Shooting games

Sixteen games, none of them ours, and all of them chosen the same way: something has to persist between rounds — other players, a rank, a set of weapons — or it is a shooting gallery.

The arena games are the ones people stay in. PixelForces.io, BattleDudes.io, ForceZ.io and TonkWars.io all drop you in and let you leave whenever. Survival Wave Zombie Multiplayer is the co-operative version, which is a different evening entirely, and Missile Dude RPG is the odd one out: a shooter with a levelling screen.

This shelf is blocky and cartoon-coloured on purpose — anything with real gore is filtered out of the catalogue before it reaches a page, along with anything named after a franchise. What is left is closer to a paintball match than a war film.