The virtual world has ways to engross people in a high-paced, exciting life where esports games, especially, have made their mark owing to players going up against one another in real-time.
Sure, NPCs do give us the thrill of battle and feel of emotional weight in set storylines. But they often tend to get predictive after a while. Playing a final boss or hordes of minions over and over again can give away crucial strategies to defeat them. Whereas, esports games have an unpredictability of their own.
Since the players are live characters, there is no end to the amount of creativity that can be brought out on the field. Time and again, we have seen shocking skills from players who have gone beyond the limits of normal gaming and established their personal vibes even in ability-restricted video games.
Gamers coming up with new strategies based on the foundational ones and blowing them up to new proportions is one of the reasons the world has taken to esports so passionately.
Here we have some of the best esports games that have given us amazing streams and are popular the world over. If you are new to the genre, this listicle will provide you with some ideas about which title to pick up next.
Valorant, CS:GO, and 8 other top esports games this year
1) Counter-Strike: Global Offense
Why don’t we start with a classic? The Counter-Strike series is one of the most popular esports titles of all time. Since its release in 2000, CS has been a highly competitive, strategy-oriented, multiplayer, first-person shooter game. It was in 2012 that CS:GO was released, and received with the same spirit as before.
The concept is simple. Players spawn on the map as part of one of the two five-player squads: Terrorists and Counter-Terrorists. The objective of the former is to plant a bomb at marked locations, whereas the latter have to defuse it or take out the terrorists.
Over time, many game dynamics and modes have been introduced, like Prop Hunt, Zombie mode, and more. But the simple nature of the game, a huge active playerbase, and competitive tournaments with massive prize pools are what make CS:GO such a popular game even today.
2) Call Of Duty: Warzone 2
Call of Duty: Warzone 2 was released in November 2022, and is the successor to the original Warzone from 2020. The title is part of the classic Call of Duty series that we know and love.
Warzone is also one of the high-paced online multiplayer esports games where you can play solo or in a squad. The main focus is the Battle Royale mode where you will be dropped on to one of the maps and will have to go on an all-out survival battle against other teams.
The last squad standing will be marked the victor. A huge variety of weapons and armor will be scattered all around the map for you to equip. Vehicles ranging from four-wheelers to choppers are up for grabs.
There’s a changing zone limit, going past which will chip away at your HP little by little. Every few minutes, the zone closes in on you and the damage incurred by being outside it increases progressively with every safe-zone collapse.
This setup draws out a wide range of strategies among the players and has thus acquired a huge playerbase. Though Warzone 2 has introduced a new DMZ mode, the Battle Royale remains a fan-favorite for players of esports games.
3) League of Legends
League of Legends is a Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA) title that is heavily inclined towards strategy and tactics. There are about 150+ champions that you can select from and develop as you go along the way.
The matches are played between two teams of five champions facing off to capture each other’s bases. Each champion has its own unique set of attacks that can be chained up with others in the team to build powerful combos.
Depending on the type of round, each game lasts anywhere between 20-40 minutes. Players are pitted against one another and the vast range of attacks lets them explore more attacking combinations and strategies. This is why League of Legends is one of the most highest-grossing esports games of all time.
Long-standing tournaments and massive prize pools have kept the craze of this esports game alive, which has acquired over 150 million registered players over the years.
4) Valorant
Although Valorant is a recent release, having launched in 2020, it has captured the hearts of countless players who have taken it up. It has a traditional mode of gameplay that consists two five-person squads where one team is required to plant spikes (essentially bombs) and the other has to defuse them, while trying to avoide a barrage of bullets.
Valorant offers lots of different modes for players to enjoy and the spotlight falls mainly on the individual abilities of the agents, who are chosen by the players themselves. Not only are they tactically versatile and allow for enjoyable gameplay, but the graphic aspect of their animations has an undeniably satisfactory feel to them.
The aim mechanics are a lot different than your usual point-and-shoot games and are fairly difficult to adjust to. Fortunately, there are aim trainers available for such titles that can be utilized to get better at aiming. Once you get the hang of it, the possibilities of going through varied gameplay are endless.
5) PUBG
PC or mobile, PUBG has acquired a hold over both platforms alike since its release in 2017. The traditional Battle Royale mode is the most popular, where players drop in on the map in teams or alone and attempt to take all others out before the time ends.
