The best soccer games

European Championship 1992 captures football in a raw, almost scrappy form. This isn’t about realism or presentation; it’s about getting the ball forward and hoping for...

Premier Manager was released in 1992 by Gremlin Interactive for the Commodore Amiga and MS-DOS platforms. It was one of the earliest football management simulation games and allowe...

If you ever wanted to run a football club without leaving your chair, The Manager (1991, DOS) delivers. This early management sim lets you buy players, balance budgets, and suffer ...

MicroProse Soccer is an abandoned action-oriented soccer game, developed by Sensible Software and released by MicroProse Software in 1988. The appeal of MicroProse Soccer was its s...

Before Football Manager made spreadsheets cool, there was Bundesliga Manager Professional, a game where managing a German football team involved more math than actual football. You...

Before Football Manager devoured your social life, there was Championship Manager. With graphics as bare as a locker room and stats as detailed as a tax form, it’s a numbers ...

Football Manager 3 (1993, DOS) trades grass stains for spreadsheets and proves that tension can thrive in numbers. You’re not scoring goals; you’re negotiating contract...

Take the tactical seriousness of Championship Manager and sprinkle on some espresso. Championship Manager Italia gives you control over Italy’s finest (and most temperamental...

The final Championship Manager to grace DOS—and what a send-off. Season 97/98 is the fan-favorite for a reason: every transfer, every injury, every last-minute goal feels lik...

If nostalgia had a soundtrack, it might be Blur’s “Song 2,” forever tied to FIFA: Road to World Cup 98. This was the entry where the series suddenly felt cool, co...

With FIFA Soccer 97, EA decided indoor soccer was exactly what the world had been waiting for, and honestly, they weren’t entirely wrong. The pace is frantic, the rebounds ar...

Ultimate Soccer Manager 2 refines the original formula, adding more depth, more leagues, and a slightly more approachable interface. It still revolves around data, decisions, and d...

There was a time when digitized sprites and surprisingly loud crowd noise felt like cutting-edge sports science, and FIFA Soccer 96 proudly lived in that moment. The big selling po...

Premier Manager 2 polished the formula, giving football nerds even more stats to obsess over. If you thought juggling line-ups and balancing books was fun in the first game, this s...

Football Fanatic (1998, DOS) is pure arcade chaos dressed in cleats. It doesn’t care much for the finer tactical nuances of the sport; it wants you sprinting, tackling, and g...

Ultimate Soccer Manager taps into the irresistible fantasy of running a football club without ever leaving your chair. Instead of flashy graphics, it offers spreadsheets, statistic...

Before Football Manager consumed the souls of soccer nerds everywhere, there was Club Football: The Manager. It’s all spreadsheets, transfers, and managing egos with egos. Th...

One-Nil Soccer Manager is a text-based soccer management simulation game that was popular in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It was developed for various home computer systems, inc...

Action Soccer (1995, DOS) is what happens when you try to make a soccer game fun without worrying too much about realism, physics, or gravity. The ball bounces like it’s fill...

Street Sports Soccer (1988, DOS) trades professional pitches for empty lots, with goalposts made of bricks and wild kids chasing glory. It’s messy, fast, and surprisingly end...

In Gazza 2, the legendary English footballer Paul Gascoigne lends his name to a soccer game that manages to be as unpredictable as his career. Released in 1991, it’s a curiou...

Football Glory (1995, DOS) approaches the beautiful game with a playful smirk and a willingness to bend reality for entertainment’s sake. The players move with exaggerated fl...