18 Sub-Genres of Shooter Games | List

The shooter genre has been around almost since the birth of video games as a medium. The earliest examples were very basic but obviously appealed to a huge audience as they became one of the most prominent game genres and it remains as such today. Because the shooter genre has existed for such a long time, developers have changed the standard formula in many different ways, thus creating many, many different sub-genres of shooter games.

The shooter genre covers an extremely diverse range of games but to sum it up simply, a shooter is an action orientated game featuring guns or long ranged weapons which tests your accuracy and reactions. The objective of a shooter changes depending on the exact sub-genre but most consist of the player character needing to reach the end of a stage while defeating enemies before they defeat you.

This list goes in depth into some shooter sub-genres, explaining what separates them from other shooter games, what some similarities are and giving some examples of games that fall into these sub-genres. This is a sort of follow up to a list I wrote about platformer sub-genres and just like in that list, I'll be starting with the most common sub-genres and as you get lower down, things will start to become more obscure and niche. Some would say that the the shooter market is over-saturated and I would definitely agree, with triple A developers, indie creators and everyone in between creating shooter games it means there's a lot to talk about, so let's stop stalling and get straight into the list.

1

First Person Shooter

Examples:

Doom, Quake, Halo, Serious Sam

The first person shooter has got to be the most popular sub-genre of shooter games in the modern era. First person shooters account for nine of the fifty best selling games of all time which is a substantial amount when you consider how diverse game genres are. A first person shooter can be defined very easily by simply looking at the camera perspective of a game, if the game looks like it's being played through the eyes of the protagonist (you can't see the protagonist's full body) it's a first person game.

The primary reason for creating games using this perspective is normally to make it feel like you, the player, are the main character of the game in some form. It becomes more immersive to use this angle because you aren't controlling a character on the screen, you're controlling yourself within the game's world. Of course, game developers know that audiences don't actually believe they are inside a video game, which is why you'll still often still be controlling a character like in any other game (such as the Master Chief) but these characters are normally mute, or as quiet as they can be without causing dissonance between the gameplay and story development.

2

Third Person Shooter

Examples:

Gears of War, Resident Evil 4, Max Payne, Uncharted

This is very similar to the last sub-genre in terms of it being defined entirely by the camera positioning in the game world. Rather than the camera being positioned so it mimics the view of a person's eyes, a third person shooter positions the camera behind the character so we can see their whole body move on screen.

The reason a game may choose to be third person rather than first person is if the story taking place is about the journey of a very specific character and isn't supposed to be a representation of the player. If the game features platforming or cover based combat it will most likely be a third person game, the reason for which being that this camera position is more suited to these mechanics due to being able to see the world around the character more clearly as well as being able to see around and over cover even when the character is behind it. Certain shooters that are predominantly first person will swap camera positions to become third person when taking cover for this very reason (examples of which being Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas and 007: Quantum of Solace).

3

Top Down Shooter

Examples:

Asteroids, Space Invaders, Commando, Ikari Warriors

This sub-genre is one that's more associated with retro games because of the fact that it was much easier to replicate 3D space from this angle when working with graphics that are pixelated and hardware that isn't very powerful and can't render things as quickly as today's consoles.

Similarly to the last couple of sub-genres, this one is defined by the positioning of the camera rather than the mechanics and design of the gameplay. A top down shooter, quite simply, is a shooter where the camera is positioned above the action taking place. Your character is normally quite small and can be moved up, down, left, right and diagonally which gives the illusion that your character is moving forwards and backwards in a 3D space. Because of being able to see around your character in every direction it's also common for enemies to be attacking you from every angle which has resulted in this sub-genre being associated with being very difficult.

While most games in this sub-genre allow movement which gives off the sense of the game taking place in a 3D world, some games were more basic and limited character movement to suit a certain design choice. An example of this is Space Invaders in which the game takes place from a top down angle but the way the sprites are displayed and the controls are locked to moving left and right make it obvious that the game takes place on a 2D plane which gives the illusion that the tank you control is shooting up into the sky at the alien enemies. Games which follow similar design choices to Space Invaders are often referred to as 'fixed shooters' because of the way that movement is fixed to being horizontal and the action taking place is on a single (non-scrolling) screen (another example of a fixed shooter is Radar Scope).

