Older ( pre 2002) Action/Light RPGs - with coop multiplayer

I have a friend. He has a cheap laptop. I have a cheap laptop too.
We both go to the same university.We sometimes like to take an hour or two to play some games over lan. It's extremely fun and seems to take away all the stress and makes life so much better

Could you guys recommend some interesting windows games, preferably lighter (action) RPGs with multiplayer?

Now, there are a few important things to remember:
- The games must be cooperative not competitive (it seems that after playing competitive games we have somehow gotten bruising on our shoulders)
- The games must run on cheap integrated GPUs. (pretty much everything pre 2002)
- Action RPGs are good (in this case). They are very fun in a quick-lapton-lan.

Now.. We have already played the D's (yes diablo1/2) and I recently got my hands on a game called Darkstone, which by the way, is absolutely fantastic.

I have heard of a game called Revenant, any experiences?

I didn´t like Revenant. The controls are quite complex, which of course allows lots of combat moves, and the world seemed quite sterile to me.

Check out if Nox includes coop MP. The campaigns are a blast, and according to many others the normal MP is even better. Nox came out 6 months before D2 but looks leagues better. It´s like Diablo with more action and less item hunting.

I liked Nox quite a bit. what i found especially cool was that the world had real objects, tables, stools, even the bones of skeletons could be moved.

Sacred was early '04, but you might get that to work. I think the Underworld expansion lets you play the campaign coop, while the regular version let's you roam about hacking and slaying and doing side quests coop, but not the main quest.

sacred is too fancy.

thanks for the suggestions so far. did some digging with mobygames.
Found many games I've never played (I usually dismiss action rpgs):

Throne of darkness, Night Stone, Silver, Rage of Mages 2, Evil Islands,
Prince of Qin, Blade & Sword…

Any of this stuff any good?

If I remember correctly Throne of Darkness was not bad for a Diablo clone, but at some point inventory management took over any action. Prince of Qin lacked multiplayer (I may be mistaken). Rage of Mages 1/2 and Evil Islands may be good though. 1/2 certainly had multiplayer, but I've forgotten if it was coop or not.

Evil Islands is a great game. Revenant is also fine (though I've no idea if you can play it coop) - the world is kinda empty, but I consider the complex moves a good thing (wait 'till you see the really fancy moves).

Thanks guys, exactly the kind of usefull info i was hoping for.
Yeah duke3d is an absolute classic. I still play it sometimes in SP.

If anyone else is looking for excellent lan coop games (other than rpgs)
I recommend the first ghost recon
with all the expansions and a bunch of mods. It excellent endless fun and runs on almost any computer. Very good.

System shock 2 , I'm not sure if this falls on 'light rpg' gategory or not. In any case it can be played with max 4 players.

Rainbow six series games are tons of fun with coop mode.

Swat 3 (99) for older pcs or swat 4 + add-on (05) if you both have good pcs.

Half-life 1 had a working coop mod called "Sven-coop". Played it few times with a friend of mine and we had a great time. You can download it from http://www.svencoop.com/files.php

Hidden and Dangerous. Tired of modern era and fighting against terrorists? well then H&D is made for you. Take a role of special team of allied soldiers going behind the enemy lines in ww2. Its a tactical and realistic shooter, much like r6 or swat, but in ww2 era. you and your buddy control the team of four allied soldier. you'll get to choose weaponry and other items before the missions and then execute it as you see it fit. Best thing is that this game and it's mission pack are both freeware now.

Hidden and Dangerous 2 with the sabre Squadron mission pack (the expansion pack is required for coop play). its much like the first game expect with better craphics and richer gameplay, although it demands a better cpu.

I've played through Lionheart (should work) and Dungeon Lords (might be a bit demanding on the system, you can try the demo) in coop. Both games have design flaws but these are more bearable in MP IMHO.

For general coop I've found the Delta Force series quite fun, but given my general dislike for FPS games that is a somewhat uninformed endorsement. Age of Empires had a feature that allows several players to control parts of the same "empire" (always found that claim ridiculous given that your empire consists of fifty peasants running back and forth), it might be worth checking the RTS market for games with that feature.

EDIT: I asked about coop RPGS in and old thread, maybe there's something useful for you as well: http://www.rpgwatch.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2929

No RPG by any means, but as far as CoOp games go, Serious Sam (and maybe the not so good sequel Serious Sam 2) deserves a spot in the list! Wouldn't touch it with a stick in single player, but multi player is so much fun!

I always mix "Hidden and Dangerous" with "Armed and Dangerous" by LucasArts.

I actually had quite fun with the games in MP, but they do come with rather significant flaws. And SP was in both cases rather less enjoyable than coop.

We would probably not have touched them if there had been more cooperative RPGs to choose from.

EDIT: Your German saying describes my feeling about Dungeon Lords combat very accurately Having a partner introduces a tactical dimension to these mediocre games.