Some of the features it has are quite common, like safe zones, weapon availability, and vehicles. Additionally, PUBG has brought forth a range of special tricks and strategies that are unique to the game’s mechanics. Other than that, it also has a few deathmatch modes to test out skills on a concentrated part of the map.
In terms of versatility, this is one esports game that looks quite good in almost all visual settings. This means that players using low-spec devices can also enjoy quality graphics in their gameplay.
6) DOTA 2
Defense Of The Ancients (DOTA) has been around for a long time. It’s one of the esports games that made its name on the MOBA model in the early 2000s. The title has hundreds of heroes spread across many different categories, with a diverse range of attacking and defensive strategies that can be a little difficult to keep track of at times.
Seasoned players have mastered some of the selective heroes over time with experience and have built an arsenal of strategies that have proven to be awe-inspiring to viewers.
Teams can pick and ban heroes based on their own strategies in the given time before the match. This gives players yet another level of strategy and has a significant impact on the match itself. The rest is taken care of by the gameplay and in-field tactics.
Hosting millions of active players and major tournaments, DOTA 2 is one of the biggest names in the esports game genre.
7) Rocket League
If racing cars had a weird child with football, that’s what Rocket League would be described as. A facepalm emoji would be used right here if not for the addictive gameplay of this esports game.
Racecars fighting each other on the football field and trying to hit a giant football into the opponent’s goal is a sight we all want, and need, to see. As bizarre as it may sound, the gameplay and the acrobatics involved are nothing to joke about.
The developers have put in uncountable hours behind projectile mechanics that can be noticed even by untrained eyes. Like other esports games, this one also offers loads of training sessions to perfect various moves to apply across multiple modes.
Rocket League is a light and fun game to play as it offers the freedom of developing your own moves, along with regular events to keep things fresh and interesting.
8) Rainbow Six Seige
Playable across various platforms, Rainbow Six started out in the very late 90’s. It has since made its way into the esports games industry and thrived on its graphic visuals and amazing mechanics.
From setting down traps to coordinating with your team and eliminating opponents, Rainbow Six has it all. Rainbow Six Siege has its sights not just on the run-and-gun aspect of the game but also on the individual abilities of the operators. Whether breaching defended areas or defending against those breaches, Seige lets players explore all kinds of approaches to complete their objectives.
Apart from the classic terrorist hunt, Rainbow Six Siege has brought in other modes as well, like Hostage Extraction and Bomb Disarmament. Each has its nuances and sets of strategies that players like to exploit and improve upon. Thus, it’s a fun lobby for friends to hang out and take on different teams every time.
9) Fortnite
Fortnite is a game about shooting people where you mostly don’t shoot them. Its main charm lies in its innate ability to provide gamers with various skillsets. Not to make things complicated, it’s a classic battle royale title, but with multiple skills for your characters that are often optional.
The building aspect in this esports game is vivid, colorful, and allows for so many different maneuvers. So much so that it is often more difficult to focus on winning than on the personal building aspects and getting stylish kills.
Heavily influenced by pop culture, there is a wide selection of achievable characters that players can choose from. From exaggerated finishing moves to outlandish character hunting, Fornite offers a free reign in gameplay within the restricted premises of the classic battle royale mode, widely followed by many other esports games.
With vivid characters, cartoonish construction of builds, and over-the-top gameplay, Fortnite has managed to gain a steady player base over a very short amount of time. The presence of regular wide-scale tournaments with great prize pools is another feature that endears the community to it.
10) Overwatch 2
Improving on its predecessor with the same name, Overwatch 2 has brought in some changes in its gameplay. It heavily focuses on player-versus-player fights across various modes.
The heroes are divided into classes like Tank, Damage, and Support. Each player has to select one of them and secure their place in the team with designated responsibilities. How they expand on them is entirely up to their creativity.
Overwatch 2 has reduced the number of Tank heroes per team by one, bringing down the total number of players per squad from six to five. As addressed by the game director, the developers had hoped to speed up the gameplay with one less Tank.
You can go about ranking up your characters individually from Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, and more, where they will have different rankings for different class types. Other than that, the game also offers a player-versus-environment mode, where fans have to go up against NPCs to obtain experience points, like a campaign mode.