You and your friends can take on Serious Sam Classic: The First Encounter’s Egyptian campaign together, with up to 16 players in online or LAN co-op and up to four on one computer in local split-screen. The goal is uncomplicated: push through wide arenas, grab weapons and supplies, and keep moving as Mental’s creatures rush in from every direction. It suits a group that wants a loud, direct shooter with shared objectives and almost no downtime between fights.
Online and LAN sessions are hosted from the game’s multiplayer menu. The host chooses cooperative play, a starting level, difficulty, and the player limit. In a network campaign, the host controls loading and quick-loading saves. The local option splits one display into as many as four views, so your group shares a computer and needs each player’s controls assigned there. Online co-op gives each friend an individual view, while local split-screen shares the computer and display.
A campaign made of monster rushes
Sam’s route through ancient Egypt takes the group from open desert into temple courtyards, tombs, and other spaces built to hold large encounters. The campaign is a sequence of levels rather than a hub full of side activities. You move toward the exit, with keys, switches, and occasional barriers breaking up the route. Most of the time, though, the game is preparing another wave.
That rhythm changes the shape of a co-op session. A quiet stretch gives you room to scan a courtyard, collect supplies, and notice a passage or pickup tucked away from the main path. Then the arena fills with enemies and the space becomes part of the fight. Some threats charge straight across the sand; others attack from farther away or appear in groups that make the open floor feel less open. You are sharing one campaign and one objective, but the number of directions to watch can make each encounter feel crowded quickly.
The scale is part of the appeal. The First Encounter is willing to fill a large view with enemies instead of spacing them out into isolated duels. You and your friends can move around the arena, circle threats, and change targets as the wave closes in. There are no classes to build around or separate support jobs to manage. Everyone brings the same basic tools to the fight, and the game’s challenge comes from movement, aim, enemy combinations, and the amount of incoming fire.
The campaign has a clear finish in Ugh-Zan, the towering, multi-storey boss. Until then, the main reward for moving forward is the next level, weapons, supplies, and another mix of enemies; the story does not branch into character builds or party upgrades. More than 80 hidden secrets add optional detours around the main route. Because those secrets are off the critical path, your group can keep moving through the campaign even when nobody wants to stop and search every room.
A different threat calls for a different weapon
The arsenal grows as you travel, with weapons such as the Double Shotgun, Rocket Launcher, Minigun, and Cannon. Ammunition and health pickups sit in the levels, making what you find along the way part of the pace. The Double Shotgun delivers a close-range blast, while the larger weapons let you answer a dense wave with heavier fire. Swapping weapons is frequent because the next group rarely arrives in quite the same shape as the last.
The enemy lineup supplies much of the variety. The Sirian Werebull is a heavy charger that barrels across open ground; the Headless Kamikaze sprints toward you with its alarm-like scream. Other creatures bring ranged attacks, leaps, or different ways to occupy the arena. The point is less to solve a puzzle than to read the space quickly while the next few threats are already crossing it. With friends beside you, enemy waves become a shared scramble of dodging, firing, and shifting attention.
Co-op and versus are different sessions
Co-op keeps the campaign’s enemies and objectives in front of the group. Online or LAN co-op supports up to 16 players, while local split-screen supports up to four on one computer. A LAN game connects players on a local network, while Internet co-op lets them play from separate setups. The native PC build is for Windows, so every player using a regular installation needs Windows. With Steam Remote Play Together, a Windows host can stream local split-screen to friends on supported Steam clients, including macOS and Linux; guests do not need to own or install the game.
The same menu offers Deathmatch and Scorematch for groups that want to compete. Those modes change the purpose of a session: instead of advancing through the campaign against Mental’s forces, players face one another for kills or scores. Split-screen supports versus play too. If your group is choosing a game specifically to clear a campaign together, make sure the host starts Cooperative rather than one of the versus modes.
There is no class progression or collection of character builds to keep up with between sessions. The game’s replay value comes from the campaign itself, different difficulty settings, hidden secrets, and the option to switch to competitive modes or create custom content in the included level editor. You can also revisit a level from a different starting point when hosting a network game. These options give the group ways to change the session, though the central activity stays focused on fast arena fights.
The included Serious Editor and Serious Modeller can create custom levels, mods, textures, and other content. That gives groups who enjoy making things another way to extend the game, though editing is a separate activity that takes more setup than simply starting a campaign. For a regular co-op night, the built-in campaign and listed Deathmatch or Scorematch modes are the direct options.
What to expect from the pace
The game rarely pauses for a long conversation or a quiet story scene. Its humor comes through Sam’s wisecracks and the odd mix of alien creatures and ancient architecture, while the soundtrack and effects lean into a pulpy action-film mood. You get sunny Egyptian courtyards, huge statues and walls, strange monsters, and a lot of noise once the fighting starts. The story gives Sam a reason to keep moving toward Mental’s forces, but it leaves most of the attention on the next encounter.
Some enemies are memorable from their silhouette or sound alone: Werebulls barrel across open sand, while Headless Kamikazes race toward you screaming. That contrast between recognizable threats and large waves keeps the action easy to read at a glance, even as the familiar arena loop can become repetitive over a long run. The campaign offers more enemy combinations and bigger confrontations, not a steady rotation of new objectives or play systems.
That focus is also the main limitation. Levels are built around repeated movement and combat, with simple switches, keys, and pickups providing only occasional changes of pace. The large spaces and enemy combinations create variety within fights, but the overall loop remains familiar: enter an arena, survive a wave, gather what you can, and continue. A long session can make that repetition more noticeable, especially if your group wants deep character progression, varied objectives, or a story that changes the way you play.
Difficulty settings let the host choose how punishing the campaign feels, and the game’s swarms can turn a straightforward corridor into a sudden rush. The demanding action and violent, gory presentation are worth knowing about before inviting a group that prefers slower shooters or less graphic games. There is no need for a specific party composition: players share the same weapons and enemy pressure, and cooperation is expressed through the campaign rather than a menu of assigned roles.
Planning an online game
The 16-player cap describes what a session allows; it does not promise a populated public match. For a campaign with friends, one player can host an Internet or LAN session.
For a small group, local split-screen puts everyone in the same space and gives each person a view of the action. Online co-op gives each friend an individual screen and can include a much larger crew. LAN offers another way to connect computers on the same local network.
A host can also choose where a network session begins, which makes it possible to start from a selected campaign level instead of treating every game night as a full run from the opening. The host is the one who can load or quick-load a network save, so that shared campaign state belongs to the person running the server. Difficulty is another host choice, while the players themselves do not build separate classes or unlock support roles between levels. That keeps the setup simple, but it also means the shape of a session comes from the chosen level, enemy pressure, and how long your group wants to stay in the fight.
Serious Sam Classic: The First Encounter fits friends who want to spend their time moving and shooting through a complete campaign, with local and network ways to share the action. It gives your group wide arenas, a memorable parade of monsters, and a generous arsenal, then keeps asking you to meet the next wave. If that focused loop sounds good, cooperative play is the mode that turns the horde into a shared problem.