Speaking of sub-genres of sub-genres, a more modern take on the top-down shooter is isometric shooters which normally consist of actual 3D graphics rather than using an angle to replicate 3D. Isometric shooters are a lot more uncommon than fixed shooters and this isometric angle seems to be used to be reminiscent of retro top-down games while incorporating modern graphics and gameplay mechanics. An isometric camera angle is difficult to describe, but if you picture the game world as taking place in a cube, then picture the camera through which we see the world as being positioned in one of the top corners of the cube, you might understand what I mean. So it isn't looking straight down on the world but it's looking down from an angle. Examples of isometric shooters are Hatred and Medal Wars: Keiser's Revenge.

4

Shoot 'Em Up

Examples:

Gradius, R-Type, Defender

Finally we've gotten to a shooter sub-genre that isn't based on where the camera is positioned. A shoot 'em up game (sometimes referred to as a 'schmup') is an extremely vague sub-genre which (like the top-down shooter) splits off into multiple other sub-genres.

The basic formula of a shoot 'em up is that there are lots of enemies on screen, lots of things to avoid, the pace is very fast and you will normally be killed in very few hits (sometimes even one hit). You can play as a human (or humanoid) character or as a vehicle but you will very often be working alone (or with a co-op partner) against hordes of opposing forces. The camera perspective and the control scheme that a shoot 'em up uses will very often determine what sub-genre of shoot 'em up the game is.

A twin stick shooter (sometimes referred to as multi-directional shooter or dual-stick shooter) is a type of shoot 'em up which is defined by the way in which the player character is controlled. Where a twin stick shooter differs from any other form of shoot 'em up is in the way that you can move and shoot in any direction at the same time. Often, this will be accomplished by the game utilising two joysticks, one which moves the character and one which controls where the character shoots. An example of a twin stick shooter is Smash TV.

A scrolling shooter differs to other shoot 'em ups because of the way in which the screen constantly moves in one direction (horizontally or vertically, although there are examples which do both) regardless of player movement. This creates situations in which the player can easily be killed by getting stuck into a corner and the screen then pushing them into the enemies. Because of the constant movement, scrolling shooters are normally particularly fast paced and feature lots of enemies, projectiles and obstacles. A classic example of a scrolling shooter is Gradius.

A tube shooter is a very obscure sub-genre of a shoot 'em up and I can find very few examples of this kind of game. Tube shooters are very similar to fixed shooters in terms of only being able to move left and right, but instead of only moving in a straight line at the bottom of the screen, you can move around in a circle. Inside this circle, enemies and obstacles can appear and will get bigger as they get closer to the screen (giving the illusion of 3D). The effect this camera perspective has is that you are traveling through a tube shape, hence the name 'tube shooter'. It's quite a primitive method of creating 3D space and the dated nature of these games isn't helped by the way that games of this type used vector graphics (presumably because of the complexity of what was happening on screen, nothing could be a solid object and as such everything looks like a wire frame). The reason why more games of this type aren't plentiful is probably because 3D graphics became much more feasible shortly after these games were created, in some ways, these games were ahead of their time. Games which fall into this category are Tempest and Gyruss.

5

Run and Gun

Examples:

Contra, Metal Slug, Gunstar Heroes

A Run and Gun game is simply a mixture of a shooter and a platformer. Most run and gun games are 2D and feature a co-op mode, but this isn't an essential to make it fall into this category. In a game of this type, you will be able to jump, move left and right across multiple levels (with changing themes), fight bosses, collect power-ups and shoot in multiple directions. The thing that makes this different to an action platformer is the emphasis on shooting as opposed to maneuvering obstacles and platforms, whereas an action platformer is less about shooting and more about standard platforming.

6

Tactical Shooter/Squad Shooter

Examples:

Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six, Battlefield, SWAT 3: Close Quarters Battle

A tactical shooter is a much more slower paced experience than other sub-genres on this list, the reason for this is that they replicate real world military combat. In these games health is normally very low which will result in dying after only a couple of shots which means that the use of tactics and stealth are required. A lot of tactical shooters often feature a planning stage or a similar concept (like the commander mode in Battlefield 2) which is reminiscent of the real time strategy genre. Another defining feature of a tactical shooter is that there is an emphasis on working in a squad with other non-playable characters which can be controlled through the use of in game commands (meaning your teammates can move independently of your character but you still maintain a degree of control over them); this opens up the possibility of flanking your opponents and completing multiple objectives at the same time. Games like SWAT 4 allow you to switch perspectives to your teammates giving you an even greater degree of control.

