The Best Free Online (in-browser or downloadable) Games

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If there, feel free to link to it here. I couldn't find it, at least.

By "online" I don't necessarily mean games that you play online with other people (although, I'm not ruling that out).

The best two free games available on these intarnets that I've found are:

Grid Wars 2 and Grow RPG. The former has staying power, while the latter just provides a really fun 30 minutes, or however long it takes you to beat it.

― Zachary S (Zach S), Monday, 22 January 2007 01:47 (eighteen years ago)

Grid Wars OTM. Was it me that originally pointed you in its direction on ILE? I think I've finally got the hang of farming, to the extent that I'm now bothered by the fact that I haven't worked out how to stop shooting. Am I missing something, or do you permanently fire from when you first shoot until you die? I'm using hybrid controls (i.e. keyboard and mouse).

http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.com/grid/gw18.jpg

Interested people, please see http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.com/grid/wars.htm

― caek (caek), Monday, 22 January 2007 02:57 (eighteen years ago)

It was you who guided me there. Thanks!
I haven't played in a while, but I'm pretty sure if you go into options, there's an auto-fire mode which is turned on by default. How does the mouse-keyboard hybrid setup work?

― Zachary S (Zach S), Monday, 22 January 2007 05:19 (eighteen years ago)

Grid wars = too hectic for me. I don't know how you manage to survive long enough to reap the benefits of yr farming, I could only ever manage to fill up and then explode one, maybe two black holes, before getting blindsided by some little blighter, or just overwhelmed by numbers.

Great link to a g'drillion online games (ok, only 20). http://www.zanorg.com/prodperso/jeuxchiants/doublejeu.htm and http://www.vivalagames.com/play/cursorthief/ two of my faves, both v simple and quick and "just one more go" type addictive.

― ledge (ledge), Monday, 22 January 2007 10:12 (eighteen years ago)

www.minijuegos.com

You need never work again...

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Monday, 22 January 2007 10:35 (eighteen years ago)

I'm pretty sure if you go into options, there's an auto-fire mode which is turned on by default.

Ah, cheers. Under hybrid setup your keyboard controls movement and the mouse controls shooting direction, a la Quake, etc.

Grid wars = too hectic for me.

I never survive longer than about ten minutes, which I see as an advantage. It's a proper game, but you only need ten minutes for it.

― caek (caek), Monday, 22 January 2007 12:25 (eighteen years ago)

Flow -- designed for maximum taskflow and really beautiful and relaxing about it
Tactics Arena Online -- D&D chess, basically
Hyperframe -- favorite puzzle

― nabisco (nabisco), Monday, 22 January 2007 21:43 (eighteen years ago)

Whoa, Hyperframe is a good time.

― Zachary S (Zach S), Tuesday, 23 January 2007 02:18 (eighteen years ago)

my god that sand falling game/toy. i couldn't tear myself off it last night.

― Ste (Fuzzy), Tuesday, 23 January 2007 09:21 (eighteen years ago)

Hahaha, if that's the sand falling thing I'm thinking of, I've spent HOURS on it.

― melton mowbray's APOCALYPTO! (adr), Tuesday, 23 January 2007 18:36 (eighteen years ago)

More please.

― nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, 25 January 2007 18:02 (eighteen years ago)

Seriously. I'd suggest some, but you guys are blowing me out of the water so far. Mine are too obvious, like this.

― Zachary S (Zach S), Friday, 26 January 2007 04:58 (eighteen years ago)

As far as little widgety games go, this one's really terrific -- basic concept, but you can actually improve / develop skills / etc.

http://addictinggames.com/extremeheliboarding.html

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 26 January 2007 05:32 (eighteen years ago)

Might be an oldie, but ULTIMATE BLAST BILLIARDS!!!

― ledge (ledge), Friday, 26 January 2007 10:44 (eighteen years ago)

As far as little widgety games go, this one's really terrific -- basic concept, but you can actually improve / develop skills / etc.

