Winter Sports Games

Winter sports games take you onto the snow and ice to ski, slide and compete. There are about a dozen, all free and with nothing to download, and many have a holiday theme with Santa as the star.

A small, mixed section

There aren't many games, and it shows: there's no single shared mechanic. There are downhill runs, like Santaski, Snowboarding Santa and Tumble Brook Slalom, where you go down a snowy slope dodging flags or obstacles. There are jumps, like Toboggan Jump 2002 and Kick Up Santa. There are holiday-themed races, like Christmas Race, Go Santa and Antarctic Racer. And there are other ideas, like Bratz Ice Champions, an ice skating game, or Pinguino Lancio, about launching penguins.

ChristmasFishing.io and Smeshariki are on the list, but they stray from traditional winter sports.

The real winter sports

Alpine skiing, snowboarding, ski jumping, figure skating, hockey and sledding are all Winter Olympic disciplines. The site has separate sections for skiing, snowboarding and hockey, with many more games, so if you're after a specific discipline, you might want to go straight there. This category collects the ones that don't fit any of them, mostly the holiday ones.

How to play them

• They're quick games with simple controls. Great for a short round, with nothing to learn first.
• If there are curves or flags, hold your line instead of correcting sharply.
• In the jumping games, the timing of the takeoff matters most.
• If the game is rhythm-based, stop thinking and give it a couple of rounds to learn the pattern.

Since most are short, they work well for playing a bit and repeating until you beat your best. Santaski or Snowboarding Santa are good ways in if you want to go down a slope without complications. Toboggan Jump 2002 or Kick Up Santa focus on jumping and judging the right moment. And if you want something else, Bratz Ice Champions takes you to ice skating with a familiar cast. The holiday-themed ones, with Santa as the lead, have a lighter tone and are the easiest to figure out.