7 February 2026

November 2004 Was an Incredible Month for FPS Games That Still Hasn’t Been Topped

By newsgame

There is often talk about the best years in gaming, but when it comes to the best months in gaming, November 2004 should be part of the conversation, especially for first-person shooter fans. First-person shooters are among the most popular and critically-acclaimed video games of all time, with some of the broadest appeal. There have been no shortage of classic FPS games released over the years, but there are certainly some that stand above the others.

When it comes to the titans of the first-person shooter genre, a few major franchises come to mind. Among some of the best FPS franchises ever are Halo, Half-Life, and Metroid Prime, and they all fill a unique niche in the genre. Halo offers a co-op campaign and an incredible multiplayer experience, while Half-Life is focused on delivering a thrilling single-player adventure with innovative physics-based mechanics. Metroid Prime, meanwhile, is all about solving puzzles and exploring mysterious alien worlds. They’re all different but high-quality FPS experiences, and so it’s wild that new entries in each franchise all dropped in the same month back in November of 2004.

8 Best First-Person Games By EA, Ranked

EA is well-known for its more famous FPS games, but the company’s best first-person titles extend well beyond the work of DICE and Respawn.

In November 2004, Halo 2, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, and Half-Life 2 all released within one week of each other. Halo 2 dropped on November 9 as an Xbox exclusive, while Metroid Prime 2: Echoes released on November 15 as a GameCube exclusive. Finally, Half-Life 2 released on November 16 as a PC exclusive. Needless to say, FPS gamers were eating good that week. Halo 2 is often hailed as one of the best multiplayer FPS games of all time, with an incredible 95 rating on Metacritic. Metroid Prime 2: Echoes may not have earned quite as high marks as the original Metroid Prime, but it too was critically acclaimed, earning a 92 overall rating on Metacritic. And then there’s Half-Life 2, which has the highest rating of them all with 96, making it one of the top 20 highest-rated video games ever made. These three games by themselves would be enough to solidify November 2004 as not just one of the best months in the history of FPS games, but one of the best months in gaming history, period. But there was even more that was released around that time, believe it or not.

Counter-Strike: Source, Killzone, Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault, and GoldenEye: Rogue Agent are some other FPS games that also released in November 2004. Non-FPS games that released in November 2004 that were fantastic include titles like Ratchet & Clank: Up Your Arsenal, Jak 3, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, and World of Warcraft. And that’s not even all of them. Whether you’re an FPS fan or not, November 2004 is clearly one of the most ridiculously stacked months in all of video game history.

The Nintendo DS handheld was also released in November 2004.

Will We Ever Get Another Month Like November 2004?

Ballooning development time means that it’s highly unlikely that any other month will come close to November 2004 in terms of volume. It was one new jaw-dropping game release after another, and while the FPS genre was the most well-represented, every other major genre also got some love. High-profile new game releases simply do not come out at the same rate that they used to, but the fall is still typically an exciting time for FPS fans at least.

Who’s That Character?

Identify the silhouettes before time runs out.

Who’s That Character?

Identify the silhouettes before time runs out.

Easy (7.5s)Medium (5.0s)Hard (2.5s)Permadeath (2.5s)

Every fall, there’s a new Call of Duty game to play, and sometimes there are other new FPS titles thrown in the mix as well. Last year, Battlefield 6 hit the scene to strong reviews and sales, separated by CoD by mere weeks. Other new FPS games are sprinkled throughout the year, with Doom: The Dark Ages hitting the scene a few months before Battlefield 6 and Black Ops 7, and Highguard launching just last month. It’s nowhere close to the levels of November 2004, but at least there are still major new FPS games released every year.