It’s definitely a generational thing, but if you’re somewhere around my age, you already know what the title of this article is about. If you don’t, Adobe Flash Player was the premier media system used to play games on the computer through your browser, which was what all the cool kids were doing during computer lab, free time, and study halls in school! Every class year had their favorites, and with tens of thousands to choose from, you never ran out of games to play…until the schools I went to started blocking those sites. Which, hey, just meant we had to get more creative with finding workarounds.
Anyway, here’s the ten Flash games I played the most when I was in school, and sometimes still revisit just for fun!
Honorable Mentions: Run 2, Achievement Unlocked, Little Rocketman, Doodle God, Shift, Snowline
10) Upbeat
Disclaimer: I’m bad at this game. Still, it’s pretty fun! It turns the center of your keyboard into a piano of sorts, and it’s your job to press the correct keys in time with the flashing notes to match the beat of an assortment of licensed songs that I really question if they were legally included in this game! There’s some easy songs, and then some truly difficult tunes (although, the game was certainly harder when I first played it in elementary school compared to nowadays). There’s some bangers in here too that I still listen to to this day, like Michael Gray’s “The Weekend“, or Sunblock’s “Baby Baby“.
9) Fireboy & Watergirl in The Forest Temple
Disclaimer: I’m even worse at this game than the entry above, but this game is also pretty fun! With one half of your keyboard you move Fireboy, and with the other half you move Watergirl. Fireboy can’t touch water, and needs to exit the level through the red door. Watergirl can’t touch fire, and needs to exit the level through the blue door. Mind-bending puzzle shenanigans ensure, although the toughest part of this game remains trying to mentally wrap your head around controlling both heroes at once! This game was hugely successful and launched an entire series of games with these two, each one using new level gimmicks.
8) Super Mario Bros. Crossover
Ever wanted to play the original Mario game as literally anybody except for Mario? Well, now you can (and technically, you can still be Mario). The entirety of the original Super Mario Bros is here, every single level, but you can choose from a selection of a bafflingly number of various video game characters, who each have their own entirely unique movesets and interact with classic Mario powerups in entirely new ways. My favorite was always the Contra guy, because when he picked up the Fire Flower he got a spread-shot gun that just destroyed entire levels, which was really satisfying! There’s a lot of replayability here for those who want to try out everyone!
7) Give Up
I’ve said before on this blog that I’m not a huge fan of overly difficult gaming experiences. Hard does not equate to fun, in my book. Then why do I like this hour-ish game that is entirely built around being hard? I’m not sure! Maybe I enjoy the dialogue from the funny evil AI eyeball. Maybe I just like the concept of a single room slowly becoming more harrowing and difficulty as you progress in a sort of loop. Maybe it’s just because I really like platformers. I don’t know, but I’ve beaten this tough game on multiple occasions, so there’s some reason I come back to it! And I also adore the gigantic and tempting “Give Up” button, which upon pressed leads to a hilarious and mockingly condescending message about how it’s okay to quit sometimes, and then closes the game.
6) Bloons Tower Defense 3
It’s far from the best Bloons Tower Defense game, but this was the one that put the series on the internet’s radar, and for good reason. An expanded array of towers, more diverse abilities and upgrades, a more fleshed-out selection of maps, and more balanced difficulty. The sequels are loads better, but the fun started here. And really, even in its simplistic state, the core formula of Bloons Tower Defense is as timeless as ever. Placing monkeys, popping balloons…it’s all just so fun and addicting. It’s little wonder this series has become the juggernaut that it is today, and it’s pretty neat to know that the multi-platform hugely successful Bloons franchise of today had roots back as a humble computer Flash game!
5) Knightmare Tower
There’s a common genre of Flash games that involve your character moving in a single direction collecting coins and points, until you inevitably crash, spend your money on upgrades, and then go flying again but you make it further this time. There’s genuinely hundreds of them, and many of them are quite good, but my favorite amongst those was always Knightmare Tower. Maybe it was because you moved vertically instead of horizontally, or maybe it was just the slick presentation and more action-focused gameplay loop. I’m not sure, but I’ve poured quite a bit of time into this game over the years, and one of my biggest Flash-game accomplishments might’ve been finishing this entire adventure in the span of a single study hall one time!
