Summary
- Some of the best FPS games are exclusive to consoles, offering unique mechanics and experiences.
- Halo 5, the weakest game in the series, still provides fun gameplay and unique multiplayer features.
- TimeSplitters 2 stands out as a console-only shooter, offering a fantastic campaign and fun multiplayer modes.
FPS (first-person shooter) games have long been associated with the PC, and it makes sense. The mouse and keyboard combination remains undefeated when controlling the movement and aim of a gun. However, players who love the genre would be doing themselves a disservice if they were to ignore console shooters altogether.
Some of the greatest games to ever grace the genre are actually still enclosed within the walls of systems they can only interact with via controllers. And that's not a problem at all. Here's a look at the best shooters of all time that are yet to reach the PC.
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Killzone 2
The Franchise At Its Peak
Killzone 2
- Released
- February 26, 2009
- ESRB
- m
- Developer(s)
- Guerrilla Games
- Genre(s)
- FPS
The world of console gaming changed when the first trailer for PS3's Killzone was shown at E3 2005. It looked like the most amazing graphical display ever pulled off by a game. Many doubted it could be real — and they were right. It was just a CGI cutscene, but after some hard backlash, the true Killzone 2 finally showed up, and it looked nearly as good.
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Better yet, it played much better than the original Killzone, and proved that the PS3 could do original shooters almost as well as the Xbox. Killzone 2 was still no Halo killer, but it's one of the most fun shooters that no one can experience outside the PS3. The series would go on to have Killzone 3 and Killzone: Shadowfall — two more games that would not come to PC, but those failed to reach the heights of the second game in the series.
Halo 5
Worst Of The Best Is Still Something
Halo 5: Guardians
- Released
- October 17, 2015
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- T for Teen: Blood, Mild Language, Violence
- Developer(s)
- 343 Industries
- Genre(s)
- FPS
To address the elephant in the room, yes, Halo 5 is by far the weakest entry in the Halo series. Then again, that's the same as calling someone the weakest player on the NBA's dream team. Halo 5: Guardians doesn't take the plot to any exciting new places, and the introduction of a non-Master Chief protagonist surely didn't help raise the hype. Still, Halo 5 is a fun entry in the series, whether players are looking for a neat campaign or some nice tweaks to the multiplayer formula. Sadly, Halo 5: Guardians remains the only game in the series that no one can play outside of the Xbox.
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Perfect Dark
Lives In Goldeneye's Shadow, But Just As Good
Perfect Dark (2000)
- Released
- May 22, 2000
- ESRB
- Mature 17+ / Animated Violence, Animated Blood
- Developer(s)
- Rare
- Genre(s)
- First-Person Shooter, Stealth
The latest title in the Perfect Dark series is sadly no longer happening. That's an absolute bummer, because that would be the sequel to one of the greatest shooters — not just console shooters — of all time. The original Perfect Dark was Rare's follow-up and spiritual successor to the massively successful GoldenEye 007. The stakes were high, but the only reason this game isn't as well-known as its predecessor is that it was a new IP, and not something based on a popular property.
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Though Perfect Dark is a little too ambitious sometimes, which will lead to the occasional slowdown, this fantastic shooter brought so many fantastic gameplay innovations that should have become a staple of games in general. Sadly, players might never get a glimpse into this world of sci-fi espionage and alien conspiracies.
Far Cry Instincts: Evolution
Not To Be Confused With The Original Far Cry Instincts
Far Cry Instincts: Evolution
- Released
- March 27, 2006
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- M For Mature
- Genre(s)
- FPS
The original Xbox wasn't equipped to deal with the massive scope of the original Far Cry, so they came up with Far Cry Instincts, a scaled-back and more linearized experience. It wasn't bad, but it paled in comparison with the Xbox ports of FPS games such as Doom 3 and Half-Life 2. Then, they came up with Far Cry Instincts: Evolution, an improved version of Instincts that featured a lot of brutal new mechanics that were not present in the PC version of the game and that made everything much more fun to play.
The Darkness
A Horror Shooter Where You Are The Horror
The Darkness
- Released
- June 25, 2007
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- M For Mature 17+ due to Blood and Gore, Drug Reference, Intense Violence, Strong Language, Suggestive Themes
- Developer(s)
- Starbreeze Studios
- Genre(s)
- FPS
The Darkness, an adaptation of a not very widely known comic, was one of the great surprise hits of 2007. Its atmosphere alone was enough to carry a regular shooter, but The Darkness features original mechanics where two heads of an evil entity can be used on top of the player's arsenal.
The game also does a great job of playing with light and shadows, Splinter Cell- style, but takes things much further. The Darkness ended up having a sequel — a good one, though aesthetically different — that also came out on PC, but this one remains trapped inside the PlayStation 3s and Xbox 360s of many.
GoldenEye 007
A Gameplay Revolution That Many Missed Out On
GoldenEye 007
- Released
- August 25, 1997
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- T for Teen: Animated Blood, Animated Violence
- Developer(s)
- Rare
- Genre(s)
- Shooter
When talking about great console shooters, many gamers are immediately transported to the world of GoldenEye 007 for the Nintendo 64, arguably one of the most fun multiplayer experiences on a platform known for excellent multiplayer titles. The true miracle here is that it was actually not a Mario party game, but an FPS — the genre that a console could never master, some said.
The detractors were wrong, and the game broke not just the curse of the FPS games for consoles, but also that of the movie tie-in, as it also provides an actually excellent adaptation of the film. Though it's no longer the gold standard of console FPS, it's one of the best that gamers can only play on the Nintendo 64.
TimeSplitters 2
The Gold Standard Of Console-Only Shooters
TimeSplitters 2
- Released
- October 8, 2002
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- T For Teen // Blood, Language, Violence
- Genre(s)
- FPS
Halo, a game that's not at this spot on this list because it has been ported to PC, gets the credit for nailing what would become the modern console shooter. However, that's not exactly true. Before there was Halo on the Xbox, there was the original Timesplitters for the PS2, and then there was TimeSplitters 2, an overall improvement on the already excellent original.
TimeSplitters 2 learned a lot of lessons from GoldenEyes, and used those lessonsto make a better and more fluid FPS that featured both a fantastic campaign and spectacularly fun multiplayer modes. It's egregious that TimeSplitters never made it to the PC, especially because it's known that its developers actually made a fully functioning HD remaster that's hiding as an Easter egg inside Homefront.
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