Sell me a Two-Player Co-Op Game.

[BosanskiSeljak]

Remnant from the ashes; you'll get a few sessions to just finish the game with opportunity to keepplaying for different bosses. Acceptable character building. Either way I got a fun 20 hours with a friend from this game

 

[Zoo]

Piggybacking dungeon of mystara to shill the metal slug series.

Otherwise few more suggestions:
-Dungeons 3 onwards (haven't personally tested the coop so no idea if it's actually fun to play dungeon keeper lite with a bro)
-Saints row 3-4
-Shadow warrior 2 (tbh i find it meh compared to 1st precisely because it went from sp focused to chasing the 4player coop trend but its still fun enough i guess and dont need full 4man since game difficulty scales to number of people)
-Anno series, one i tried in coop specifically was 2070
-Rimworld
-Dragon's Dogma, can't believe forgot to sneak that one in.

Dragon's Dogma is great, but single-only. Dragon's Dogma Online (never released in the west) is already shutted down. DD2 will be single-only, too. I like the pawn system with even its faults, but I really would like a DD game with proper co-op.

 

[BrotherFrank]

Dragon's Dogma is great, but single-only. Dragon's Dogma Online (never released in the west) is already shutted down. DD2 will be single-only, too. I like the pawn system with even its faults, but I really would like DD game with proper co-op.

Was legit under the impression DD was coop and standard party was 2 pcs+2pawns for some reason (maybe confused it with the non west version?) and was gonna pick it up for a friend so this literally ruined christmas for me.

 

[Great Deceiver]

Multiplayer would ruin Dragon's Dogma. I'm so glad DD2 kept the pawn system.

 

[Pocgels]

Nioh 2 if you like dark souls.
Synthetik is a solid top-down shooter with good variety.
Vermintide series (start with the first one) is best with 3-4 players, but should worth looking into as well.

 

[3 others]

I will always shill Ibb & Obb in these situations: https://store.steampowered.com/app/95400/ibb__obb/

It's a cutesy, minimalistic co-op 2D puzzle platformer in a mirrored world where you have to assist each other to overcome obstacles and eliminate enemies. Very suitable for different skill levels - I've played through it with my non-gayming wife. Good aesthetics, good level of challenge, good Amanita/Floex-style ambient OST. It could be yours for all of $2.50.

 

[Hagashager]

Star Wars Jedi Power Battles for the PS1. Very fun co-op beat-em-up set during Phantom Menace. Great memories of it with my best friend at the time when we were kids.

Castle Crashers is also a very fun brawler with light RPG mechanics.

 

[911 Jumper]

I think the Army of Two games may be worth looking into.

I was going to grab them myself recently, but in the end I didn't.

 

[Avonaeon]

Was going to suggest Clandestine, but happy to see you already enjoyed it

Something very different might be something like project zomboid. It allows for a lot of freedom and there's tons of settings and mods to tweak the game exactly to your liking.

 

[Elthosian]

Are you planning to do this local? If you've got access to emulators or a Switch I'd say grab yourself Pikmin 3 Deluxe. I've been playing the game recently with my wife and it's a great cooperative experience. The game is not THAT hard if both players are experienced but my wife hasn't done much 3D gaming so the challenge goes up significantly. There is no explicit asymmetry, but things are easier to manage if you take care of separate kinds of Pikmins each thus meaning you'll be taking care of different threats. Also it's honestly a beautiful game with the same "small characters going around the human world" vibes as It Takes Two.

Depending on whether you're playing local or online I could give you a few more recommendations.

PS: Saw EDF5 mentioned above. EDF4 at least is great, but I think they will release EDF6 soon so might want to wait for that one.

 

[Zombra]

Depending on whether you're playing local or online I could give you a few more recommendations.

Online. (Updated OP with this requirement.)

 

[Elthosian]

Depending on whether you're playing local or online I could give you a few more recommendations.

Online. (Updated OP with this requirement.)

Alrighty:

* Nioh 2: great gameplay, snorefest plot and world. The only way I've been able to get through it is in co-op, although be warned that it's a combat-only experience and far from a Soulslike.
* Halo MCC: a blast to play on the highest difficulties. Pretty much the only decent popamole game series up until Reach. Don't even bother with the newer ones.
* Portal 2: the co-op is an extra campaign separate from the main game, in case you have already played that

 

[rumSaint]

Specifically 2 player
Door Kickers: Action Squad - 2d 2 player coop shooter (some level of strategy, planing required). 2 people police anti terrorist squad. Hella fun, especially Breacher class.

Hidden Deep - coop horror experience.

Cat Quest 2 - more of a kid game, but fun nontheless

Multiplayer but working well 2 player
Monster Hunter World (didn't play Rise) - 2 player coop is pretty good as you both players have their Palicoes.

Gunfire Reborn - like Borderlands but good. Actually it's sorta Borderlands roguelite, pretty fun, large variety of weapons and playstyles. upt to 4 but 2 coop works really well.