A squad shooter (or squad based shooter) is sometimes regarded as a different genre however the only thing that separates these two sub-genres is that a squad shooter has a focus on online or multiplayer gameplay (meaning that the enemies or teammates are real people as opposed to NPCs) whereas a tactical shooter is predominantly a single player experience in which the teammates and enemies are all NPCs.

7

Military Shooter

Examples:

Call of Duty, Medal of Honour, Killzone

At a glance a military shooter may seem to be the same sub-genre as a tactical shooter or squad shooter but there are a few key differences to warrant splitting this into it's own category. Similarities between this sub-genre and the previous one on the list are the low amount of health and the emphasis on military combat.

Where this genre splits off from the tactical shooter genre though is in the way that a military shooter isn't designed to reflect real life combat and because of this it has a much faster pace and often features regenerating health. A military shooter will often focus almost entirely on the player character, with other NPCs being of little help and not being directly controllable, which is also reflected in the online/multiplayer gameplay by these games having much less emphasis on working as a team when compared to tactical shooters.

8

Role Playing Shooter (RPS)

Examples:

System Shock, Deus Ex, Bioshock, Fallout 3, Borderlands

A role playing shooter is a blend of the shooter genre and the role playing game (RPG) genre. While there is still an emphasis on shooting, there are also many elements from RPG games such as experience gathering and leveling up, armor and weapon pick ups which affect your stats in different ways, status effects such as poison and some even feature turn based aspects (like the V.A.T.S. system in Fallout 3). There is always an emphasis on the single player experience with any multiplayer aspects being co-operative or not at the forefront of the game.

9

Multiplayer Shooter

Examples:

Lost Planet 2, Titanfall, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive

This one is very vague and I'm not sure it's considered an actual genre although it is sometimes referred to as such. For the sake of this list I'm including it as it helps to narrow down what type of game you're playing. There are many different sub-genres of the multiplayer shooter, but it basically breaks down into whether or not the game is co-operative or competitive.

A co-op multiplayer shooter is something like the campaign sections of Lost Planet 2, Gears of War or Halo in which you and several other people work together through the entire experience to achieve a common goal. A competitive multiplayer shooter is what makes up the bulk of multiplayer modes in video games; this is where the player will be pitted against other players and given an objective they must complete before the other opposing players do. Typical game modes that exist in competitive shooters are Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag and King of the Hill, almost every modern shooter game will feature modes of these types.

10

Hero Shooter

Examples:

Overwatch, Monday Night Combat, Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2

This sub-genre is a more recent addition to the roster of shooter sub-genres and is inspired by MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena) games. Hero shooters work very similarly to MOBAs in the way that you pick from pre-set characters who all have unique abilities and the objective is to work as a team to achieve objectives or defeat your opponents. Hero shooters are always multiplayer focused and have a tendency to be very bright and colourful which is in stark contrast to a lot of other modern shooter games. Similarly to a tactical shooter there is a clear emphasis on working with teammates and creating strategies to overcome your enemies, however, hero shooters are not grounded in reality at all. The characters you choose to play as all have over the top abilities which can be activated in battle (and often feature cool-down timers before you can use the ability again) and coordinating these different abilities to work in tandem with other players is essential (for example, a healer character working with a tank character creates a blend of offensive and defensive strategies).

11

Light Gun Games

Examples:

Point Blank, Time Crisis, House of the Dead

A light gun game can be very easily identified by what the controller looks like, if the game features a gun peripheral which is aimed at the screen to replicate shooting a gun in real life, the game you're looking at is a light gun game. These are one of my personal favourite types of shooters because of the shooting gimmick which can be used in very interesting ways, Namco's GunCon (or G-Con) controller was the first gaming peripheral I ever used which probably adds to the reason I like these types of games so much.

Light gun games can be quite varied in terms of gameplay, for example, Point Blank is a minigame compilation which uses the gun peripheral to test your accuracy and speed across many different games. House of the Dead is a horror game in which you use the gun to dispatch waves of enemies and after doing so your character moves forward on their own (similarly to an on-rails shooter which I'll talk about later in this list) and the next wave appears. Time Crisis follows a more traditional shooter premise where the objective is to shoot enemy soldiers while taking cover from their shots by using a foot pedal which replicates crouching behind boxes, walls or anything else you can hide behind.

