NoBadPicks

Anime Like Cross Game

If you loved Cross Game's Animation and Comedy storytelling, these anime deliver a similar experience — selected for art style, narrative depth, and emotional impact. Each includes where to stream it now.

Top Picks

Touch
9.2

Touch

1985

Twins Kazuya and Tatsuya, and their neighbor Minami have played together since they were children and built an unbreakable bond. But with puberty, the twins realized something: Minami is a girl, and three is a crowd. As the trio tries to preserve their relationship, Kazuya's pledge to make Minami's dream come true by taking her to Koshien with his baseball pitching skills makes the slackerish Tatsuya wonder about himself, and his own goals. But Minami has another dream she wants fulfilled, and as the twins continue to push themselves, with Minami in the middle, a life-changing tragedy leads one twin down a path he once never would've considered...

Blue Box
8.0

Blue Box

2024

Taiki Inomata loves badminton, but he has a long way to go before he can reach nationals. When Taiki sees upperclassman Chinatsu Kano practicing her heart out on the girls’ basketball team, he falls for her hard. After an unexpected turn of events brings the two closer together, sports might not be the first thing on their minds anymore!

Kuroko's Basketball
8.4

Kuroko's Basketball

2012

In the story, Kagami Taiga has just enrolled into Seirin High School when he meets Kuroko Tetsuya of the school's basketball team. Kuroko happens to be the shadowy sixth member of the legendary Generation of Miracles basketball team. Together, Kagami and Kuroko aim to take their team to the inter-high school championship - against Kuroko's former teammates.

Kokoro Connect
6.6

Kokoro Connect

2012

Five members of the school culture club—Taichi Yaegashi, Iori Nagase, Himeko Inaba, Yui Kiriyama, and Yoshifumi Aoki—encounter a bizarre phenomenon one day when Aoki and Yui switch personalities without warning. The same begins to happen to the other club members, throwing their daily lives into chaos. At first the five students find some amusement among the confusion, but this connection also exposes the painful scars hidden within their hearts... When their calm lives are shattered, the relationships between the five students also begin to change!

Slam Dunk
8.7

Slam Dunk

1993

Sakuragi Hanamichi is a junior high punk used to getting into fights and being rejected by girls but upon entering high school he meets the girl of his dreams, Haruko Akagi. He will do anything in order to win her heart including joining the school basketball team that is aiming to conquer the nation lead by Haruko's brother. The problem is that Sakuragi has never played basketball before and a freshman sensation is stealing the spotlight and Haruko's affection from him.

Horimiya: The Missing Pieces
7.6

Horimiya: The Missing Pieces

2023

A new anime project that adapts popular side stories that were left out of the main anime series As the graduation ceremony at Katagiri High School comes to an end, Kyouko Hori, her boyfriend Izumi Miyamura, and their friends begin to look back on their time as students. The moments they shared together may be fleeting, but each one is a colorful piece of their precious memories.

Real Girl
8.5

Real Girl

2018

Tsutsui Hikari (a.k.a "Tsuttsun") is a high school student who is content with his virtual life of anime and video games. One day, he gets stuck cleaning the pool with Iroha, a real live girl who is stylish, sassy and known to be easy with boys ... and she aggressively approaches him! Tsuttsun, who has few friends and lives in his own world, finds himself smitten by the confident and wild Iroha ... and his whole world is turned upside down!! It's the awkward and pure love story of a boy who experiences relationship for the first time.

The Dangers in My Heart
8.5

The Dangers in My Heart

2023

Kyotaro Ichikawa, a boy barely clinging to the bottom rung of his school's social ladder, secretly believes he’s the tortured lead in some psychological thriller. He spends his days dreaming up ways to disrupt his classmates' peaceful lives and pining after Anna Yamada, the class idol. But Kyotaro's not nearly the troubled teen he pretends to be…and it turns out Anna's a bit odd herself!

More Anime Like Cross Game

The Fragrant Flower Blooms with Dignity
8.6

The Fragrant Flower Blooms with Dignity

2025

When the intimidating Rintaro meets the open-minded Kaoruko, the unlikely duo grows closer. The issue? Their neighboring high schools hate each other.

Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions!
8.1

Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions!

2012

As one of the thousands of Japanese students afflicted with "chunibyo," a state where they're so desperate to stand out that they've convinced themselves that they have secret knowledge and hidden powers, Yuta spent most of his middle school years living in a complete fantasy world. He's finally managing to overcome his delusions but his chunibyo have attracted the attentions of another sufferer, and she's decided that this makes him her soul mate.

Shikimori's Not Just a Cutie
7.8

Shikimori's Not Just a Cutie

2022

Shikimori seems like the perfect girlfriend: cute, fun to be around, sweet when she wants to be… but she has a cool dark side that comes out under the right circumstances. And her boyfriend Izumi loves to be around when that happens!