 

[Azalin]

Some off the top of my head

Portal 2
In case you haven't played it already in coop do so

Borderlands 2
FPS/rpg looter shooter, lots of content especially if you add the dlcs,there is asymmetry since you choose classes and builds, enjoyable as a coop

Borderlands the Pre-Sequel
Like Borderlands 2 but not as good

Resident Evil 6
This one was designed as a coop game,there is only one path that is single player oriented, not really a horror game but an action game with zombies

Halo Master Chief Collection
Lots of content here,some is good some is just ok

Serious Sam First&Second Encounter
Fun old school shooters ,I believe 3 is also coop but I haven't played it that way

Vermintide 2
L4D inspired warhammer game where you can choose classes and have some progression,enjoyable as coop although it might be better with more players

Most old arcade games that are on Steam are also coop like Capcom beat em ups,Metal Slug games,DnD beat em ups like someone posted and of course more recent games of these types like Streets of Rage 4,Cuphead and so on

Of course most hack'n'slash rpgs can be coop like Diablo games,Torhlight,Titan Quest etc

 

[POOPERSCOOPER]

I didn't read your OP post too much but for co-op that Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game (the new one) looks like an old school co-op beat em up in vein of Turtle in Time which was a great game.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

 

[udm]

I was gonna suggest Streets of Rogue and Saints Row 3/4 but I see you already have them in your library haha!

Ok I've got a few more that tick all your checkboxes, some of which have already been suggested by others:
- Grim Dawn (love the overall experience, best Diablo 2-like for me)
- Streets of Rage 4 / Streets of Rage Remake / Shadows of Mystara (they're fun but as with all beat-em-ups, they can get mind-numbing after a while)
- Orcs Must Die 2 (has an insanely fun co-op experience with different character/trap builds)
- System Shock 2 (I had a blast playing co-op all those years ago with one player joining Marine and the other being Navy, but it might be a bitch to get it set up)

Also, I was going to recommend Neverwinter Nights co-op, but I cannot for the life of me remember which modules I used to play. But if that's your thing, you could give it a try and explore some modules online.

 

[Blutwurstritter]

I don't know if it still works, but C&C 3 Red Alert campaigns were great in co-op and support exactly two players. The Borderlands games support co-op, although not specifically two-players. I am not too fond of the Borderland games in general, however, I had some fun with Tiny Tina's Wonderland in co-op with my brother. Quake 1/2 and Blood are always nice and good for quick sessions, and just finished the complete Q2 campaign in 3 days visiting family. Any Serious Sam game is also an option. There are a couple of Splinter Cell games with 2 player co-op that are good, I remember Chaos theory and Blacklist. I think in some you could play the whole campaign together and some offered a specific co-op only campaign, I would highly recommend checking them out. Resident Evil 5 also has specifically two-player co-op and is fun that way. I have no clue with respect to online functionality since I've always used LAN versions but some of the games should still be working. The Overcooked games were also silly fun in local co-op and I think the sequel also features online multiplayer but I don't know if it is enjoyable outside of couch co-op. The Rainbow Six Vegas games also featured full campaigns in co-op but I guess the servers are no longer running, they were not too great but still worth a mention. The latest Turtles game, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge, has online co-op and is a nice arcade beat-em up up to 4(6?) players. Another good two player co-op game that relies on both players working together is Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, and it seems it got online multiplayer patched in at some point. I don't like playing fully fledged rpg's in co-op, but Divinity:OS1/2 and BG3 have full co-op campaigns and I know a few people that played D:OS1 and D:OS2 completely in co-op and liked it.

 

[Modron]

The State of Decay games fit most of your requiresment granted I think you can have more than 2 players in the online coop, each map has a storyline and end goal, will last your more than a few sessions, is a third person action shooter, can be a bit rough depending and sounds like recent changes have given you the ability to make it harder, has a variety of starting skills which have exclusive upgrade types, and there are some choices in how you deal with other groups that popup on the map.

 

[Azalin]

- Orcs Must Die 2 (has an insanely fun co-op experience with different character/trap builds)

Oh forgot about this one, it has the asymmetry he was looking for too

 

[Zoo]

The Rainbow Six Vegas games also featured full campaigns in co-op but I guess the servers are no longer running, they were not too great but still worth a mention.

The servers should have shutted down by UbiSoft, but they are still working on Xbox 360 (this version playable on Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S, too). I don't know of the PC versions, because my co-op buddies wanted to play them on console (Vegas 1 has 2-4 player co-op, Vegas 2 has only 2 player co-op with another two mandatory AI teammates), but Gameranger supports both Vegas games.

 

[Blutwurstritter]

The Rainbow Six Vegas games also featured full campaigns in co-op but I guess the servers are no longer running, they were not too great but still worth a mention.

The servers should have shutted down by UbiSoft, but they are still working on Xbox 360 (this version playable on Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S, too). I don't know of the PC versions, because my co-op buddies wanted to play them on console (Vegas 1 has 2-4 player co-op, Vegas 2 has only 2 player co-op with another twomandatory AI teammates), but Gameranger support both Vegas games.

I also know two people that really like these games and still play them. The RS: Vegas games certainly found their audience. Cracked versions also run in local area network, so it should be possible to set them up via virtual LAN, but I never bothered to try it since we always play local.