well maybe you should give this game a try :)
its from 2005 and available for under 10$... you can play it with up to three buddies. when you play with one buddy the other 2 characters are played by the computer and you can switch between them.
pretty good game.
you can also first try the demo, which is about 350 mb.

X-Men Legends II : Rise Of Apocalypse (action rpg brawler / about 8$)

(4 player)

->demo available

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/xmenlegendsiiriseofapocalypse/index.html?tag=result;title;6

Protozoa
6 MB
Download Site
Screenshots and Game Info

a very well made arena shooter wit great graphics, power ups, a nice
water effect and cool 3d background.
plays best with a dual analog gamepad...cause you know,
its an arena shooter

are you sure that it was for ps2?

cause your descrption sound like that it could be gunmetal

http://www.gamespot.com/xbox/action/gunmetal/index.html?tag=result;title;1

Generic Arena Shmup
17 MB
Direct Download

well this is another brand new very good arena shooter which is
meant to be played with dual analog gamepad.
(but can also be playeed with keyboard + mouse of course)
i followed through the development process and tried the previous beta
versions versions...and now im proud to present the final version here.
the developer is now working on a new game. cool guy.

fluid gameplay and good nice graphics.
choose from 3 ships: average ship, fast but not so strong ship,
slow but strong ship.
you can also activate some bombs which soaks all the enemies in
with a nice graphical effect.

you mean like phantom hourglass, right?

2d top down, third person 3d or isometric whatever.

the zelda games stand for quality. therfore this game would be great too ;)

well i have made a blog entry about coop games on pc.
they are all playable on one computer and some additionally over lan.
it is probably not exactly what you are seacrhing for but maybe you will enjoy it too.

Local Multiplayer Fun On PC

http://www.gamespot.com/users/AuthenticKaizen/

check amazon if you have a ds.

the ds version of scurge hive is available for 9.97$...worth it. pretty good game.

and the gba version for 28.95$...strange world ;)

free good fps for mac...lets see...

you can check out


Savage: The Battle For Newerth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savage:_The_Battle_for_Newerth

Open Arena

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenArena

Nexuiz

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nexuiz

World Of Padman

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_of_Padman



Warsow

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War%C2%A7ow

Enemy Territory

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfenstein:_Enemy_Territory

Graviroids

not a directly arena shooter...but a very good asteroids game with
gravity feature.very nice graphics and gameplay.

watch a gameplay clip here

http://crashtestgames.com/

check out wild earth africa!

there is a demo available. pretty small ...50 mb.

the full version is very affordable... costs about 20 bucks.

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/adventure/wildearth/index.html?tag=result;title;1