What's Your Favorite Sports Game of All Time?

[Abe Sargent]

Vote Away, folks!

-Anxiety

[EagleFan]

Earl Weaver Baseball. It had just what I wanted in a baseball game, plus it even allowed you to create your own stadiums, something that is currently unheard of in a graphic baseball game.

[Philliesfan980]

Winner: FPS Football Pro

Runners up (some listed, some not):

Hardball series (namely 3 - played the hell out of that game)
NHL 93
Tecmo Super Bowl
Jack Nickelson Signature Golf

[Maple Leafs]

Earl Weaver Baseball. It had just what I wanted in a baseball game, plus it even allowed you to create your own stadiums, something that is currently unheard of in a graphic baseball game.That was my vote as well. A decade ahead of its time, maybe more. If I could get my old Amiga running I'd probably spend more time playing Earl than just about anything on the market today.

[MikeVic]

Winner: FPS Football Pro

Runners up (some listed, some not):

Hardball series (namely 3 - played the hell out of that game)
NHL 93
Tecmo Super Bowl
Jack Nickelson Signature Golf

Damnit. Did you also but that Accolade Sports 3-pack? Unnecessary Roughness, Hardball 3 I believe, and that golf game you listed...

[sabotai]

Front Page Sports Football. Way ahead of its time. I wonder what would have happened if Sierra kept at it and didn't just sit on the same game repackaged for several years until it got old and died...

[LionsFan10]

Front Page Sports, I got this game when I was like 13 yrs old before it ever had the NFLPA license and me and my friends played it for 5 days straight, from after school until about midnight. GREAT game, I came across some of the floppys when our family moved but I had lost most of them, I'd still like to know where I can pick up a copy of FBPro.

[Philliesfan980]

Damnit. Did you also but that Accolade Sports 3-pack? Unnecessary Roughness, Hardball 3 I believe, and that golf game you listed...


haha, I might have! Unnecessary Roughness was pretty unplayable though from what I remember.

This is in no way saying that these are the best sports games out there, but what are my favorite. I'm only 23 and most console games that are out there bore me to death. I still miss the simplicity of hitting the space bar in golf games :), the over the top view of NHL93, and being excited at the ability to "Warm up my pitchers" before putting them in the game.

I think it has to do more with the time that you had available as a child rather than the game itself.

[vex]

IS TCY consdiered as Front Office Football?

[Jets80]

I voted Tecmo only becasue you left out my other two favorite games of all time ...FPS Baseball Pro and Baseball Stars

[MIJB#19]

Other: Sensible World Of Soccer 1995/1996 ECE Edition with 1996/1997 Update.

[TroyF]

I had to vote for Front Office Football. I can't even begin to describe the amount of time I've put in with this series. Front Page Sports was a terrific game, but it was just too damned slow, even on a high end machine. The "one more season before I go to bed" factor of FOF is still addictive to this day when I get involved in a career.

[JonInMiddleGA]

FPS Baseball Pro

[Anthony]

madden. it was the closest thing to FOF before FOF (and before most of us were able to afford PC's). and friends playing against each other can't be beat. back then i thought EA Sports was the greatest company ever.

[Noop]

NCAA 2004 best football game I have ever played.

[Shucker]

Out of the Park Baseball series (currently on v6).

Got into after stumbling upon FOF and learning about the text sim genre. I thought FOF2 was really something. Subsequent versions have not done it for me like the first one though.

OOTP, minor problems aside, is nothing short of brilliant. if you are a baseball fan and haven't gotten on board yet, I would highly recommend it. Solo is very good, but you aren't even tapping the capabilities until you get into one of the many, many fine on-line leagues. That is where the magic is at.

[Buccaneer]

1. OOTP
2. Jack Nicklaus 5 and 6
3. Tom Landry Strategy Football
4. FBCB

[Hurst2112]

I wasn't rich enough to own a computer or Nintendo right after they go popular. Being born in 1975, my parents were victim to the Atari marketing ploy and purchased a 5200 about a week befor Atari went under. After that, they were kinda gun shy about investing in any more electronic entertainment. This is why I first got Nintendo in 90 and my first computer (apple classic) in 1989. I wasn't privey(sp?) to all of the cool games that came out for the PC in the mid 90s. Tecmo Super Bowl was my big introduction (granted, I did play tecmo bowl via game and console rental) to the sports video game world. I would like to think that FOF, OOTP and the CM series were participants in my world, but my origional love was Tecmo football.