It would be nice to get past a log for once grrrr

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Friday, 26 January 2007 11:16 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.1up.com/do/feature?pager.offset=0&cId=3156339

101 free games (with hardly any comments on any of them. there's moaning on a.n.other forum that the list is an amalgam of other lists which were better but...)

― Koogy Bloogies (koogs), Friday, 26 January 2007 18:28 (eighteen years ago)

three months pass...

http://www.acrobots.net/ !!!
This thing is so addicting. At first it's fun to just mess around with the physics and feel of it, then you can play the "try to keep your core triangle standing" mini-game, but when that gets dull you can always just throw 20 more creatures in and then mess with whatever that slider on the right does. It's great!

― Z S, Wednesday, 2 May 2007 22:28 (eighteen years ago)

Damn, also this String-Spinning thing. Someone should include it in a system performance test application as a measure of how much your computer can handle, because you can add as many lines and shapes as you want, and it overloads if you go bat-shit crazy as you make the lines. But rein it in your string-spinning ambitions a little, and you can get a nice little lampshade.

― Z S, Wednesday, 2 May 2007 22:44 (eighteen years ago)

what's a.n.other forum?

Anyway, I am going to pimp this game... Acrophobia. It's "free" on some other site, but you need to sign up. That guy found a way around it, though, so you can just stick a name in and it puts you in the game automatically :D

It was made in the 90s, and released by the same guys who were doing the You Don't Know Jack Netshow... basically it follows a similar game show vibe, and you have to play against real people. Think Balderdash, but with acronyms, and you vote for the funniest, not the "realest" or whatever. Every person who votes for you gives you a point, etc. Bonus points for being the fastest answer to receive a point, and bonus points for voting for the winning answer (to encourage people not to throw away votes).

There's a room called "The Couch" which is even better, because they have a house rule that instead of picking a topic from the list (boring shit like animals, science, etc) you make a specific topic up, like "Why are you so addicted to ILX?"

Fucking seriously, we NEED to get an ILX game of Acrophobia going on.

― Will M., Thursday, 3 May 2007 14:23 (eighteen years ago)

That link doesn't work anymore, it seems... LAME.

There's a more IRC-looking version of it too but that's slightly less fun... acrowars.com

― Will M., Thursday, 3 May 2007 15:09 (eighteen years ago)

three months pass...

gimme new ones

― chaki, Wednesday, 29 August 2007 22:15 (seventeen years ago)

About a month ago, I used the Stumble Upon "online games" channel so often that I actually got a message telling me that I had viewed every single recommended Stumble link on the topic, and to chill out for a while. I haven't played a free online game since. Thanks for fucking up my self-esteem, Stumble Upon.

― Z S, Thursday, 30 August 2007 03:16 (seventeen years ago)

www.minijuegos.com

Can't pimp it enough people.

― kv_nol, Thursday, 30 August 2007 08:31 (seventeen years ago)

BUT WHAT GAME ON MINIJUAGOS

― chaki, Thursday, 30 August 2007 21:57 (seventeen years ago)

^srsly

― Z S, Thursday, 30 August 2007 23:27 (seventeen years ago)

http://zetaflow.skylogic.ca/

― El Tomboto, Monday, 10 September 2007 21:46 (seventeen years ago)

Lazy bastards! (xxpost)

― kv_nol, Tuesday, 11 September 2007 09:22 (seventeen years ago)

Tombot, that is a fantastic game.

― kv_nol, Tuesday, 11 September 2007 12:28 (seventeen years ago)

puzzler: http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/games/bloxorz

― caek, Thursday, 20 September 2007 23:44 (seventeen years ago)

hte best free online game: http://www.foon.co.uk/farcade/ssb/

― sleepingbag, Friday, 28 September 2007 04:26 (seventeen years ago)

bloxorz roxorz! Something surprisingly counter-intuitive about it. (Or, I'm dense.)

― ledge, Friday, 28 September 2007 13:01 (seventeen years ago)

No one seems to have mentioned these old school platform games yet:

Cave Story
Info
Download with English Patch for Windows
And then the Mac English patch is here
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/ilikehame/_111_cave_story_ss_01.gif

Knytt Stories
Can be downloaded here
Extra levels
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/ilikehame/knytt6.jpg

La Mulana
English version is available at home of the underdogs
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/ilikehame/lamu_01.jpg

― Penguin USA Paper, Friday, 28 September 2007 21:12 (seventeen years ago)

This might be a better place to get La Mulana

No pop ups.