4) Duck Life
Duck Life won’t (and shouldn’t) win any awards when it comes to complex gameplay mechanics or stellar visual design, but it definitely excels at simple fun! You have a duck, you raise and train that duck to compete in the Duck Olympics, and then you race other ducks and rake in the big bucks when you win. And…that’s it! The aesthetics are as simplistic as can be, the minigames you play to train your duck (while pretty addicting) only require one or two button presses, and the actual races are done entirely automatically (think “Day At the Races” from Mario Party 2, but without the luck factor). And yet, somehow the formula just works, and is so cozy to play. This first entry spawned multiple sequels, and even a full on indie game release on the Nintendo Switch (which is nuts, by the way).
3) This Is The Only Level
There’s a lot of Flash games that are essentially glorified gimmicks, but this game right here is one that manages to be fresh, funny, and doesn’t overstay its welcome. In the span of only around ten minutes, you help to guide this little elephant through this singular room about thirty times, with something ridiculous and new happening each time. Maybe the spikes become bouncy springs, or maybe the floor starts to fall. Maybe the screen is really zoomed-in, or maybe you have to jump on the button about ten times to actually get the door to open. Maybe you have to quit the game and refresh the page, then when you load back in the door is magically open (still have no idea what coding wizardry makes that work). It’s short and silly, and one of the most “you can’t skip playing this” Flash games of all time.
2) Super Mario 63
This is one of the most infamous Flash games of all time, and that high level of praise isn’t for nothing. Take the original Super Mario 64, turn it into a 2D platformer instead of 3D, and add in the FLUDD waterpack from Super Mario Sunshine. That’s this game! You explore all the levels you know and love but in a flat dimension, gather power stars, jump into paintings, find secrets, and swing Bowser around by the tail to toss him into bombs. It’s hours long, packed with content, and constantly hits you with unexpected surprises. Perhaps the biggest surprise is the production quality, as this Flash game is so top-tier it’s hard to believe, and Mario controls exactly like you’d think he would. It’s a commitment to play, but very worth the effort, and there’s even save files so you can take a break and resume days or weeks later! It’s a true testament to the magic Flash allowed clever and creative developers/programmers to wield.
1) Epic Battle Fantasy 2
I’ve considered writing an entire article on this game just by itself, which should go to show you the high esteem that I hold this game in. And in some respects, I view it in a similar way as I do to the above entry. Because, on the surface, it’s just a turn-based JRPG that lasts for around 2-ish hours, and is comprised entirely of battles. Nothing new, right? And yet, just like Super Mario 63 adding in FLUDD and other bonus goodies, Epic Battle Fantasy 2 goes above and beyond in proving that it isn’t just some lazy Flash game, but was built with love.
Each of your two protagonists have a mind-boggling number of skills and abilities to use, that encourages creating and experimenting with new builds each time you play. When you level-up between battles you can also pick from certain mutually-exclusive bonus perks which can also help you tailor each playthrough to be entirely unique. The enemy variety is staggering, the bosses are plentiful (and extremely tough), and there’s even silly little money-earning minigames between each chapter of the journey. What really blows me away is the soundtrack, which is a mix of covers of existing songs, but also a shockingly large number of completely original tracks made entirely for this game, and they’re really good! Many of these songs I still think about or find myself humming to this day.
Now, it’s worth noting that this game was so good and successful that it turned Epic Battle Fantasy into a franchise. There’s been a collection of spinoffs, three mainline sequels, and a few of the games have even jumped from Flash to being full-on indie releases on Steam. So it’s worth mentioning that, for example, Epic Battle Fantasy 5 is an amazing thirty-hour JRPG of the same (or much higher) quality of this Flash game here, and that’s something to commend. But man, I just really like this installment and it’s simplicity but also it’s addicting fun!
But hey, that’s just my opinion!
The Contrarian Corner 