Looking for some cooperative video games my husband and I can play together.
May 25, 2012 12:07 PM   Subscribe

Looking for some cooperative video games my husband and I can play together.

We played World of Warcraft for quite a few years but we've stopped now. We've been searching for some games we can play together that aren't so time consuming. We played Portal 2 together and the co-op mode for that is pretty much exactly what we're looking for. Cheaper = better, of course.

The difficulty: I have a Mac [1] and he has Windows and both computers are both ~3 years old. This limits us a fair amount.

[1] I can't install Windows using Bootcamp right now as my superdrive bit the dust and you have to have a physical disc to install, plus I don't feel like buying a Windows license.
posted by disaster77 to Computers & Internet (17 answers total) 18 users marked this as a favorite
 
The original Halo is fun with 2 people and can be strategically challenging due to impressive enemy AI. It's available for the PC and Mac and probably sub $15 by now.
posted by 2bucksplus at 12:21 PM on May 25, 2012


If you like this sort of thing, Diablo III fits the bill nicely. It's out for the mac, it is not graphics intensive, though it looks great, and it is co-op to a fault. It even has separate loot for each coop player. I'm not sure what a 3-year old mac looks like, specs-wise, but if you dial down the graphics and you can get it to run it should be a good fit.

Oh and it's tons of fun.
posted by The Bellman at 12:23 PM on May 25, 2012 [2 favorites]


We very much enjoy Left 4 Dead 2. It's more violent than Portal, but not too bad. My boyfriend has a Mac but boots into windows for it, though he assures me there's a Mac version as well. We've played it about once a month for about 2 years now and haven't tired much of it. There's room for 4 players, which we sometimes take advantage of, but most often we play just the two of us with the computer controlling the other two people.
posted by lilac girl at 12:23 PM on May 25, 2012


Another bungie option: Myth Soulblighter. Fifteen-year-old combat strategy game with a sense of humor. You can download the demo and try the tutorial, and if you like it buy a cheap copy of the full game somewhere and download the open source program to install and run it on today's hardware. As a casual (ten minutes or so per game) multiplayer (eight players maximum I think) game, it is quite charming and old school.
posted by davejay at 12:24 PM on May 25, 2012


Is Minecraft out of the question? You can build/explore collaboratively, download mods (see Yogbox, Technic Pack), and even download custom adventure maps. Also, there's a Metafliter server you can play on with a bunch of other people as well (see Mefightclub for more info on that). I think Minecraft itself is about $20 now, but a lot of the content for it is free.
posted by Pecinpah at 12:24 PM on May 25, 2012 [1 favorite]


Oh, I just caught the coop part. I think myth has that, but can't remember for certain.
posted by davejay at 12:25 PM on May 25, 2012


Seconding minecraft.
posted by empath at 12:26 PM on May 25, 2012 [1 favorite]


I'm playing Diablo 3 on a 4 year old iMac with an old ATI 2600 pro video card. I find that I don't need to scale back the graphics if I run it slightly minimized in window mode instead of full display size.
posted by cazoo at 1:01 PM on May 25, 2012


Nthing Diablo3. I never played the previous version online, but a few friends of mine have strongarmed me into playing with them over the past week with Diablo 3 and it's a blast. We talk over a Skype voice channel to coordinate, but if you're in the same room it'd be even easier.

If Diablo 3 is a little too taxing for your older hardware, Torchlight II (which is a similar concept and made by a bunch of ex Blizzard guys) will be out very soon and is a very similar style.

Not sure if you're into the more twitchy FPS style games, but Team Fortress 2 is free on Steam and can be quite fun to play on the same team as a mini-squad of two. My daughter and I used to do that.
posted by barc0001 at 1:07 PM on May 25, 2012


Steam > Mac > Co-Op Games
posted by dgeiser13 at 1:09 PM on May 25, 2012


The LEGO games are co-op, based around popular themes, cute, not too hard and good fun.

I liked the Star Wars one, but they also have Indiana Jones, Harry Potter and Pirates of the Carribean.
posted by mr_silver at 2:56 PM on May 25, 2012


Trine 2 is a great physics puzzle game designed for co-op. Pretty cheap, available for Mac and PC, and should run fine on older computers.
posted by St. Sorryass at 5:08 PM on May 25, 2012


Borderlands (Mac, PC; info on cross-platform co-op).
posted by aparrish at 5:16 PM on May 25, 2012


A Valley Without Wind sounds perfect for you - cheaper then Diablo, under heavy development guided by player requests, very fun. It's not super story oriented though so it might not be perfect.
posted by airways at 8:27 AM on May 26, 2012


Oh and AVWW is wonderfully cross platform.
posted by airways at 8:28 AM on May 26, 2012


Terrarium is a 2-D version of Minecraft, which I prefer as I struggle with 3D games.

My SO and I play LA Noire together, with one of us controlling the gameplay. It works really well as a lot of the game is about decision-making and deduction.
posted by mippy at 4:29 AM on May 28, 2012


If you have a Wii or get a emulator (free) you can play Toejam & Earl, which is what my wife and I play cooperatively. Great if you're not into twitch gaming.

We've also played Titan Quest, which is decent but is a bit of a click-fest, and apparently D3 has improved on this drawback a bit.
posted by Four Flavors at 10:41 AM on May 29, 2012


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