― Penguin USA Paper, Friday, 28 September 2007 21:17 (seventeen years ago)

desktop tower defense!

― pj, Sunday, 30 September 2007 04:57 (seventeen years ago)

Damn, I forgot all about Cave Story! I can really, really recommend that one. That one was obviously a labor of love for whoever developed it. It also has replay value because depending on the way you proceed, you can get different weapons and endings. A+ would play again etc.

Knytt Stories looks intriguing, I may check that out later today.

― Z S, Sunday, 30 September 2007 17:28 (seventeen years ago)

Knytt Stories looks intriguing, I may check that out later today.

It took forever and never seemed to go anywhere. I stopped playing.

― kv_nol, Monday, 1 October 2007 11:58 (seventeen years ago)

The original Knytt is even more low-key than most of the Knytt Stories levels. I'd agree that they don't really 'go anywhere' -- the appeal is mostly in exploring the weird mysterious world and seeing the tiny little sprite animals hop around, which is compelling enough for me but I can see how it could seem boring.

― Penguin USA Paper, Monday, 1 October 2007 19:48 (seventeen years ago)

http://www.yoyogames.com/games/launch/11956

Just going to give it a try.

http://jayisgames.com/images/kaipuu.gif

― kv_nol, Tuesday, 2 October 2007 12:36 (seventeen years ago)

Kaipuu has a memory leak. (and Seiklus is better)

― abanana, Tuesday, 2 October 2007 21:48 (seventeen years ago)

I couldn't get Kaipuu to work.

― kv_nol, Wednesday, 3 October 2007 09:49 (seventeen years ago)

God help me, I just discovered Peggle.
Crack.

― forksclovetofu, Thursday, 4 October 2007 05:36 (seventeen years ago)

I really like Peggle and I've considered thought about buying the full version, but I bet it isn't much better than the free one.

― abanana, Thursday, 4 October 2007 05:56 (seventeen years ago)

~~thought about~~

― abanana, Thursday, 4 October 2007 05:56 (seventeen years ago)

But more levels! MORE LEVELS

― forksclovetofu, Thursday, 4 October 2007 19:55 (seventeen years ago)

o hi dere, its a download, but how does online kart racing grab you http://kart.nexon.net/Download/Client.aspx

― stevie, Friday, 5 October 2007 11:55 (seventeen years ago)

I played KongKongSEA for a long time. It is a jump racing game with attack items and tiles on the ground that give you boost and direction changes.

― CaptainLorax, Monday, 8 October 2007 04:39 (seventeen years ago)

as for rpgs I found:
The Spirit Engine
Triglaw -only works in certain browsers
flash rpgs: Sinjid Shadow of the Warrior, Swords and Sandals 2 (need full version to save), Bleach Training 2

― CaptainLorax, Monday, 8 October 2007 05:20 (seventeen years ago)

Everyone should play the Knytt Stories level "Don't Eat the Mushroom"
http://www.box.net/shared/5ju8b2232v

― abanana, Sunday, 14 October 2007 06:13 (seventeen years ago)

http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/1171/pathpixss7.png
PathPix and more. The demos will take you several hours to complete each.
http://krispixton.com/PathPix/
http://www.kaser.com/

― abanana, Saturday, 27 October 2007 21:08 (seventeen years ago)

Question:

Is the music for this game the worst music of all time?

HINT: Wait until the programmer's 15 year old girlfriend starts singing before you make your final decision.

― Z S, Friday, 2 November 2007 17:57 (seventeen years ago)

Skipping 1787 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

holy fuck.

― Nhex, Monday, 17 July 2023 02:39 (one year ago)

four weeks pass...