Because of the limited amount of buttons on the controllers, these games are normally quite simple in terms of interaction but this makes them accessible to anyone, regardless of their skill level. A common trope in light gun games is that they are always played from a first person perspective and you must shoot enemies or projectiles before they get too close to the screen and hit you (which will either kill you or take your health down depending on the game).

12

Rogue-like Shooter

Examples:

Nuclear Throne, The Binding of Issac, Enter the Gungeon

This is another more modern entry into the mass of shooter sub-genres, and yet again it's a mix of two different genres, this time being the shooter genre and the rogue-like genre. Rogue-like games have very specific tropes which make them quite easily identifiable such as starting at the first floor of a dungeon-like area and working your way up (or down) through multiple levels, gaining new items while travelling through the levels, fighting various monsters which get progressively harder as the game goes on (and featuring boss levels at the end of each floor) and a form of permadeath which means if your character dies you will lose progress and start from the first floor of the dungeon again (sometimes losing all the equipment you've gaining in the process).

Knowing these defining features of a rogue-like it's easy to identify a rogue-like shooter because it will follow most (if not all) of the previously mentioned gameplay mechanics, while also having an emphasis on shooting or long ranged combat.

13

Action/Adventure Shooter

Examples:

Grand Theft Auto V, Metroid Prime, Tomb Raider (2013)

This sub-genre is a blend of the action/adventure genre and the shooter genre. Action/adventure games are difficult to describe because the term covers such a broad range of games, some of which may not bare many similarities to other games in the same category. I tend to avoid using the term 'action/adventure' unless the game I'm talking about doesn't fit easily into one particular genre. It's just a very vague and general way of describing a game.

But to give a brief summary of what an action/adventure game is, it's a game which features a sense of exploration, story-development and elements of puzzle solving (whether that be environmental puzzles (working out how to get to a certain place through movement) or more literal puzzle sections, for example the puzzle elements in Resident Evil). But it also features more physical game mechanics such as combat, where the player character will be able to attack a variety of enemies in different ways.

The shooter aspect of this sub-genre comes into play when we look at the primary way that the character can attack in an action/adventure game. Assassin's Creed for example, is an action/adventure game with a focus on melee combat which means it isn't a shooter, whereas Grand Theft Auto V focuses on taking cover and using a variety of firearms to dispatch enemies but also has all of the aforementioned elements of an action/adventure game, meaning it isn't a straight up shooter but an action/adventure shooter. That isn't to say that you can't use melee combat in Grand Theft Auto V, but it clearly isn't the main focus of the gameplay.

14

Puzzle Shooter

Examples:

Portal, SuperHot, Antichamber

I actually wasn't sure whether to put this sub-genre on the list because it's not really widely recognised in the gaming community. However because of the number of games that fall into this category, I feel that it makes sense to include it anyway. The games I have used as examples would probably fit the genre of first person puzzle games rather than being puzzle shooters, but because of the emphasis on guns and the elements of shooter games featured in them, I feel that they fit the puzzle shooter sub-genre quite well.

Rather than the objective of a puzzle shooter being to simply kill all the enemies, the shooting aspect is somewhat subverted to create situations where the player needs to solve puzzles by using a gun (or gun-like object). Even if the objective is to kill everything (like in the case of SuperHot) the way in which you achieve this isn't straight forward and you'll need to work out a strategy, explore and find solutions to problems in order to progress.

The puzzle shooter could be seen as the pacifist of the shooter sub-genres because it's the only one on this list where the primary objective isn't to shoot and kill things but rather to progress through exploration and puzzle-solving.

15

On Rails Shooter

Examples:

Space Harrier, Starfox 64, Panzer Dragoon

This sub-genre is similar to the tube shooter which I mentioned in the shoot 'em up section of this list but there's a few differences between them, most notably is that the game world no longer looks like a tube and features more impressive 3D graphics. The on rails shooter genre is, in a way, the successor to the tube shooter.

