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Best shooter games on GamesNostalgia

Shooter games have been a popular form of entertainment for decades, captivating gamers across the globe with their intense action and immersive gameplay. In these games, sometimes called "shoot 'em up" games, the player shoots bullets or other projectiles at the enemies.

One of the first, and probably the most famous, arcade games, Space Invaders, was a shooter in which you have to destroy hordes of aliens. Shooter games are addictive because they tap into our innate desire for competition and accomplishment. They give players a sense of control and power that is difficult to find in real life. In shooter games, players are given a clear objective, and their success is determined by their ability to complete it. Speed and adrenaline are part of the deal: if games are not fast, they are not shooters. Robotron: 2084, released in 1984, is a perfect example.

In the early days of gaming, we had primarily 2D games, like Uridium for the Commodore 64 or the arcades Gradius and Xevious. There was a specific trend for space shooters with vertical or horizontal scrolling. Vertical scrolling shoot 'em up include Xenon, Hybris, and the legendary Xenon 2: Megablast for the Amiga, released in 1989. Horizontal scrolling shooters include R-Type, Factor 5's Katakis, or Armalyte for the Commodore 64. The arcade Star Wars is an excellent example of a space shooter with a first-person point of view.

But it's not just about space shooters. There is a particular sub-genre of run and gun games, or platform-shooters, like Konami's Contra or the famous Turrican developed for C64 and Amiga, or Gunstar Heroes for the Mega Drive/Genesis. Anyway, not all platform shooters can be considered shoot 'em ups. It depends if shooting is part of the core mechanics or not.

To mention top-down view shooters, we should remember the Alien Breed series by Team17.

Finally, we must close this overview by mentioning the genre that revolutionized PC gaming and made PC games a multi-million business: 3D first-person shooters. Everything changed when id Software launched Wolfenstein 3D in 1992, and one year later, Doom. After that, every studio tried to launch a 3D FPS. Duke Nukem 3D, Blood, and of course, Quake are just a few examples.

Shooters is a very generic group that includes a lot of games. You can find a lot of titles here. You can browse and see what you like most.

Turrican II commodore-64amiga

Turrican II: The Final Fight is a run-and-gun game developed by Factor 5 and published by Rainbow Arts in 1991. The first version, designed by Manfred Trenz and Andreas Escher, was...

Year: 1991 Genre: Shooter

c64 original game commodore 64 cyborgs platform-shooter run and gun science fiction shooter walkabout

Revenge of the Mutant Camels commodore-64amiga

Revenge of the Mutant Camels is a side-scrolling shooter written by Jeff Minter for the Commodore 64 and released in 1984 by Llamasoft. The game was a kind of sequel to another sho...

Year: 1984 Genre: Shooter

commodore 64 h-scrolling shoot-em up shareware shooter side-scrolling

MUSHA genesis

MUSHA, also known as Musha Aleste, is a vertically scrolling shooter created by Compile for the SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive and released in 1990. The full title is M.U.S.H.A.: Metallic Uniframe Super Hybrid Armor.

Year: 1990 Genre: Shooter

genesis original game japan mecha shooter top-down v-scrolling shoot-em up vertical-scrolling

Xevious msxatari-st

Xevious is a vertical scrolling shooter arcade released by Namco in 1982 and ported to multiple platforms. There were releases for MSX, ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, and Apple II.

Year: 1987 Genre: Shooter

arcade coin-op conversion science fiction shooter v-scrolling shoot-em up

Contra Force nes

Contra Force is a run-and-gun platformer created by Konami and released exclusively for the NES in 1992 in North America only. This is the fifth game in the Contra series and the...

Year: 1992 Genre: Shooter

2 players nes original game platform-shooter shooter

R-Type amigamsxpc-enginesega-master-system

R-Type is a side-scrolling shoot-em-up arcade created by Irem in 1987. The graphics design was inspired by H. R. Giger's artwork for the Alien movies. It was ported to several home...

Year: 1989 Genre: Shooter

arcade coin-op conversion freeware h-scrolling shoot-em up science fiction shooter side-scrolling

Blazing Lazers pc-engine

Blazing Lazers (also known as Gunhed) is a sci-fi vertical scrolling shooter created by Hudson Soft for the TurboGrafx-16. The game, released in 1989, is considered one of the best...

Year: 1989 Genre: Shooter

arcade pc engine shooter space top-down turbografx-16 v-scrolling shoot-em up vertical-scrolling

Back to the Future Part III amiga

Back to the Future Part III is an action game inspired by the movie with the same title. It was developed by Probe Software and released by Image Works in 1991 for MS-DOS, Amiga, A...

Year: 1991 Genre: Action

action-adventure brawler isometric licensed movies multi-type shooter time travel wild west

Contra Advance: The Alien Wars EX game-boy-advance

Contra Advance: The Alien Wars EX is a side-scrolling shooter game released for the Game Boy Advance in 2002. It was developed in a collaboration between Konami and TOSE and published by Konami.

Year: 2002 Genre: Shooter

2 players aliens co-op game boy advance run and gun science fiction shooter side-scrolling

Cannon Fodder amigagame-boy-colorgenesis

Cannon Fodder: war has never been so much fun, is an action-strategy shoot 'em up game developed by Sensible Software and published by Virgin Interactive for the Amiga in 1993. The...

Year: 1993 Genre: Shooter

amiga original game humour military real-time shooter squad management walkabout war

Doom II dosgame-boy-advance

Doom II is Id Software's follow-up to their award winning Doom. Published by GT Interactive, it was released for DOS in 1994, just one year after its predecessor. Unlike most sequels, this one is actually good.

Year: 1994 Genre: Shooter

2.5d fps horror science fiction shooter texture map

Summer Carnival '92: Recca nes

Summer Carnival '92: Recca is a vertical scrolling shoot 'em-up for the NES, created by KID Corp and released in 1992. Have you ever wondered what the best sci-fi vertical scrollin...

Year: 1992 Genre: Shooter

nes original game science fiction shooter space top-down v-scrolling shoot-em up vertical-scrolling

Predator amiga

Predator is a shooter-action game created by Activision, based on the famous movie with Schwarzenegger. Released in 1988 by Activision and developed by Source, it is an action-pack...

Year: 1989 Genre: Shooter

aliens c64 original game jungle movies run and gun shooter side-scrolling walkabout

Insanity Fight amiga

Insanity Fight is a top-down vertical shooter created by Linel and published by MicroDeal in 1987 for the Amiga and Atari ST. The game stands as a peculiar anomaly in the world of retro gaming.

Year: 1987 Genre: Shooter

aliens amiga original game parallax scrolling science fiction shooter top-down v-scrolling shoot-em up