Someone ported wipEout to the browser
https://phoboslab.org/wipegame/

― Philip Nunez, Tuesday, 15 August 2023 17:28 (one year ago)

wow! despite being a huuuuge fan of 2097 and wip3out i've never actually played the original, maybe now is the time. though i'd have to get a controller, is that even possible for browser games on macos? and maybe it's not the best use of my time...

― crutch of england (ledge), Wednesday, 16 August 2023 09:08 (one year ago)

one month passes...

https://gridlochgames.itch.io/21st-century-roguelike-pac-man

― formerly abanana (dat), Saturday, 16 September 2023 13:03 (one year ago)

three months pass...

pac-man having a minimalist renaissance!
https://abagames.github.io/crisp-game-lib-11-games/?pakupaku

― Philip Nunez, Thursday, 4 January 2024 18:31 (one year ago)

Ha I love it

― Jordan s/t (Jordan), Thursday, 4 January 2024 18:35 (one year ago)

paku paku is very fun. i think it would reach flappy bird levels of stupid/addicting viral simplicity by adding mute and pause buttons

― z_tbd, Thursday, 4 January 2024 23:51 (one year ago)

i know this is extremely beatable (even by me!) but after playing 10 times or so my hi score is about 3100. you get multipliers every time you pick up a power pellet so staying alive for an additional 30 seconds or so would probably quadruple that

― z_tbd, Friday, 5 January 2024 00:01 (one year ago)

4723

― The Yellow Kid, Friday, 5 January 2024 06:12 (one year ago)

Does anyone else like these stripped down versions better than the originals? I don't remember actual Pac-Man being as instantly fun.

― Philip Nunez, Friday, 5 January 2024 21:21 (one year ago)

6269

― z_tbd, Wednesday, 17 January 2024 00:44 (one year ago)

https://itch.io/jam/bigmode-2023/entries

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPhNzYCQtCc

― Jordan s/t (Jordan), Friday, 26 January 2024 19:53 (one year ago)

This is dumb but I keep coming back to it to try to make Doctor Who: https://neal.fun/infinite-craft/

― Selune Gomez (Leee), Monday, 5 February 2024 21:54 (one year ago)

I played it a few days ago and got some firsts pretty quickly. seems like there aren't nearly as many now.

time + unicorn = time machine
time machine + captain = doctor
time machine + doctor = doctor who

― formerly abanana (dat), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 08:27 (one year ago)

Looks to be heavily indebted to this: https://littlealchemy.com/ / https://littlealchemy2.com/

― organ doner (ledge), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 08:44 (one year ago)

There's a few predecessors, Doodle God and it's versions are others

― wang mang band (Noodle Vague), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 10:49 (one year ago)

If you somehow get goku, you can perform "his power level is increasing!" by continually plopping goku on top of goku
goku + time machine = trunks naturally.

― Philip Nunez, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 20:18 (one year ago)

free game 20 Small Mazes
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2570630/20_Small_Mazes/

― adam t. (abanana), Saturday, 17 February 2024 12:06 (one year ago)

Infinite Craft is hilarious

― Nhex, Friday, 1 March 2024 16:13 (one year ago)

two weeks pass...

Eldritchvania, a free PC game that dropped last month: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2423710/Eldritchvania/

maybe the most La-Mulana-inspired game ever? i'll take whatever scraps i can get.

― adam t. (abanana), Thursday, 21 March 2024 02:02 (one year ago)

https://downpour.games/~terry/a-proper-cup-of-tea

― gene besserit (ledge), Wednesday, 3 April 2024 08:29 (one year ago)

I love that every combination is the perfect cup of tea. Amazing.

― emil.y, Wednesday, 3 April 2024 14:49 (one year ago)

spoilers??

― Bitchin Doutai (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 3 April 2024 15:39 (one year ago)

You know what, yes, that was totally spoilery. Hidden now.

