Best sports games of all time, ranked

The best sports games are hard to find in an industry with yearly releases, but we’ve got you covered

The best sports games in anyone's memories are probably the ones they grew up with, no matter if they were set on a pitch, on the ice, or on a court, which makes an objective ranking of them quite hard.

It's naturally very difficult to stand out in a genre where developers release yearly iterations of games simulating what is mostly the same, unchanging sport. And yet, some titles over the years have been able catch fans' hearts like no other games in their own series could, be it because they had a certain charm or their gameplay was somehow smoother.

We're taking you right into the Hall of Fame of sport simulations. Well, mostly. There is one very necessary exception, which we hope you'll agree with.

Best sports games of all time

10. NHL 2002 (PS2, Xbox, PC, 2001)

EA Sports – it’s in the game. You read that in his voice, didn’t you? Iconic.

EA has always been at the forefront of sports games, and this isn’t the only time those two letters will crop up in this list. Get maximum enjoyment by continuing to read it in that deep, powerful American accent.

NHL 2002 is special because it depicts an actual hockey season that took place – a season with a roster packed full of future Hall of Famers. Playing it now is like playing a bit of NHL history, but somehow with even more brawls.

Close your eyes and you can probably still hear Jim Hughson’s and Don Taylor’s unhinged, surreal commentary.

It represented the spirit of the discipline perfectly, with just the right dose of cartoon violence and stylized exaggeration. Where modern sports games are all about photorealism, this captured the “feel” of the sport instead. Slapshots felt like they could knock the moon out of orbit.

9. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2004 (PS2, Xbox, PC, 2003)

Create a game with simple but subtle controls, mix in the raw star power of Tiger Woods, and infuse that with a soundtrack full of R&B bangers, and – somehow, against all odds – you make golf cool.

Sure, you’re able to customize your clubs and stroll around famous courses in Nike slacks and a sweater vest, but golf games had been doing that for years. This one stood out because of its style, landing in the era where most games had the word “Underground” slapped at the end of their title. Back when neon under lights on cars were the height of cool.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2004 was more stylish than Ryan Gosling and it moved like Muhammad Ali. They just don’t make them like this anymore.

8. Track & Field (Atari 2600, Arcade, 1983)

Sports are about talent and skill, sure. But they’re also about physical discipline. Even boxing matches are often decided by who trained the hardest. Track & Field captures the grueling physical toll sports take by asking you to bash buttons until your thumbs bleed. (Or, you know, use the back side of a lighter if you want to cheat.)

The lighter and tea towel tricks might seem like misty-eyed nostalgia now, but it was about street cred and bragging rights back in the day. We’ve still got the callouses.

Sure, it’s primitive by today’s standards, but Track & Field walked (presumably by hammering buttons) so Madden could run. Throw your Xbox Elite controller at a wall in its honor.

7. Madden NFL 2005 (PS2, Xbox, PC, GameCube, 2004)

The early 2000s really were the peak of the Madden series. It took a lot longer for the sport to find its feet in video game form than it did for soccer or hockey, but when it did, throwing and catching a Hail Mary felt like eating Thai food for the first time.

With Ray Lewis as the Madden cover star for this iteration, the controls were so refined by the time 2005 rolled around that it feels right to hand the award to that year's release. It was easier to understand the passages of play, breaking the line felt more thrilling, and it somehow used a 2D screen to get across the sickening impact of two giant men crashing into each other while wearing body armor.

6. Wii Sports (Wii, 2006)

So, remember the exception we talked about above? Yeah. It’s simply impossible to make a list of the best sports games without including the one that tore down the barriers between gamers and people who stare at a TV without pressing buttons. Your Nan probably played this.

If you play games, there’s a good chance you have done since you were a kid. You’ve played them as the controllers grew more complex, added new buttons, and included analogue sticks. You understand the shared language between each game and how they control because of the standardization that’s developed as the games industry evolved.

Wii Sports eliminated the need for any of that by saying, “Hey, you just wave your arms around.” Genius. The next thing you know, your Mom is challenging you to a virtual boxing match and you’re turtling up, praying that she attached the wrist strap, as she lands a flurry of strikes.

5. MLB 11: The Show (PS2, PS3, 2011)

Peerless presentation, intuitive controls within both pitching and running base, and the most satisfying ‘donk’ when you connect the bat with a ball – the MLB games have always been great.

But it was here in 2011 when Sony San Diego really nailed the formula. Complete with its own RPG-like rags-to-riches story, called Road to the Show, it was a glimpse of what the future of sports games would look like.

This game also gave us our first taste of the Pure Analogue control system, which helps to sell the fantasy that you’re swinging a bat into a ball instead of just pressing buttons. It’s no wonder they still use that control system today, even if it is in a slightly evolved form.

4. FIFA 12 (PS3, Xbox 360, PC, 2011)

People complain about FIFA every year. People buy FIFA every year. We all have that one friend who has a new-gen console and only ever plays this and Call of Duty. FIFA 12 stands out among the yearly updates because it was foundational. It’s essentially the base for all the games EA is building today.

Sure, FIFA Ultimate Team is a void of discourse and a money-sucking black hole now, but we weren’t fatigued by it back in 2011. Back then, it felt like an actual innovation, instead of a businessman picking your pockets while he's laughing at you.

This was FIFA before it became a game about who can spend the most on virtual millionaires.

3. NBA Jam: Tournament Edition (Genesis, SNES, 1994)

Where most of the games on this list attempt to shoot for realism, NBA Jam dipped its basketballs in oil and lit them on fire. It captured the essence of the slam dunk.

A slam dunk is way more exciting in your head than it is out of context. It’s the buzz of the crowd, the obstacles on the pitch, and the spectacle of watching a tall man hanging from a basketball hoop. In the game, that manifests as flaming basketballs and other over-the-top visual effects.

A perfect pairing of finesse and flamboyance, only possible in video game form.

2. Pro Evolution Soccer 6 (PS2, Xbox 360, PC, 2006)

We slotted NBA between this and FIFA to prevent any kind of pre-match tunnel altercation, such is the rivalry between the two titans of soccer video games.

PES (now known as eFootball) has always been a bit like FIFA’s weird cousin. Where FIFA is concerned with making a video game that looks exactly like watching a match at home, PES has always been a video game first and foremost – a more arcade-style vision of the beautiful game.

PES 6 is the pinnacle of that arcade-minded mission. Take famous teams such as… Pompey and Middlebrook, and run them across the pitch before scoring a screamer. Sure, it looks like they’re running while piloting invisible shopping carts and the animations are stiff (pretty sure ramming your hand through someone's stomach like in the screenshot above should be counted as a foul), but that’s the price you pay for players actually reacting when you press a button.

It’s a shame the series has lost its way in recent years, but you can always go back and play this one.

1. NBA 2K17 (PS4, Xbox One, PC, 2016)

NBA 2K17 was the pinnacle of the series – all the best bits from modern NBA games, without having to get your credit card out to pay for an in-game haircut or being herded towards a literal slot machine in the game. Here, player builds were balanced and unrestrictive, the mechanics were more polished than The Rock’s head, and Michael B. Jordan was only a little bit annoying.

Sure, it’s much easier to play online in newer entries, and the options there are massively expanded, but the fundamentals are essentially unchanged. There’s not a single pound of fat on NBA 2K17.

If thinking about sports games gives you the heebie-jeebies, check out the best strategy games to do some world-conquering or assassinate some fools in the best stealth games.