Best Co-Op Arena Shooters

An Arena Shooter is a sub-genre that can be utilized in many different ways for making unique experiences — some of them will even incorporate elements of other Shooter sub-genres such as Shoot ‘Em Up games. This genre-blurring makes for a lot of different ways to enjoy the sub-genre, all of which are made even better when players have some friends coming along for the ride.

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By  Ana Micaela Leite Scheidemantel

While an Arcade Shooter is a game that focuses purely on entertainment value over realism, an Arena Shooter has a few more rules to make it a full-blown sub-genre. They promote speed and quick reactions to create a very engaging atmosphere, with less of a focus on aiming down sights and hiding behind cover. They also provide lots of features that can change gameplay elements mid-match — such as modifying pick-ups or having powerful weapons spawning into the game. Arena Shooters aren't as common as other Shooter counterparts, but there are still some classic games in the genre.

8 Perfect Dark

Arena Espionage

Perfect Dark might not have as fast of movement as other Arena Shooters, nor the adrenaline-pumping music, but this N64 classic provided players with a great sci-fi spy experience. The game is constantly compared to GoldenEye 007, a game that was made by the same developer, Rare.

Players can team up to play through the game’s story campaign together, or load some bots into one of its multiplayer modes. The remastered version of the game also brings online functionality, along with stunning new visual elements to bring the game closer to the modern era.

7 Quake 3 Arena

Putting The Arena In Arena Shooter

• Release Date: December 2, 1999
• Platforms: AmigaOS 4, Microsoft Windows, Linux, Mac OS, Mac OS X, Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, Xbox 360, iOS

One of the games that helped pioneer the sub-genre of Arena Shooters is Quake 3 Arena. The game features a wide range of weapons with different methods of fragging opponents, and players will need to keep moving to prevent an opponent from coming at them from a blind spot.

Being as old as it is, the game doesn’t offer as wide a range of cooperative game modes as it does weapon choices. Players can team up to work together in Team Deathmatches and Capture the Flag modes — and having good communication can give them a monstrously powerful advantage, but at the end of the day, skill usually wins out.

6 Doom 3

A Rip & Tear Masterpiece

Old as it may be, Doom 3 had some stunning visuals for its time — and some extraordinary gameplay. The game ramped up the violence and action from previous entries for players to make their way through every room and corridor. Each filled with hordes of demons, zombies, and other monstrosities.

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By  Jake Fillery

Officially, the only way to play Doom 3’s campaign or other game modes in co-op was to connect two consoles together on the same LAN network — a very cumbersome practice by today’s standards. However, the PC version of Doom 3 has mods that allow players to enjoy the game together no matter where they are in the world.

5 Splitgate

Quake With Portals

Splitgate helps to modernize a lot of the core principles of old-school Arena Shooters. It does not focus on large-scale maps, and instead has players moving across more cramped spaces with a wide range of powerful weapons. It also throws portals into the mix to allow very fast traversal and ambushing. This works really well to make players feel like they need to keep moving and stay in the action.

Splitgate offers several cooperative game modes, such as Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, Team SplitBall (where one player holds a ball to gather points while team members defend them), and Domination (where teams capture and hold various points).

4 Halo 3

Co-Op Evolved

Halo is one of the most influential shooters around, and it helped modernize a lot of features seen in PvP today. FPS games had a reputation for not being as good on consoles as on PCs due to PCs using a mouse and keyboard, but Bungie's franchise changed all that. Halo would continue to make its controls more intuitive, with Halo 3 being referred to as one of the greatest FPS games of all time.

Halo 3 offered every means of co-op possible for its campaign. 2-Player local co-op, 4-Player online co-op, combined local and online co-op, and even letting players hook up their consoles together so no internet was needed for everyone to enjoy the game on their own screens. Bungie went all-out with Halo 3's co-op, and it paid off in spades.

3 Unreal Tournament 2004

Endless Arena Shooter Enjoyment

• Release Date: March 16, 2004
• Platforms: Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Linux

Quake may have helped pioneer Arena Shooters, but Unreal made great strides in perfecting them. Unreal Tournament 2004 is the pinnacle of everything a fan of Arena Shooters could ever ask for. It offers a hugely diverse range of weapons, mutators, vehicles, & turrets, but also 12 different game modes to juggle between.

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Players are able to play together on the same teams in multiple game modes, including Team Deathmatche, Onslaught, Assault, and multiple variations of Capture the Flag. Assault in particular puts one team on the offensive of a set objective, and another team on defense. This leads to a sort of pseudo-campaign experience where all the enemies are controlled by other players.

2 Tribes 3: Rivals

Modernized Arena Shooter Action

• Release Date: March 12, 2024 (Early Access)
• Platforms: Steam

While Splitgate offers some modern expectations, Tribes 3 should be seen as what all modern Arena Shooters can aspire to be. The game features large open maps to traverse, jetpacks to give an intense sense of speed and mobility, and mid-air combat that feels very satisfying when taking out an enemy.

The core focus of Tribes 3 is Capture the Flag, as this will encourage players to defend their flag, giving chase to hunt down any opponent that steals it, and making dives to grab enemy flags that will then need to be safely delivered back to the player’s base while being pursued relentlessly. While this might not be on many people's list of best Arena Shooters, it can serve as the foundation of what may be the best one of all day.

1 TimeSplitters 2

Everything All In One Game

TImeSplitters 2 has everything an arena shooter should have. Fast-paced movement, lots of different weapons that players can pick up, power-ups, turrets, and pickups that can replenish health and armor. It also featured a staggering 126 characters to choose from — spread out across all manner of genres and time periods. Creepy clowns, killer robots, magic stone golems, soldiers, a monkey, and just plain whacky ideas that are all available in one roster — with optional special stats for each of them.

Players can play together on the same team in many game modes, some of which are unique to the TimeSplitters franchise. However, they can also enjoy the entirety of the game’s story campaign in split-screen local co-op. Having all of this in a single game on the PS2 made TimeSplitters 2 something truly special.

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