An on rails shooter is a game in which you can control your character and move all around the screen in 2D space, but the game will be controlling your movement through 3D space for you (in other words, you're constantly moving forwards regardless of what buttons you're pressing), you could think of on rails shooters as being the 3D equivalent to scrolling shooters. You may be able to slow your character down to regain some control over your forward movement but regardless of this you're still moving in a pre-determined path which the game chooses for you. The effect this has is that you're on a train or roller coaster, hence the name on rails shooter. Another example of this kind of game is the Gummi Ship sections in Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II.

Most light gun games are actually a sub-genre of on rails shooters but the obvious thing separating these two are the controllers, one being a gun peripheral and the other being a standard controller. But the on rails movement is the same in both.

16

Bullet Hell

Examples:

Robotron: 2084, Ikaruga, Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved

The sub-genre of bullet hell has many different names, manic shooters, danmaku and curtain fire just to name a few, but they are all fundamentally the same. Traditionally a bullet hell game consists of controlling a small character who needs to avoid many on screen threats while shooting against them and after clearing a stage, you'll move onto a harder level with more variety in enemies. The amount of on screen enemies and projectiles in a bullet hell game is much, much higher than other sub-genres on this list and it's this that separates this sub-genre from others. Bullet hell games are regarded as being extremely difficult and are aimed at fans of the shooter genre who need more of a challenge, but because of this niche appeal, there aren't many games that fall into this genre (which is a shame, because I'm a huge fan of this style).

Recently there has been a tendency for indie games to feature aspects of bullet hell games while not being shooters at all. The classic example of this is Undertale, where the turn based combat is made more engaging through the use of bullet hell sections where you can avoid enemy attacks by dodging projectiles in a small grid on the battle screen.

17

Shooting Gallery

Examples:

Wild Guns, Blood Bros., Dynamite Duke, Cabal

It's such a shame that this particular sub-genre is practically non-existent because it's one of my personal favourites and doesn't get the attention it deserves. It's actually very similar to light gun games and on rails shooters only rather than using a light gun you control a character who appears on screen and unlike on rails shooters you don't move in 3D space.

The main thing that separates shooting gallery games from any other shooter is that you can move your character and a targeting reticle independently of each other. Stages tend to be quite static with enemies walking into the stage from off screen or popping up from windows or behind cover which gives these games a sense of movement despite actually having a lack of it. Because of the static screens, this meant a lot of detail could be put into the backgrounds and in games like Cabal you could actually destroy buildings and other environmental objects which is something that wasn't common back then and made these games stand apart from others. Another feature of shooting gallery games is that they tend to include co-operative multiplayer.

18

Hybrid Shooter

Examples:

Star Wars: Battlefront II, Splatoon

As you've probably noticed, a lot of the games I've used as examples and talked about on this list fit into many different sub-genres and not just the one I've listed it as. This is common and it's actually pretty much impossible for a shooter to only fit into one sub-genre, for example Splatoon is a third person shooter but it also has elements of a squad based shooters, hero shooters and even puzzle shooters. So while every shooter is a hybrid shooter in some form, there are some which fall into this category more so than others. Sure, Rainbow Six is a first person shooter, tactical shooter and a multiplayer shooter but it obviously falls predominantly into the tactical shooter category because of the mechanics it uses all reflecting the criteria for this sub-genre.

But for some games it isn't that simple and they have equal amounts of mechanics matching multiple different sub-genres making it more difficult to catagorise, and these games are simply hybrids of sub-genres. For example, Star Wars: Battlefront II is a third person shooter, first person shooter, multiplayer shooter, hero shooter and has elements of both tactical shooters and military shooters, meaning that it's much more difficult to catagorise than most other games, so this would fall into the hybrid shooter sub-genre, more specifically I would say it's a tactical/military shooter because it's game mechanics align with the tactical shooter and military shooter genres more closely than any others.

It's really a matter of interpretation as to which games are hybrids and which can be classed as one specific genre so there is some debate to be had regarding this, but most of the time it's fairly easy to recognise which sub-genre a game falls into because it will match one a lot more than any others.

Which that I would like to wrap up this list by saying thanks for reading! I hope it's come in handy and maybe you've discovered a new sub-genre or found some new games to try out. If you liked the list or think I've missed anything out please leave a comment below or contact me on my social media pages. If you want to read more content of this style you could check out my list of platformer sub-genres too!