What are the best multiplayer video games?

[rusty_shackleford]

No platform limit, including arcade

[Oyster Sauce]

Mario Bros

[sheet]

Any Half-Life 1 mod.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I assume this meant couch co-op, ie to people in the same room playing on the same screen.

• Lego Racers N64
• Star Wars Podracer for N64
• Mario Kart Double Dash for Gamecube
• The Traveller's Tales games (Chronicles of Narnia and Lego Star Wars) for Gamecube and PS2
• Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for Gamecube
• Star Wars Battlefront 2 for PS2
• Super Smash Bros for N64, Gamecube, and Wii

The racing games are the easiest competitive games to pick up and play. You just hold the thumbstick forward or hold down A and you go, and you steer to avoid obstacles or run over a power up and press another button to use it, and that's it. Double Dash has the best co-op experience because you can have two players on a team on the same car (one person driving, the other person aiming and firing off the powerups), so you can have two people play with neither being in competition against each other.

With fighting games, it can feel very frustrating because the other guy who owns the game probably knows some combos and will beat you up, while you don't know anything and obviously in a couch co-op situation you can't just tell him to stop and not play and not have fun while you look up and practice the controls. I liked Clay Fighter 64's aesthetic but I don't think other people enjoyed it that much. Smash (n64, Melee, and Brawl) however has a lax feel. Not sure about Ultimate, I have never played that one so maybe the huge roster would be overwhelming.

The Traveller's Tales games and Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles are co-op games where everyone is on the same side beating up bad guys and running through levels. Characters are pretty simple and easy to pick up, don't need to study how they work. Unfortunately there is an issue where since you are going through linear campaign levels, players need to stay within range of each other to progress the mission, so more experienced people or players focused on doing the story might feel frustration waiting for the other person to catch up or to "stop wasting time". Skylanders was okay-ish but I thought that the gameplay felt lackluster.

Battlefront 2 is a war game/shooter but it also has a somewhat lax feel particularly the hero free for alls in Tatooine, and players can fight on the same team together so they are not in competition. The controls are very easy to learn.

I remember going to a friend's house and playing Call of Duty Black Ops' zombie mode. It was a little overwhelming as a new player since I didn't know all of the controls or what all of these guns did, but you are generally fighting with friends against relatively easy enemies so it's okay.

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If we include co-op to include online games with each player at their own computer... I don't know. I have organized very few online co-op sessions with IRL friends. RPGs are usually not very conducive to co-op because both players need to be already well into the game to be able to play together and have a good experience, so that makes it difficult for you to call someone up and tell him to install a game and you both play and have fun immediately. Among Us was good in that regard because someone told me to install it and 5 minutes later we were playing.

It was kinda fun to blast things with people in Warframe or Diablo 3. RTS games are also usually bad because they have a similar insurmountable skill disparity like fighting games and both players are usually not on the same side.



EDIT: I think Donkey Kong Country 2 or 3 might have had co-op multiplayer. I remember playing that in a waiting room once and I think it might have been with another person.

[Tweed]

Metal Slug is a blast to play with frens. Marble Madness is superior when racing against someone else. Most of the arcade era beat'em ups are better with frens (the OG Double Dragon makes you fight the other player at the end if it's a 2-player game). Midway had a real talent for multiplayer arcade titles like Smash T.V. and Total Carnage (which is a hilarious game and fun). I didn't like it, but a lot of people swore by NBA Jam. Skull and Crossbones is often overlooked, but good fun. OG Gauntlet is fun despite being a quarter muncher, but Legends/Dark Legacy is the superior multiplayer arcade game and up to four bros can play at a time.

Super Mario Bros 3 becomes a whole different game when playing with someone else, especially if the other player insists on trying to force you into the versus game every time you move past. River City Ransom is big funs with another player, so long as they don't beat you up.

Factorio is great, except when people insists on blocking the bus with construction. We had a fun time with Alien Swarm and Left 4 Dead.

[Classix]

Fusion Frenzy for me. Brother and I always had a couple of my buddies or his around when we fired it up as we would play almost every weekend when we could.

[maidenhaver IV]

DDR

[Tangerine]

Mendel Palace.

[stormvermin]

L4D and its derivatives, namely Vermintide
Chivalry before it became dead and gay

[DecadeRiptide]

Vermintide II

[DecadeRiptide]

Overcooked if split screen
Lego Indiana Jones splitscreen and other Lego games

[DecadeRiptide]

Battleblock Theater
Diabo III

[Jordy]

MAG was a pretty cool experience.

[Lich]

Tetris

[methoxetamine]

Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles (Gamecube)


SOCOM U.S. Navy Seals (PS2)


Half Life 2 Deathmatch

[methoxetamine]

Also I used to love NEOTOKYO and Gears of War 1 and 2

[Kalarion]

Dungeons & Dragons: Shadows Over Mystara.

OG Mario Kart.

Second Gauntlet Legacy. Fantastic fun in the arcades, and great fun on console.

[rusty_shackleford]

To be clear I will be forcing you to play these with me

[Manny V]

co-op shooters/slashers mostly for me, eg Payday, Killing Floor, L4d, Vermintide, Deep Rock Galactic, GTFO (in theory, never got round to playing it with mates sadly), EDF (ditto)

[MrTwinkls]

Team Fortress 2. Still playing it since the release.

[Femboi_Otaku]

Dark Souls 3, Unreal/Unreal Return to Na Pali(coop campaign), Mass Effect 3, and some of the Resident Evil games and really fun to coop(RE5, RE6 and RE:Rev 2 in particular) and Counter Strike 2. Honorable mention Halo MCC; the Halo games are still great in coop with friends but the random multiplayer matches are lame now imo as you can't a choose single match type anymore, now you have to choose from groups of match types and you get penalized for backing out of matches you don't care to play. Lame.