The Rocky Road to Finding Good PC Boxing Games
For those of us who shun consoles and prefer our gaming action on the PC, there’s a surprising lack of options around when it comes to boxing video games. Considering this is a sport which still attracts big crowds at fight venues and huge TV audiences around the world for title bouts, the gaming options over the last decade or two have been somewhat sparse.
The Fight Night series from EA Games was arguably the best representation of the sport in recent years, using officially licensed boxers in the most realistic settings, with the 2011 Fight Night Champion release featuring a career and Hollywood-styled story mode, which took the action inside and outside the ring to a whole new level. Nevertheless, they were only ever released on consoles and iOS, never on the PC.

Image Source: @OperationSports via Twitter
Fans have petitioned for another Fight Night game at https://answers.ea.com/t5/Other-EA-Games/Fight-Night-2018/td-p/6285538 and there’s certainly demand for EA to step back into the boxing ring. However, whether we PC gamers will get the chance to play one of the greatest boxing games around, is another question entirely. Hopefully, the petitions won’t be a swing and a miss, and that EA will consider a PC release of any future offering, even if it’s a console port.
Creed: Rise to Glory by Servios at https://store.steampowered.com/app/804490/Creed_Rise_to_Glory/ is arguably the best PC boxing game of late, released in 2018 as a VR title that features everyone’s favourite Hollywood punchbag, Rocky Balboa, training Adonis Creed. The only downside for mouse and keyboard traditionalists on the PC, is that you’ll also need an HTC Vive or Oculus Rift headset to actually play the game. That said, no game has captured the essence of boxing from the perspective of the fighter quite so convincingly.

Image Source: @RealityCheckVR via Twitter
As for Rocky, well, the fictional rags to riches boxing star has featured in numerous games over the years, albeit mostly during the 80’s and 90’s. More recently, The Italian Stallion has even appeared at https://casino.paddypower.com/c/scratch in a Rocky-themed online casino scratch card game, which can be played on the PC, as gamers aim to win prizes with more punch than Ivan Drago.
Online casinos also have other games carrying the Rocky theme. The Rocky Slot was released way back in 2010 by Playtech. Visit Casino Professor at https://casino-professor.com/en/ to see what online casinos have the Rocky slot in their selection by using the filters and selecting Playtech as software provider.
For those who like the managerial side of things, the strategy and simulation of managing our own stable of boxers and training them to glory, incredibly, the best option still arguably remains World Championship Boxing Manager, which came out way back in 1990. It can be found at https://www.myabandonware.com/game/world-championship-boxing-manager-126 for download, although you’ll need the latest version of DOSbox to run it.
Amusingly, there was one avatar that looked uncannily like Rocky Balboa amongst those to choose from in World Championship Boxing Manager. Despite the game being released nearly thirty years ago, nobody has been able to come up with anything better than it did as a management simulation. If only someone could make something like Football Manager for the world of boxing on the PC, that would be truly amazing – but we’re not holding our breath.
Meanwhile, the nearest we’ll perhaps get to the action of the old Fight Night games any time soon is possibly from Vivid Games at https://vividgames.com/games/real-boxing/?lang=en with their Real Boxing that has had a PC release via Steam. Sadly, it is somewhat limited as a game that was obviously made for mobile devices, but if it gives us at least a taste of the fun boxing games can bring, then it’s still worth playing.
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