― emil.y, Wednesday, 3 April 2024 15:55 (one year ago)

aw cheers tbf i was half and half whether i'm gonna play it at all but i read your post before i'd got home and thought "ok that's the punchline" lol

― Bitchin Doutai (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 3 April 2024 16:02 (one year ago)

playing it now, still worth it, 5.0/5.0

― Bitchin Doutai (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 3 April 2024 16:04 (one year ago)

another good one from the samr site
https://downpour.games/~holly/where-s-madeleine

― formerly abanana (dat), Thursday, 4 April 2024 08:28 (one year ago)

(the downpour thing is from the same person that did Cheap Bots Done Quick, the twitter bot meta thing that let people like me write twitter bots. that's their thing - tools to enable other people to create things. so Downpour is the platform and each individual game is just uploaded by pretty much anybody - you can make such games on your phone)

― koogs, Thursday, 4 April 2024 10:50 (one year ago)

Oh god I assumed based on the url that it was going to be some awful Madeleine McCann thing. Thankfully it's not.

― JimD, Friday, 5 April 2024 14:52 (one year ago)

two months pass...

https://tchaikovskyed.itch.io/ancient-chinese-poet-in-exile

short and sweet

― i love a man in a unicorn (Noodle Vague), Friday, 7 June 2024 05:56 (one year ago)

two months pass...

https://kultisti.itch.io/juurru

― master of the pan (abanana), Wednesday, 14 August 2024 16:52 (ten months ago)

two months pass...

I remembered a point & click game demo set in ancient Greece that I played in the 90s and looked up what it was.

The creator made it free on the web and it is a trip
https://www.wrathgame.com

― master of the pan (abanana), Friday, 1 November 2024 17:32 (seven months ago)

lol this rules. Incredible acting.

― Jordan s/t (Jordan), Friday, 1 November 2024 17:54 (seven months ago)

one month passes...

https://gwenckatz.itch.io/pet

short 1-screen game inspired by golden idol.

― master of the pan (abanana), Sunday, 29 December 2024 14:21 (five months ago)

three weeks pass...

https://danielben.itch.io/dragonsweeper

minesweeper roguelike

― master of the pan (abanana), Saturday, 25 January 2025 04:13 (four months ago)

aargh the fucking mimic

― birming man (ledge), Monday, 27 January 2025 09:42 (four months ago)

i won! but i didn't clear the board.

― birming man (ledge), Monday, 27 January 2025 10:49 (four months ago)

hint: you can break the brick walls

― master of the pan (abanana), Monday, 27 January 2025 19:58 (four months ago)

i was one hp short of killing the dragon, after clearing the board :(

― birming man (ledge), Tuesday, 28 January 2025 09:59 (four months ago)

two weeks pass...

https://dailyakari.com/

― adam t (dat), Wednesday, 12 February 2025 06:22 (four months ago)

sorry, this is a bit addictive.

https://vole.wtf/styscraper/

getting close to 10m now but should go go to sleep.

― Inside The Wasp Factory with Gregg Wallace (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Tuesday, 25 February 2025 23:26 (three months ago)

yes this is what i want

― z_tbd, Wednesday, 26 February 2025 00:48 (three months ago)

surprisingly addictive little physics game! very "oh, just one more."

took me a sec to realize that while suspended objects can be used to nudge things around, the chain itself is intangible - opens up some options for manipulating the stack.

― Doctor Casino, Thursday, 27 February 2025 12:31 (three months ago)

probably played this too much already, i got 15.5 yesterday. you really do need to be lucky with what you get, armchairs are the worst.

― birming man (ledge), Thursday, 27 February 2025 13:25 (three months ago)

I hate those fucking armchairs.

― Inside The Wasp Factory with Gregg Wallace (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Thursday, 27 February 2025 13:27 (three months ago)

10.16 my pb but this is infuriating in the best way

― triste et cassé (gyac), Thursday, 27 February 2025 18:00 (three months ago)

12.40

― na (NA), Thursday, 27 February 2025 18:31 (three months ago)

NA! Sorry to bug you here but could you check your instagram messages? There’s something important (about free online in-browser games of course) I needed to run by you!

― z_tbd, Thursday, 27 February 2025 19:14 (three months ago)

well this is addictive

― sleeve, Thursday, 27 February 2025 19:59 (three months ago)

for those without ufo 50:
https://partayhouse.com/

― adam t (dat), Tuesday, 11 March 2025 05:02 (three months ago)

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