AccidentalDenz
Lord of Steam
It has been noted on this forum that I have a stupidly big Steam library (2,390 games and counting!), and I have also been quite open that I enjoy most sports. I don't really have the hand/eye co-ordination to be any good at the games that require you to actually do the sport, but I've always enjoyed sports management games, so I figured I'd put together a post covering a few of my favourite games in the genre across a few different sports.
Football
These days, there's only one football management game of any real size out there and it's Football Manager. I was a long-term player of the game, but year on year, the game has gotten more and more complex to the point where completing an in-game season takes weeks of play. The depth of the series is absolutely staggering now, but that has come at the cost of speed of play. I used to enjoy watching the kids of players I started with develop after playing a couple of decades, but I've not done more than 4 or 5 seasons in one game in quite some time.
It never used to be this way though, the first management game I played was Ultimate Soccer Manager 98 which can still be found online, but requires a bit of fiddling about with to get playing on modern hardware. Still, as you can see from the pic below, the game was a beauty!
Baseball
The first sports management game I tried outside of football was baseball, specifically the Out of the Park Baseball series. They're incredibly indepth and have most of the main leagues worldwide fully licensed - if that's your thing. I like the balance in the series between depth and speed of play, as even with a 162-game season (as in MLB), you can still move through a season in a couple of evenings quite easily. The series also features a really good editor, so you can create your own leagues - I once created a British Baseball League which was fun. OOTP 17 is one of my most played games on Steam ever, with well over 1,600 hours played.
I'd also give a little shout out to the makers of Baseball Mogul as a fun, if smaller focussed game.
Ice Hockey
I've never seen a hockey game live - my nearest team of any size is Manchester, but I'm not sure I should go anywhere near Manchester with an accent like mine. That being said, the publishers of OOTP Baseball also do an ice hockey series, Franchise Hockey Manager, which keeps sucking me back in. I've currently got a game in the Canadian junior hockey leagues which is eating up a lot of my time recently. I'm typically trying to find the next NHL superstar, but still get a little teary-eyed when one of "my" kids makes it to the NHL.
US Sports
Wolverine Studios are probably the go-to company for American football and basketball, but I'd advise you to buy from them directly, as the Steam versions are quite glitchy (I think it's to do with the Steam overlay and how that interacts with the game). Their basketball games are Draft Day Sports: College Basketball and Pro Basketball
If you prefer your balls funny-shaped, Draft Day Sports: College Football and Pro Football have you covered. Wolverine Studios have included the rather nifty feature that players can be imported between games, so if a college kid looks good and you want to see how he'd do in the big leagues, you can import him and his draft class into the pro game and see.
Rugby (both codes)
Growing up with a Scottish dad in a city on the edge of league country, I've had a fair amount of exposure to our own funny-shaped ball games. Most of the rugby management games on the market are a bit pants, but I feel that Rugby Union Team Manager 3 and Rugby League Team Manager 3 are both solid efforts and probably the best games out there, but they do need mods if you want licensed teams/players, etc.
Wrestling
Stretching the "sports" bit a touch, I'm a long term casual fan of the often wacky world of professional wrestling - it's the spandex obviously!
There's a long-running series of wrestling games Total Extreme Wrestling which are definite timesinks, as they come with a fully-realised database of a fictional universe inspired by real-life. The game also has a fantastic editor and so modders have created mods covering most of the major wrestling events over the last 30 years. You can try and re-create history, or go off and do your own thing. This is another one I'd go direct to the developer for as only the older games in the series are on Steam.
I started this thread as half an idea of something to do and have ended up spending the last hour and a half putting this all together - I must be mad.
Still are there any sports management games out there that I've missed or that you'd like to see get some love? Or perhaps should see about adding to my backlog!
Football
These days, there's only one football management game of any real size out there and it's Football Manager. I was a long-term player of the game, but year on year, the game has gotten more and more complex to the point where completing an in-game season takes weeks of play. The depth of the series is absolutely staggering now, but that has come at the cost of speed of play. I used to enjoy watching the kids of players I started with develop after playing a couple of decades, but I've not done more than 4 or 5 seasons in one game in quite some time.
It never used to be this way though, the first management game I played was Ultimate Soccer Manager 98 which can still be found online, but requires a bit of fiddling about with to get playing on modern hardware. Still, as you can see from the pic below, the game was a beauty!
Baseball
The first sports management game I tried outside of football was baseball, specifically the Out of the Park Baseball series. They're incredibly indepth and have most of the main leagues worldwide fully licensed - if that's your thing. I like the balance in the series between depth and speed of play, as even with a 162-game season (as in MLB), you can still move through a season in a couple of evenings quite easily. The series also features a really good editor, so you can create your own leagues - I once created a British Baseball League which was fun. OOTP 17 is one of my most played games on Steam ever, with well over 1,600 hours played.
I'd also give a little shout out to the makers of Baseball Mogul as a fun, if smaller focussed game.
Ice Hockey
I've never seen a hockey game live - my nearest team of any size is Manchester, but I'm not sure I should go anywhere near Manchester with an accent like mine. That being said, the publishers of OOTP Baseball also do an ice hockey series, Franchise Hockey Manager, which keeps sucking me back in. I've currently got a game in the Canadian junior hockey leagues which is eating up a lot of my time recently. I'm typically trying to find the next NHL superstar, but still get a little teary-eyed when one of "my" kids makes it to the NHL.
US Sports
Wolverine Studios are probably the go-to company for American football and basketball, but I'd advise you to buy from them directly, as the Steam versions are quite glitchy (I think it's to do with the Steam overlay and how that interacts with the game). Their basketball games are Draft Day Sports: College Basketball and Pro Basketball
If you prefer your balls funny-shaped, Draft Day Sports: College Football and Pro Football have you covered. Wolverine Studios have included the rather nifty feature that players can be imported between games, so if a college kid looks good and you want to see how he'd do in the big leagues, you can import him and his draft class into the pro game and see.
Rugby (both codes)
Growing up with a Scottish dad in a city on the edge of league country, I've had a fair amount of exposure to our own funny-shaped ball games. Most of the rugby management games on the market are a bit pants, but I feel that Rugby Union Team Manager 3 and Rugby League Team Manager 3 are both solid efforts and probably the best games out there, but they do need mods if you want licensed teams/players, etc.
Wrestling
Stretching the "sports" bit a touch, I'm a long term casual fan of the often wacky world of professional wrestling - it's the spandex obviously!
There's a long-running series of wrestling games Total Extreme Wrestling which are definite timesinks, as they come with a fully-realised database of a fictional universe inspired by real-life. The game also has a fantastic editor and so modders have created mods covering most of the major wrestling events over the last 30 years. You can try and re-create history, or go off and do your own thing. This is another one I'd go direct to the developer for as only the older games in the series are on Steam.
I started this thread as half an idea of something to do and have ended up spending the last hour and a half putting this all together - I must be mad.
Still are there any sports management games out there that I've missed or that you'd like to see get some love? Or perhaps should see about adding to my backlog!
