Best Multiplayer Games for LAN Party

JimDaddy

Junior Member
May 10, 2003
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Greetings. My son (age 12) is having a LAN Party and I'd like to get some recommendations for some good multiplayer games. He has WarCraft III. Are there any other games you recommend? Thanks.
 

mrbass

Senior member
Sep 13, 2001
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enemy territory is free so everyone can play that. Just have one fast computer to play host. 4 on 4 is a blast....3 on 3 will still work too.
 
Mar 9, 2003
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HALO!!!! I know I know, its on XBOX, but seriously, Halo Capture the Flag is the MOST enjoyable game I have ever played. I've played basically 2 lan parties a month since it came out with my clan, and its the best $60 I EVER spent. It by far beats out any other multiplayer game, on any system.

 

Slogun

Platinum Member
Jul 4, 2001
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Counter Strike remains the most popular multiplayer game, unlike warcraft, it is a first person shooter (FPS).

Many people also like Battlefield1942, Medal of Honor, and Return to Castle Wolfenstein (all FPS games).
 

540mb

Senior member
Jun 2, 2003
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I'm with Tyler. STARCRAFT all the way. It's old but it's still awesome.
 

Ravenit

Senior member
Feb 25, 2000
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Yeh Starcraft Is the first game we always play. Can be quick and fun.
FPS would have to be Soldier of Fortune 2 only need one disk to play multiplayer and slower computers can get by with settings turned down.
Going to try 1942 next lan but I think evertone needs a disk or a patch.....
 

igowerf

Diamond Member
Jun 27, 2000
7,697
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We always play Total Annihilation. It's an older real time strategy game, but it's really fun. The matches usually last for hours, sometimes unfinished because we have to stop for food.
 

Mavrick007

Diamond Member
Dec 19, 2001
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We played BF1942 with the Desert Combat mod on the weekend and it rocked big time.
Usually it's MOH, Starcraft, Warcraft3, AOE, C&C Generals, UT2k3, or the like for a good multiplayer time.

There are alot of different games that can either take a few minutes to play to several hours depending on how long you want to go.
Games like UT2k3 are good to warm up with cause they're really fast paced, or it's good to end with too cause it can be a short game.
 

element

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
4,635
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Pro Race Driver. Only if you have latest hardware though. Even on my AMD 2400+ geforce 4 4200 rig I don't have the settings on max but it looks great. I played it on internet multiplayer lately too and even with lag it's fun, with no lag on a lan it'd rock!
 

beatle

Diamond Member
Apr 2, 2001
5,661
5
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Vietcong is a stellar game. Its deathmatch is decent, but pitting you and 4 friends against a battalion of clever VC soldiers is just incredible.
 

Malladine

Diamond Member
Mar 31, 2003
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What machine specs will you be using and how many people do you expect?

As for the games, MOH:AA and BF1942 are both great, but bear in mind MOH:AA will run on a mediocre system, but BF1942 needs a pretty high-end rig to run acceptably. Starcraft sure.
Counterstrike definately.
Quake 3 with Urban Terror mod is fun (fun standalone too, for a while :)).
Unreal Tourney.
Rune: Halls of Valhalla
 

EglsFly

Senior member
Feb 21, 2001
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As a person that has hosted many LAN parties, and speaking from experience....

Games like Starcraft, Warcraft, Age Of Empires, etc... problem with these is that the people that get eliminated end up sitting around twiddling their thumbs until the end of the game. So those that maybe are not as good as say the best players, don't have much actual gametime fun.

First Person Shooter type games seem to work best for LAN parties, especially the ones that let you get right back into the game. Games such as Unreal Tournament (and UT2K3), Quake III Team Arena, BF1942, Ghost Recon, etc. For these, even if you are no good, you can at least keep playing, and stay in the action.
 

yukichigai

Diamond Member
Apr 23, 2003
6,404
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In addition to all the recommendations here, I'd say Red Faction is also good. The multiplayer on the game is pretty fun, particularly with the deformable terrain, and it's cheap; $10 at Wallymart. I'm not sure if it has an option to play multiplayer without a disk, but again, it's cheap and fun.