ORESUKI Are you the only one who loves me?
8.5

ORESUKI Are you the only one who loves me?

2019

Kisaragi Amatsuyu is invited out alone by the cool beauty upperclassman Cosmos and his childhood friend Himawari. Expecting to hear their confessions, he triumphantly goes to meet each of them in turn. But Cosmos and Himawari both instead confess to Amatsuyu that they like his friend. Amatsuyu fights this lonely battle, but there is another girl who is looking at him. She is a gloomy girl with glasses and braids. Amatsuyu finds that he hates her, because she's always turning her sharp tongue only on him and finding enjoyment in his troubles. But it turns out that she's the only one who actually does like him.

My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU
8.2

My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU

2013

So exactly what’s going to happen when Hachiman Hikigaya, an isolated high school student with no friends, no interest in making any and a belief that everyone else’s supposedly great high school experiences are either delusions or outright lies, is coerced by a well meaning faculty member into joining the one member “Volunteer Services Club” run by Yukino Yukinoshita, who’s smart, attractive and generally considers everyone in her school to be her complete inferior?

Monthly Girls' Nozaki-kun
7.2

Monthly Girls' Nozaki-kun

2014

High school student Chiyo Sakura has a crush on schoolmate Umetarō Nozaki, but when she confesses her love to him, he mistakes her for a fan and gives her an autograph. When she says that she always wants to be with him, he invites her to his house and has her help on some drawings. Chiyo discovers that Nozaki is actually a renowned shōjo manga artist named Sakiko Yumeno. She then agrees to be his assistant in order to get closer to him. As they work on his manga Let's Fall in Love (恋しよっ), they encounter other schoolmates who assist them or serve as inspirations for characters in the stories.

From Me to You: Kimi ni Todoke
8.4

From Me to You: Kimi ni Todoke

2009

Nicknamed "Sadako" for her spooky appearance, high schooler Sawako begins to break out of her shell when she befriends popular boy Kazehaya.

Blue Spring Ride
8.4

Blue Spring Ride

2014

At the end of her first year of high school, Futaba Yoshioka suddenly has a chance encounter with her first love, Kou Tanaka. Three years ago, he transferred schools before she was able to say how she felt about him. After meeting each other again, Futaba realizes that he has gone through many changes. He acts more cool and even had his last name changed to Mabuchi. Gradually the two rekindle their love while piecing together what had happened in the time that they were apart.

This Art Club Has a Problem!
6.1

This Art Club Has a Problem!

2016

An art club in a certain middle school, and its members: Subaru Uchimaki, who is a genius at drawing faces, but only wants to draw the perfect 2D wife; Colette, a rich troublemaker who never stops making mischief; and the club president, who sleeps through sessions and collects sleeping aids. Mizuki Usami is the only person in the club who wants to do art club-like activities, and constantly struggles to do so.

Honey Lemon Soda
8.3

Honey Lemon Soda

2025

After middle school, with its bullying and nicknames, Uka Ishimori is excited for a fresh start at Hachimitsu High School. Kai Miura, a cool and uninhibited boy, sits next to her in class. Uka remembers she met Kai in middle school and with a single word, he had convinced her to attend Hachimitsu. Though he’s popular, Kai supports Uka in her efforts to fit in with her new classmates.

Pseudo Harem
7.9

Pseudo Harem

2024

Eiji Kitahama joins the drama club with dreams of having a harem like the ones from his favorite manga. Rin Nanakura, an underclassman, finds herself crushing hard on Eiji, and tries on different personas in his presence to win him over. No matter how she acts, one thing is certain—her feelings for Eiji continue to grow stronger. Will she ever be able to tell him the truth and be herself?

Seiren
7.8

Seiren

2017

For high school students like Shouichi Kamita, university entrance exams and the future are common concerns. It is also during this time in life that a mysterious emotion that vexes people of all ages may begin to weigh upon one's mind—love. At this point in his teenage years, Shouichi finds three girls he could see himself having a future with: the ever-cheerful Hikari Tsuneki, who teases Shouichi without mercy, but actually has a softer side; the competitive gamer, Tooru Miyamae, who has difficulty communicating with others; and Shouichi's childhood friend, Kyouko Touno, the sometimes immature shoujo manga enthusiast. Seiren follows Shouichi's relationships with these three girls across three separate arcs, as their feelings grow from mutual interest and blossom into something more beautiful.

Why These Anime Are Similar

These recommendations share core qualities with Cross Game (2009): Animation and Comedy themes, comparable animation style, and similar narrative pacing. NoBadPicks uses TMDB collaborative filtering, genre matching, and AI analysis to surface anime most likely to resonate with fans of Cross Game.

See full details for Cross Game (2009)

People Also Search For