Good games for a PC LAN party...

[knave]

Back in the day I used to invite a group of 10 or so buddies over and we'd play Half-Life, Starcraft, Team fortress, all the classic LAN games.

I'm thinking about setting one up but I need some good games to play.

About two years ago I did one and we played RTCW:Enemy territory.  This was cool because it's a standalone freeware game so we didn't have to buy 10 copies.
The graphics were pretty dated though.

What are some Good Freeware/shareware FPS and RTS games that would be good for a LAN party?

  I'm not opposed to buying a copy or two as long as we don't have to buy 10 to get everyone set up.   

Besides I am dying to try out my new Gigabit switch.

[jbox]

My LANs almost always end with a Quake* map because after the brain-strain of all the RTS's that get played the old "run, jump and shoot" makes a good way to meet the sunrise. Quake 1 runs on every platform now including LinukitchenSink OS, and most of the other engines are downloadable for free with four maps or so for WinXX.

If you have a character editor for Diablo 2 (like ShadowMaster) then you can make a bunch of quick-n-chunky heroes for a romp into a D&D adventure. The main problem with Diablo is all the installation, but using Daemon 10 times against a central server will certainly test that switch.

And of course don't write off the "basic" games like TetriNet. Even a simple game can be fun in vs- or co-op mode.

[AtomSmasher]

I think Enemy Territory is still going to be your best bet.  There just are not many free FPS games with better graphics or gameplay then ET.  I believe that Tribes 2 was released for free a while back, it definately has dated graphics, but it's a fun lan party game.  And as JBox mentioned, Quake shows up at pretty much every lan party for a reason.

For strategy games, my current favorite is Supreme Commander, but you'll probably have to buy seperate copies to run it.

[SithMaster]

I vote for classic doom or zdaemon custom wads (maps if you want).

I know that the special ed of Quake 4 came with a quake 2 coop mode but that would take more effort to get for your lan.

sven coop for half life and theres starship troopers which has coop.

[lanman31337]

there's a rtcw freeware thing out there, i forget what it's called.  there's also soldat, which is free, and sooooo much fun.  there's scorched earth 3d.

[AtomSmasher]

there's a rtcw freeware thing out there, i forget what it's called.

That would be RTCW: Enemy Territory, which was mentioned earlier, and is a game I still play fairly often.  Another option is America's Army, which is also a free game, but I never really played it and don't know how well it will work in a lan.

[knave]

So, I googled a bit and found this Wiki for freeware FPS games.

I can't believe I forgot about Fear combat...I DL'd it and got a key for just this reason...Lan parties.

Warrock and tribes 2 also look promising.  Anyone played alien arena 2007?

I used to play Americas army years ago and it was fun...but I think something with deathmatch would give more options.