Other possibilites if your kids are adventurous at all are Tribes and Tribes 2, though I recommend using mods rather than the base game. You can check out planettribes.com for details, even links to mods and stuff. I recommend Shifter since that's what I play, but I'm kinda biased. Tribes and Tribes 2 are both cheap, though Tribes 2 may require a large-sized patch to run and Tribes may be hard to find. Both are a bit of a trip to get used to since players have jetpacks in the game.

The orginial Soldier of Fortune is good as well. Kept my dorm buddies and I busy for hours and hours. Should be cheap as well. But it, like its sequel, is pretty bloody. If you're worried about that kind of thing make sure the parental controls are on. They'll complain a little but trust me, the game is fun enough they won't care.

Oh yes, I have Unreal II but not Unreal Tourney 2k3. I'm assuming it has all the same weapons as the singleplayer game? If so that will be high on the list of games to try. The Flamethrower alone makes it worth playing. Burn, burn! Hehe.


P.S. All those are First Person Shooters. For non-FPS games I'd say any of the Worms games are high on the list. Humorous and entertaining!
 

JimDaddy

Junior Member
May 10, 2003
13
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Thanks for all the ideas. This forum is definitely filled with experienced and knowledgable folks. Lots of games mentioned that I didn't know about. Good point about people getting killed out of the games (like WarCraft III)
and then having to wait for the others to finish.

Just some background info (requested by Malladine): It's going to be a small party (5-7 people). The machines range from AMD 1700+s, to Pentium 4s. Video cards range from TNT 2 (yes, I know), to ATI Radeon 9600 Pro. All the machines have at least 512 megs of ram (some are PC-133, others are DDR). Anyway, they should be able to run most of the games mentioned in this thread.

 

PsychoE

Junior Member
Jun 4, 2003
10
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Soldier Of Fortune 2, Unreal Tournment 2003, Medal Of Honor, America's Army(free game), WarCraft3, C&C Generals.
Those games are a great lan games... AA is a fantastic game and he's also free!!!
 

Malladine

Diamond Member
Mar 31, 2003
4,618
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I'd say the minimum specs for 1942 are around 1ghz cpu, 512 DDR ram and a 64mb GF2. TNT2 :beer:

But yes, those machines should be fine for most of these games, as you said. Are you planning on buying a bunch of new games for this party?

Check your PMs Jim.
 

yukichigai

Diamond Member
Apr 23, 2003
6,404
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Originally posted by: JimDaddy
Video cards range from TNT 2 (yes, I know), to ATI Radeon 9600 Pro.

There's a Hot Deals forum here that can fix that TNT 2 problem you know. :p

Anyway, sounds like fun. Hope they like it.


P.S. Unreal 2k3 shouldn't be a problem. I'm currently running a GeForce 3 64mb and it handles it really well at medium-high overall quality. Stick that kid on medium/medium-low and he'll be blazing along with the rest of 'em ;)
 

bunker

Lifer
Apr 23, 2001
10,572
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Insane is an older racing game but you should still be able to find it (and pretty cheap too).

We always end up playing a few rounds of that at our LAN's.
 

Vonkhan

Diamond Member
Feb 27, 2003
8,198
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Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

FREE multiplayer game, awesome game, beautiful graphics, kikz azz!
 

yukichigai

Diamond Member
Apr 23, 2003
6,404
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Good gravy, how could I forget America's Army? Yeah, that's a good one as well. Not only is it fun, but it's also patriotic. :p

Another thought: the Carmageddon series. A bit bloody (you get points for running over pedestrians) but very very fun. Some of the car selection in there is nuts. Just a warning though, the first game has probably the worst graphics engine in the history of computer gaming. Really. In it's day it rendered graphics normally seen on systems outdated by 3 years, but using all the processing power of a top-of-the-line system. Pretty damn inefficient. Anyway, you can pick Carmegeddon 1 or 2 up in bargain bins at places like Office Depot. You might even find Carmageddon TDR 2000 in there as well.