Like many role-playing games, the gameplay is diverse and each level is completely different to the last, so you’ll always be doing something new. Police games are incredibly popular because of the thrills involved. You can fight crime rather than causing it and you’re responsible for ensuring that perps are caught and brought to justice. There’s no need to go through the police academy, and you’ll be straight into the driver’s seat where you can catch some of the meanest criminals on the planet. If you’ve ever felt like sitting in the front of a police car while the lights flash and the sirens blare, then police games are a great option for you. Noire by Rockstar took the genre to a new level, referencing the world’s greatest crime writers as part of the gameplay. A decade or so later, Driver encouraged gamers to get stuck into the car chases we’ve seen in traditional cop movies, and Max Payne allowed gamers to play as an anti-hero in search of revenge. Launched in 1987, it’s so authentic that its developers Sierra claim it was even used in police training academies.

Police Quest: In Pursuit of the Death Angel was the first police game to catch the world’s attention.

Driving a police car games