong and healthy online community ensures it's
always easy to find a game.
PES Developer: Konami
Release Date: Sep 2017
While Fifa will draw in those interested in the single
player story or online multiplayer, PES is my preference for local multiplayer,
or when I want to sink into the signature Master League. The two games also
play slightly differently, with PES leaning more towards long passes and lofted
through balls for a faster paced, more frenetic game.
MANAGEMENT GAMES
Developer: Sports Interactive
Release Date: Nov 2017
It’s hard to overrstate the enormity of Football Manager. It
is consistently one of the most popular games on Steam, its scouting network
rivals real life clubs and once a player received an international call up from
the wrong country because of it. It's also incredibly absorbing and fun, even
more so since they added the streamlined variant Football Manager Touch. Play
it with care: it is all-consuming.
Out of the Park
Baseball 18
Developer: Out of the Park Developments
Release Date: Mar 2017
It's strange how few other sports have a Football Manager
equivalent, but understandable that the highly stat-driven baseball is one of
those that does. Out of the Park Baseball doesn't seem to change that much from
year to year, but the underlying game remains an engrossing way to live out
your Moneyball fantasies.
Motorsport Manager
Developer: Playsport Games
Release Date: Nov 2016
Another sensible sport to adapt into a management game,
Motorsport Manager is half about the strategy, half about the cars. Between
races you’ll spend time improving and upgrading your vehicle, then make
strategic calls like what tires to use and when to make a pit stop, but all
without having to bother getting your hands dirty actually steering the thing.
Arcade sports
Sensible World of Soccer
Developer: Sensible Software
Release Date: Jan 1996
"I don’t like football but I did enjoy Sensible
Soccer" is a thing I’ve been told by more 40-year-old game journalists
than I care to count. By stripping the sport down to its essentials, SWOS finds
a purity in the tick tock of precision passes. GOG only stocks Sensible World of
Soccer 96/97, so expect to be stuck in the days of David Seaman and Ian Wright.
Super Arcade Football
Developer: Out of the Bit
Release Date: Early Access
Super Arcade Football is built on the classic top down
approach of Sensible Soccer but with some more modern touches, the most
impressive being a physics defying slow motion aftertouch shot. Unlike SWOS it
also works online, making it much easier to get a game against a human.
QWOP
Developer: Bennett Foddy
Release Date: Nov 2008
QWOP is, in many ways, the anti-sports game. Most sports
games are about using easy, accessible controls to allow anyone to simulate
being a peak athlete. QWOP on the other hand uses an overly complicated control
scheme to make the relatively simple act of running a 110m hurdles (yes there
are hurdles, most people don’t make it far enough to realise that)
astonishingly difficult and hilarious. It’s the Eddie the Eagle of sports
games.
Fire Pro Wrestler
Developer: Spike Chunsoft
Release Date: Early Access
Is wrestling a sport? According to Vince McMahon it’s
'sports entertainment', which is close enough for this list. Unlike the awful
official WWE games, Fire Pro Wrestling World leans into the fact that wrestling
is a performance, subtly pushing players to put on an entertaining match,
rather than just trying to win. That, coupled with its astonishing Steam
Workshop-supported character creation makes it unique among wrestling games.
OlliOlli
Developer: Roll7
Release Date: Jul 2014
OlliOlli's great success is in taking all the fun of older
skating games like Tony Hawk and distilling them down to two dimensions. The
simplicity of OlliOlli's side on approach makes it easier to learn a track
while constantly embellishing your performance with tricks and flourishes.
Desert Golfing
Developer: Captain Games
Release Date: Dec 2017
Weird zen minimalist golf game Desert Golfing was a cult hit
on mobile and it's just gotten a Steam release. It's a testament to achieving a
little with a lot, creating challenging holes with simple geometric shapes.
Crucially, there is no going back, so every wasted stroke is there forever.
Previously, the game was only available on the Windows Store.
Tennes
Developer: Jan Willem Nijman
Release Date: Nov 2012
Originally a bonus game for people who backed the
SportsFriends Kickstarter, Tennnes is a simplified tennis game with a flexible
approach to rules. The game does not mind if, for example, you jump over the
net and play on the other side of the court. If you liked SportsFriends, you'll
like this.
FANTASY SPORTS
Rocket League
Developer: Psyonix
Release Date: Jul 2015
I've had Rocket League installed on my PC for nearly two
years now, and I still find myself jumping in for a quick 15 minute game every
couple of weeks. The premise is simple: it’s football with rocket powered cars.
What makes it work is the strange physics: the ball seems to be moving almost
in slow motion, resulting in great slapstick comedy and much rage on the part of
PC Gamer editor Sam Roberts.
SportsFriends
Developer: De Gute Fabrik
Release Date: Dec 2014
SportsFriends is a bundle of local multiplayer indie games
loosely themed around sports. Hokra is a very fast, minimalist ice hockey game,
BariBariBall is a blend of Super Smash Bros and volleyball, Super Pole Riders
is a strange pole vaulter jousting game and Johan Sebastian Joust is a kind of
full contact musical chairs played with motion controllers. What they have in
common is that they’re all a amazing fun with a group of friends.
Bloodbowl 2
Developer: Cyanide Release
Date: Sep 2015
The Blood Bowl board game is as old as I am, which is
testament to its enduring appeal. It is simultaneously one of the most
frustrating and entertaining games I've ever played. Dice rolls are required
for everything, meaning sometimes players fall over and die because they ran
too fast. The digital port is solid enough, but the real charm lies in the time
tested rules.
Frozen Cortex
Developer: Mode7
Release Date: Feb 2015
Frozen Synapse's trademark interpretation of turn-based
combat, where both sides plan their moves and execute them simultaneously,
turns out to translate really well into sports. A paired down version of
American Football featuring big stompy robots on a small pitch, Frozen Cortex
excels at replicating the execution of a single play, but lacks the back and
forth of larger, more fluid sports.
Pyre
Developer: Supergiant Games
Release Date: Jul 2017
Pyre is essentially an RPG with a sport instead of random
battles. The story and atmosphere are the kind of strong stuff you'd expect
from SuperGiant (who also made Bastion and Transistor). The sport itself can
end up a little one dimensional, as attacking players can’t move without the
ball, there's little point in the passing game. Still, the way in which the
fiction and the sport combine is a unique delight.
Read more: 10 Best Esports Games In 2023