Rock On!

[wade moore]

madden. it was the closest thing to FOF before FOF (and before most of us were able to afford PC's). and friends playing against each other can't be beat. back then i thought EA Sports was the greatest company ever.

I hate to say it, but I agree with HA ;)...

Although my 1 week involved with MP for FOF may change the rankings here, nothing beats going head to head against your boys in a Madden Franchise that you play over a few weeks with many late nights...

[Sharpieman]

I'm going to have to go with FOF. It's a hard choice between FOF, Madden and CM. FOF is an unbelievable franchise. Not only have the games been very deep and challenging, but the legacy that the game has created. Even more amazing is the fact that Jim practically made these games by himself!

Madden will have to #2. Being right next door to me in Redwood City, EA was the little engine that could and put a franchise mode in a football console game. EA was a great company in the 90s and was very consumer friendly. However, I have to put them second because of the depth of FOF and the fact that EA has turned into a monster.

CM is a wonderful game, but it has to go #3. Partly because Football (American Football) is the greatest sport ever created. CM has made soccer my 2nd favorite sport, and I don't even have a team that I follow (sorry Giants).

[Philliesfan980]

I hate to say it, but I agree with HA ;)...

Although my 1 week involved with MP for FOF may change the rankings here, nothing beats going head to head against your boys in a Madden Franchise that you play over a few weeks with many late nights...


Possible FOFC league in the works for the new PC version? :)

[wade moore]

Possible FOFC league in the works for the new PC version? :)

PC Version is going to have franchise? Is that announced? I plan to get it on ps2 because my PC just can't keep up anymore.. if they go like they have been, I would think franchise on pc means franchise on ps2 too?

[Philliesfan980]

PC Version is going to have franchise? Is that announced? I plan to get it on ps2 because my PC just can't keep up anymore.. if they go like they have been, I would think franchise on pc means franchise on ps2 too?

Aren't there online leagues for Madden?

[RandyChase]

Front Page Sports Football. Way ahead of its time. I wonder what would have happened if Sierra kept at it and didn't just sit on the same game repackaged for several years until it got old and died...

That isn't really what happened to it, or lead to the problems. Some brilliant fool up in Seattle (Sierra was in the early stages at this time of their never-ending series of merger/sales) decided they could save money by taking the product away from Pat Cook's amazing team at the Dynamic facility down in Eugene and farming it out to another development company. And it all went downhill from there.

I was working on a game for Sierra at the time they made the _huge_ announcement (and it came out of France) that they were discontinuing FP Baseball, Football and Basketball because they wanted to shift from fringe sports to mainstream sports. And that of course brought us bull riding and bass fishing.

(I was lucky enough to actually see the basketball game running. When it was killed, they still had problems with the graphics engine, but the sim engine seemed to be running pretty nicely. That's my favorite sports game that I never got to play.)

[Mac Howard]

Headcoach by Colin Adams. Possibly 15 years ahead of any other gridiron career game (as far as I know) but had all the ideas that you see today and incredibly compulsive.

[FBPro]

OOTP

[sterlingice]

I gotta go with other. I love Tecmo Super Bowl and NHLPA93 which, with my choice, made up the holy triumvirate of sports games on my SNES (for baseball, I think Griffey was about as good as the SNES got but they just never got it together to make a good baseball game on that system). But the game I had the most fun with was NBA Jam Tournament Edition. Sure, it was arcade first, but I got it when it came out for SNES and could stop feeding quarters into the machine. For the longest time and even now to an extent, there's an uphill battle to make sports games more like reality. Well, NBA Jam was content with their level of realism and then made modifications to enhance it like on fire and super dunks that opened up a new way for games to go. Before, games were content to try and get as close to reality as possible (or be very outlandish and built on a gimmick like Bill Lambeer's Combat Basketball or Base Wars). But for NBA Jam, you had to be able to pass and run the floor and play defense like any other basketball game but there was so much more. I doubt I'll ever have as much fun playing a basketball video game as that.

Hm... some honorable mentions go to the two mentioned above (Tecmo Super Bowl and NHLPA93), Lakers v Celtics for PC, Front Page Sports BBPro, RBI Baseball, and for some reason that I have yet to fathom my enjoyment: Pat Riley's Basketball for Genesis. I know there are some but nothing more off the top of my head.

