With its nearly two-decade lifetime, theXbox 360console saw quite an astonishing library of titles featuring visceral combat and non-stop action in the form of shooters or hack-and-slash games. And though the Xbox 360 store is shutting its doors in 2024, there’s still plenty of time to get some of these action offerings,along with other hidden gems.
RELATED:The Best Action Games On PC
Some may have a more compelling story, while others focus more on brilliant gunplay, but all these games will have you covered with endless action sequences. And there’s quite a bunch from genres such as sci-fi, fantasy, crime dramas, or even historical titles.
10Stranglehold
Combine all the gameplay elements ofMax Paynewith a John Woo storyline, and you get a game like Stranglehold, the actual sequel to John Woo’s 1992 film Hard Boiled, with Chow Yun-Fat reprising Inspector Tequila Yuen and Woo co-directing. He’s a director who’s mastered the genre with films like A Better Tomorrow, The Killer, and Face/Off, translating this style into the game’s mechanics.
Stranglehold brings intense and gory fast-paced third-person shootouts all the way through the campaign, with elements such as standoffs, where you dodge bullets and shoot targets in close range, and bullet time combat entailing lots of diving and shooting with dual-wielded weapons. You’re even able to use the environment to your advantage.
9Middle-Earth: Shadow Of Mordor
WhileThe Lord of the Ringsis about Frodo’s journey with the Ring of Power, Peter Jackson’s trilogy had some of the best cinematic battles between the fantasy heroes and Sauron’s Orcs.Shadow of Mordorreally takes the idea of orc-slaying and runs with it, as the environment is packed with them, and their heads and bodies will pile up in no time with combat encounters all over the map.
RELATED:Every Single The Lord Of The Rings Video Game, Officially Ranked
The gameplay delivers brutal hack-and-slash swordplaywith Mad Max and Batman Arkham-style counters, also allowing executions that offer more gore than the films. It’s a prequel to The Lord of the Rings featuring a ranger named Talion bonded to the Wraith Celebrimbor, with various Wraith abilities to help with combat and riding mounts, and utilizing a Nemesis hierarchy system of replacing Orc commanders.
8Sleeping Dogs
Taking heavy inspiration from GTA and fusing martial arts action, you have the video game Sleeping Dogs. The game’s core focus is its beat ‘em-up style combat, with a system that relies on counters, which allows you to grab and drag your opponents into environmental objects to defeat them. It has neat finishing animations, too.
Filled with a star-studded castof names like Lucy Liu, James Hong, Will Yun Lee, and Emma Stone, the game sees you play as a cop named Wei Shen who’s been transferred from San Francisco to work undercover to stop Triads in Hong Kong. Similar to GTA, you have plenty of vehicle options to traverse the open-world map, a cell phone mechanic, and a wanted-level system.
7X-Men Origins: Wolverine
While the PlayStation 4 and 5 haveMarvel’s Spider-Man, the Xbox 360 has a Marvel gem of its own. X-Men Origins: Wolverine is an extremely brutal game with bloody action better matching 2017’s Logan than the 2009 film the game is based on. This game is Logan at his most violent, launching himself at enemy soldiers and ripping them up with his claws in a frenzy left and right.
His character presents a true beast, a hybrid of Predator and Kratos, able to juggle enemies and activate rage mode to deliver more heavy blows. You also have boss battles with gigantic golem-like creatures and can acquire various skill upgrades as you progress. The story has little to do with the film, instead creating a different experience with new plotlines from the developer.
6Rise Of The Tomb Raider
Originally an Xbox exclusive, 2015’sRise of the Tomb Raiderwas the last Tomb Raider title to be released on old-gen. It’s a sequel to the 2013 reboot taking Laura’s cinematic journey to Syria and the snowy environments of Siberia with field partner Jonah, the duo in search of the mythical Slavic region of Kitezh.
RELATED:Action-Adventure Games With The Best Writing
The climbing and scaling are thrilling as ever, and the combat largely stays the same, using Laura’s archery skills and arrow crafting in a more stealth approach or going at Trinity’s forces guns blazing. As standard in the series, the story again incorporates supernatural elements with an object capable of granting immortality called the Divine Source, linked as far back as the Byzantine era.
5Max Payne 3
Max Payne is a gritty neo-noir detective series that delivers over-the-top gunplay via its bullet time Shootdodge mechanic. While Remedy created the first two games, Max Payne’s third and final action game outingmoved over to GTA developer Rockstar Games. It was a revitalized and refreshing take that gave the series a new character model and location of Brazil while adding Rockstar aesthetics but keeping the signature narration.
Max has put NYC and his life as a detective behind him, his skills now being applied in his new occupation as a private security officer for an affluent family with political ties in São Paulo. Once some of its members are kidnapped as part of a larger conspiracy, Max Payne will prove a relentless force in his quest for justice.
4Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag
If you love the high seas action seen in Black Sails or Pirates of the Caribbean and are a fan of theAssassin’s Creedseries, Black Flag offers the best fluid combat and open world of any old-gen AC game. Unlike the newer RPG titles, taking on crowds of enemies here is as easy as timing correct parries to chain kills or throwing smoke bombs and using your hidden blade in the smoke screen.
As pirate Edward Kenway, you command the Jackdaw and can sail and board Galleons once you’ve weakened the ship with cannons to steal its cargo. With all your weapons like berserker darts, pistols, swords, and rope darts, there are endless possibilities for dealing with enemies. You’ll also be able to hunt sharks and whales with a harpoon mechanic from your ship.
An even more immersive action game from Rockstar on Xbox 360 isRed Dead Redemption, an open world taking you to the early 20th-century pre-WW1 Western US and playing as former gang member-turned-bounty hunter John Marston going after his old associates. Merely riding a horse throughout the scenic landscape is among the most beautiful experience you’ll have on the 360.
RELATED:Things A Red Dead Redemption Remaster Needs
Shootouts are a big part of the missions, almost non-stop and often while you’re on horseback for even bigger thrills, and you have the Dead Eye system where time slows down, marking as many targets as your meter drains before quick-firing on each of them. And the arsenal containssome of the era’s best weapons.
2Gears Of War Series
Although you may’t playGears of War4 or 5, the Xbox 360 is exclusively home to the first three games in the series and the 2013 spin-off Gears of War: Judgement. It’sone of the best third-person shootersyou can play, delivering an original sci-fi story set in the world of Sera, where COG soldiers wield chainsaw bayonet rifles and battle an underground alien race called the Locust Horde.
The combat in these games relies heavily on taking cover and firing over the shoulder in atmospheric environments, with some interesting creature designs and iconic action-hero characters like Marcus Fenix, Dominic Santiago, and Damon Baird.
1BioShock Infinite
BioShock Infiniteis the perfect blend of great action and a great story, with twice the weapons at your disposal. And that doesn’t mean dual-wielding, but instead, your other hand acquiring special powers from vigors, which give you the ability to possess turrets, so they fire at enemies or send a wave of crows to peck away and distract as you shoot, among others like shooting flames or electricity.
There’s lots of fast-paced actionall around the sky world of Columbia, often when taking the sky rail and blasting foes as you ride or when hopping aboard floating vehicles in the sky. The game has unique twists and turns in a more mind-bending fashion than its predecessors and introduces a companion system with Elizabeth, who can open tears to alternate universes.
