My husband has grown bored with his current PS2 games. What he likes, in his own words: “Serious Sam (and part 2), GTAs, Airborne Troops-Countdown to D Day, even Resident Evil 4 and a few 007 games have been along the lines of what I like, with the linear game play, even. On the PC, Marine Sharpshooter, Max Payne (except for the puzzle maze) and Castle Wolfensteins. I love the freedom of GTA SA and Vice City, and Serious Sam, to a degree. No online gaming, no strategy games, no wizardry or potions or any of that. Tactical movements with guns and cars and shit is something for someone simple like me.”
Given all that, what other games are out there for the PS2 (to reiterate, I’m not looking for games for PC or any other platform) that he might enjoy?
How about the Tom Clancy games? Splinter Cell, Rainbow Six, Ghost Recon. Stay away from Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter for PS2, but the rest should be ok. They’re generally a bit more stealthy and tactical than say Serious Sam, but if he doesn’t mind the sound of that then they are good shooters. Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory is probably the best of the bunch.
The best FPS in the PS2 era will always be Timesplitters 2 - you’re basically chasing an alien menace through Earth’s history, taking on the role of different law-abiding element for each time period (with differing agility, toughness, and power characteristics to mix things up), from the European explorers of Africa, to the Prohibition, to the zombie-infested Notre Dame. It’s rather Goldeneye 007 in its setup, in that every stage has a number of objectives, and the speed and efficiency with which you perform them determines extra unlocks, like cheats and new characters for multiplayer.
Of course, there’s split-screen deathmatch, but that’s just scratching the surface. If you like that sorta thing, you’ve also got CTF modes, frag-the-monkeys, zombie infection modes, and a ton of event-based challenges to earn you medals outside of any storyline. Oh, and there are adjustable bots if you don’t have enough people to play with.
I never played the sequel, Future Perfect, but maybe it’s even better.
If you’re looking for more must-play adventure type stuff (since you mentioned RE4), there’s Okami, Shadow of the Colossus, and Devil May Cry 3. The Metal Gear Solid games are definitely worth a look if you don’t mind getting used to the stealth - they’re some of the most immersive games outside of the Half-Life universe.
Black was hailed as “gun porn” during its development, and the loading movies featuring loving close-ups of shells ejecting in slo-mo from gold-plated assault rifles rivals the Sledge Hammer! intro for sheer revelry in a killing instrument. The game itself is reasonably frantic and real-worldly (except for stuff like ejection ports being on the wrong side of the dang guns), though it pulls some really cheap designer tricks at the end.
Killzone is rather good, about a futuristic civil war against Martian colonists. Sci-fi, of course, but no lasers – good 'ol lead everywhere. No vehicles, except some stints with a turret.
TimeSplitters 2 and Future Perfect are lots of fun, in a cartoony way. I liked 2 a lot better than the other.
I’d also suggest the Metal Gear Solid collection, but I say that to everybody. Not an FPS, but a stealthy/actiony series.
Thanks for the recommendations so far; he’s checking those out. One question: do any of these games have a mode that’s less violent, like some of the GTA missions where you just take cars or fly around and stuff? We have toddlers, and he doesn’t often play when they’re around, but it would be nice to have that option.
Hmm… None of the FPS games specified above have a completely non-violent section. The TimeSplitters games (2 in particular) have a slew of minigames, some of which are non-violent. Monkey curling, that sort of thing.
If you pick up the MGS collection, the second one in the series comes with 200 separate “VR” training missions where you just shoot targets, navigate areas without being spotted by enemies, and such.
Black is a lot of fun. There’s also Mercenaries or The Punisher, though Punisher probably isn’t one to play when the kids are around.