SI

[FBPro]

I was working on a game for Sierra at the time they made the _huge_ announcement (and it came out of France) that they were discontinuing FP Baseball, Football and Basketball because they wanted to shift from fringe sports to mainstream sports. And that of course brought us bull riding and bass fishing.



Was there ever a DUMBER move in sports video gaming history?

[RandyChase]

Was there ever a DUMBER move in sports video gaming history?

Well, about six months after that, the same "brilliant" mind over there in France (Havas was the owner at this time) decided that science fiction no longer had any mass appeal. And they killed the Babylon 5 project (which was just about ready to go into beta) and just scrapped it.

(They also killed five other sci-fi projects at the time, including one I was working on for them. But with the huge investment in it, and the high visiblity, the day became known as the Babylon 5 Massacre.)

Hard to believe they paid a billion dollars for a company and then so quickly turned it into a pile of rubble.

[Ragone]

I'd vote for Ncaa 2004 over madden if it was a option.... but alas its not.. Tecmo bowl was my favorite game as a kid.. and still today i play it on my emulator.. But my favorite sports game has to be Championship manager.. which single handedly got me into soccer. There is not another sports game that will ever have that effect on me i believe.(well at least until front office curling comes out)

[Honolulu_Blue]

I would have to go with Champ Man as well. Though, like SI, Tecmo Super Bowl and NHLPA93 hold very special places in my heart. I played those games so. damned. much. A good part of my first two years of college were dedicated to those games. I made around $50 my Freshman year winning various Tecmo Super Bowl leagues.

[MIJB#19]

Other: Sensible World Of Soccer 1995/1996 ECE Edition with 1996/1997 Update.This was my initial thought, but with the second IHOF season kicking off today, I have to admit that FOF2004 Multi-player is seriously competing my favorite sports game of the past nine years.
For some reason, succes in the IHOF could be crucial to FOF2004 becoming my #1.

[Darkiller]

FOF all the way.
I am a big fan of Madden, and I loved Front Page Sports' Football Pro '95.

But all in all, FOF remains my all-time favourite sports game.

[Kevin]

1. Links, starting with 386 Pro. I bought a new computer just to be able to play that one.
2. Title Bout, despite not being a huge fan of boxing, I've been playing it full tilt since it's release.
3. OOTP, although I've grown somewhat tired of it now having played it steadily from Version 2 onward.

[Honolulu Blue]

This is HB #2 here.

I note that the poll isn't limited to computer games, so I won't limit myself to them. This makes the question, for me, impossible to answer. But that won't stop me from making a long post with my thoughts on various games that influenced me over the years (not in rank order):

* Mattel Electronic Baseball and Football II - These were handheld LED games from the late '70s and early '80s. Just a bunch of dots and dashes, but oh what fun I had with them. Great fun to mash the HIT button and slash a double into the gap, then step on the gas and leg out a triple! The football game was even more fun, dropping back and waiting for a passing lane or hitting the gaps myself.

* Strat-O-Matic Baseball - I had some fun with the card & dice version as a youngster and with the computer version when I was a little older. I know far more about immortals like Pete Broberg and Dave Moates than any man should, because I started out with the '76 Brewers and Rangers, and for awhile those were the only teams I had.

* NFL Strategy - Taught me a lot about what plays and formations are run in the NFL, in addition to being fun in its own right. The randomizer (a ball on a metal pole with a spring) hurt my index finger after some time playing it, but that was a small price to pay.

* Omni-Play Basketball - This was my first introduction to career play. It was a lot of fun to build an expansion-quality team into a powerhouse, and watching near-worthless rookies turn into MVP candidates. There was a neat point system that made it all possible.

* Pursue The Pennant/Diamond Mind Baseball - I'm not talking about the card & dice game (though I did get the first version of that and played it some), but the computer game in its various versions. I continue to say if you want to play one game or one season of baseball, this is the game to get. The lack of a career mode limits its usefulness.

* Front Office Football/TCY - There isn't much left to say about these games that haven't been said already. Both games have their flaws, but remain enjoyable despite them.

* OOTP/ITP - Not much to say about these games either. OOTP's greatest appeal for me is its customizability - it's possible to organize leagues nearly any possible way imaginable. And ITP is nice for first-person "what if?" games.

Honorable mention: Vince Lombardi's Game, Paydirt/Bowl Bound, Full Count Baseball, Tony Larussa Baseball/Old Time Baseball, Baseball Mogul, Hooves of Thunder/QuarterPole Plus, Greyhound, Grand Prix II/Grand Prix Wizard.

