10 Classic Multiplayer Video Games You Must Play Before You Die

For some, playing video games is a uniquely singular affair; a time to get locked inside a virtual world and say goodbye to that incessantly buzzing thing called "reality" outside. Single player campaign mode is where it's at for times like these, because who needs friends to play with? They only get in your way.

Other players thrive on social interaction, though. For them, the more friends, the merrier. These days that means playing online with gamers called nOObkilla1725 - one one who repeatedly laughs and swears at you whenever you die in Call of Duty. Because in online gaming, a stranger really is just a friend you haven't owned yet.

But in the good old days, when a meme was something you read about in a Richard Dawkins book, playing with more than one player meant everyone had to be together in the same room... at the same time. Such a crazy concept produced some ridiculously fun multiplayer games - ones that you could play no matter how low your bandwidth was.

And if you haven't yet played some of these games yet, then it's really time to get your pals round, and get stuck into some old-school multiplayer mayhem.

Worms is a 2D turn-based strategy game where you controlled a team of worms, whose simple goal was to wipe out all the other teams of worms. It was like a basic microcosm of all wars and conflicts that have ever been played out, except with worms and exploding sheep.

It was an update on old-school geometric shooters like Atari's Artillery Duel, or another old Amiga favourite, Scorched Tanks. Instead of uninteresting polygons blowing each other up though, you had colourful, cutesy worms instead. Which sounds a bit sadistic and evil in retrospect, but made for a fun-looking game nonetheless.

A key element to the success of Worms was its multiplayer functionality. As the game was turn-based, it meant up to 16 players could partake in one battle. Although for most of us gamers in our teens, we would count ourselves lucky to have had that many friends to play with.

Worms has gone on to become a long-standing franchise in the multiplayer combat game genre, and deservedly so too. Even if its success has partially led to the spread of an avian disease crisis of recent years, known only as Angry Birds.