The Most Popular Fantasy Sports Games
1. Fantasy Rugby
The sport of rugby has a long history going back to the early 19th century and is now more popular on a global basis than ever before. Therefore, it’s no surprise that it’s one of the top fantasy sports now, letting you pick the star players from different leagues to join your team.
As they play in real games in their respective leagues, your players then pick up points that count towards your total. Prizes in this game range from merchandise to official digital cards you can use in the game.
2. Fantasy Football
As the most popular sport in the US, it’s easy to imagine that football is also huge in the fantasy sports market. In fact, arguably the first fantasy sports game came in 1962 and was based on choosing NFL players.
The first step is to join a league. You can do this with friends and family or join a league with other internet users all looking to earn the top prize. The drafting rules will vary but, in most cases, you’re asked to select a full team, respecting a salary cap while choosing a player for each position.
You’ll be given a chance to change your team as the season progresses, with different ways of doing this. You might take part in a live draft or an offline draft, with some platforms imposing a strict time limit or enforcing the order of the draft.
3. Fantasy Soccer
The most popular sport in the world offers another of the most popular fantasy sports which is particularly important in countries such as the UK and Germany. Many of these games are based on a single league such as the EPL or La Liga, so you can only pick players from that specific competition.
Other games are based on a major tournament like the FIFA World Cup or Women’s World Cup. In this case, you can choose players from any of the competing teams as you create a team that you think will pick up more points than your rivals.
One of the interesting aspects of fantasy soccer is that you may be asked to choose a full roster at the start of the season, allowing you to then choose your best starting 11 players before each game.
4. Fantasy Basketball
Since the NBA is the world’s biggest and most widely-followed basketball league, this is the league that’s more frequently used for fantasy basketball games. Like all of the other fantasy sports we’ve looked at, it’s all about choosing the players you believe will get the most points for you. One of the possible advantages of fantasy basketball is that this sport involves smaller teams so you need to draft fewer players. You also need to understand the different ways of scoring points in this game, which involves methods such as points, head-to-head points, and roto.
You might also come across multi-season leagues that allow you to keep one or more players in your roster from one season to the next. All of these factors will affect how you approach the game’s draft and pick your players
5. Fantasy Hockey
The NHL is the biggest ice hockey league in the world, so the majority of fans are likely to play fantasy sports based on its players and teams. As with most American-focused fantasy sports, the season begins with a draft where you choose between the best-established stars and the rookies with potential, making this the most important moment of the season.
Some fantasy hockey games let you set up a roster for the season and just let it run. However, most will require some sort of roster maintenance to give you a chance of winning. This is where you can look to boost your performance by bringing in better players and removing anyone who hasn’t been doing well for you.
The head-to-head approach is the most common in fantasy hockey, but you might see the total points – or rotisserie – method of finding out who is the overall winner of the league also used at times.