[thetrilogy]

FPS: Football Pro!

I bought a 486mhz computer for $2000 to play this game with no sound.

It has shaped my professional career, because I learned everything there was to know about computers after I bought that game and the computer.

I had to learn how to add a sound card to the thing so I could play the game with sound. I learned how to make my own boot disks for more memory.

I still have the install disks and have my seasons saved somewhere.

[MizzouRah]

* Mattel Electronic Baseball and Football II - These were handheld LED games from the late '70s and early '80s. Just a bunch of dots and dashes, but oh what fun I had with them. Great fun to mash the HIT button and slash a double into the gap, then step on the gas and leg out a triple! The football game was even more fun, dropping back and waiting for a passing lane or hitting the gaps myself.

I went through about 4 of these games!

I voted FBPro though... heck throw in FPS Baseball for that matter. I loved those series. My first introduction into modding a game as well.


Todd

[lcjjdnh]

For some reason Tony LaRussa Baseball II was always my favorite game as a kid. I used to play that game for hours upon hours. Also, I got the fantasy draft kit with it, which was my first real introduction to "text sims". I used to create tons of leagues, drafting my team and then simulating the season. I would make trades, etc. then import that seasons stats into next years and start again. That game also had the old time players and stadiums and I used to love having my all-time leagues with all the great players.

[Celeval]

No particular order:
Championship Manager
FOF/TCY
Baseball Stars
NCAA 2004

[Arles]

Tony Larussa Baseball III
Baseball Mogul
original FOF
CM 00/01
FPS Baseball/Football 98

I spent more hours on these than I care to count.

[The_herd]

Graphically, I loved the High Heat series on the PC. The 2001 version I believe was where it peaked (if thats the one with Sammy Sosa on the cover). Was really sad to see that series die a painfull death.

The Original baseball mogul is what hooked me on text sims. So that deserves mentioning.

Front Page Sports Football Pro allowed me dream of what console games one day may become.

The original FOF, thats why the majority of us are here.

Tecmo Bowl, no other game kept me inside during my summers off from school like Tecmo Bowl.

[Gallifrey]

I voted FOF for #1.

Many years ago Status Pro Football was the best, but FOF is really much like it.

Madden had it's moments years ago when there wasn't much else.

[Buccaneer]

1. OOTP
2. Jack Nicklaus 5 and 6
3. Tom Landry Strategy Football
4. FBCB
I have changed my mind. Like many, I suppose, I have grown somewhat tired of OOTP. Even though I have had no problems with OOTP6 and like playing it, it doesn't give me the "look forward to playing it again and/or play one more season" hook anymore. The game that does (and the one that I can't wait to get back to soon) is FBCB.

[Scholes]

CM for Pres.

I guess I had the most fun with the 01-02 version, but I really like the 03/04 version
and I can see it getting better...

[Kodos]

No surprise from me:

1. Madden
2. NCAA Football
3. FOF (IHOF is really helping FOF move up the charts)

[ntndeacon]

ahhh the wonder that was Intellivision sports games
1) Intellivision Baseball
2) Intelivision Football
3)FOF

[nilodor]

NCAA 2005, it has captured my imagination and for the first days since tecmo I felt like I was part of the game.

[gottimd]

Nigel Weatherbee's Extreme Badminton.

















Seriously though, FOF 2k4.

[k0ruptr]

seriously this is easy

High Heat series for PC. no doubt about it

[Draft Dodger]

MicroLeague Baseball for the Apple II.
spent countless hours of my life playing that game...

I would spend weeks editing all the teams to current players. I'd play out the real MLB schedule (simming games I didn't play amounted to putting both teams to "computer" control and leaving for 30 minutes). I'd print out stats on a weekly basis to track the league's progress (and so I could coallate the data to come up with league leaders, which the game didn't track). I created a system to handle free agency, and also created farm teams for each club. Quite involved, really. never got a whole season done, but I always had a TON of fun setting one up. Amazing how all that stuff is now automated in text-sims...

NHL 93 was a close second. Many, many, many crazy nights playing drinking games with that game...

[Raiders Army]

I voted for Madden, although that wouldn't hardly be fair...

If Sierra had continued Front Page Sports Football, it would be #1. Comparing a game of today against games of yesteryear (yesterday?) isn't fair.