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Best Internet Games

As if we needed an excuse to waste more time on the Internet, Internet games have become one of the most popular features of Web browsing. Games like Angry Birds enter the global lexicon, and social media games like Farmville and MafiaWars take up more browsing time than actual work or email functions.

Internet games occupy the full spectrum of gaming, from hardcore games like World of Warcraft that eat up thousands of playing hours a year to simple online Flash and Java versions of chess and other popular games.

Here's a guide to the best Internet games, past, present, and future.

Best Internet Games List

Long lists of the best Internet games are all over the Internet. The Web lends itself to making massive lists of our favorite things, probably because of the social nature of the Internet and the way we like to brag about finding new cool things.

Here's my personal list of the five best and most addictive Internet games of all time--these are Flash games meant to be addictive with high replay value. This list doesn't include more complicated games like RPGs, MMORPGS, or anything like that. These games are easy to learn, easy to play, and totally addictive.

Bejeweled / Diamond Mine - Easily the most addictive game ever invented. I wonder how many millions of work hours have been wasted on this simple match game? Move multicolored gems around to create sets of three, like Tetris for dummies. Something about the game play is totally addictive.

Bow Man - Ever wanted to be Robin Hood? Bow Man has you, the hero, shooting arrows at your enemies. You select the power and the angle of the shot and hope your arrows pierces your enemy's heart. Addictive because it is easy to play and has cool sound effects, several versions of Bow Man have appeared over the years.

Portal - This is actually a sophisticated platform game built with Flash. It is difficult to describe how Portal works, you just need to play the Flash version and find out. One of the best-looking Flash programs when it came out, Portal is as much fun to play now as ever before.

Crimson Room - "Escape" games are huge on the Internet. Flash and Java lend themselves to this simple game concept. Basically, in Crimson Room you start out in a simple red room and have only your brains to help you escape. Thousands of knock-offs of this game have since swallowed up millions of hours of productivity.

Bloons - The goal of Bloons is to bust as many balloons as you can. You are a monkey with different weapons, required to destroy a certain number of balloons before you go on to the next level. Sounds ridiculous, but it is that "eat up an entire afternoon" kind of addictive.

Best Internet Games 2011

The most anticipated Internet games of 2011 tend to be social network based games. This is a new and lucrative market for game designers--unlike other Internet games, people seem willing and able to spend actual cash on games they play on sites like Facebook.

The best Internet game of 2011 appears to be CityVille, a Facebook game from the makers of FarmVille. CityVille is already turning a profit and attractive hordes of new players. CityVille, like FarmVille, has you and your friends teaming up to build awesome cities. You take on the roles of city planner, architect, and mayor all at once, building cities and other social structures along with your Facebook friends.

Any new social media game is going to be a big hit in 2011--new versions of online Texas holdem poker are popping up all over the place, including on Facebook, where rabid fans brag about playing holdem for hours at a stretch, hopefully in forums where their bosses aren't listening.

Best Internet Games 2012

What do we have to look forward to in terms of Internet games in 2012? More of the same--more pay-to-play social media games based on addictive principles that keep people buying and selling, building and developing, and annoying their Facebook friends with endless gaming status updates.

According to research by analyst eMarketer, 30% of all Internet users will play social media games in 2012. That means that development of Internet games is at a feverish pace. Since the early days of Facebook games like FarmVille and MafiaWars, it has become clear that Internet gaming is a profitable industry. Look for more games that give you the option of spending your real-world cash to improve your game play.

Best Internet Games of All Time

Any list of the best Internet games of all time would have to be made up of the best Internet games for free. Pay-to-play games are great, but they can hardly be called the "best of all time." Any game where I have to spend my hard-earned cash to advance is not going to be as fun as a game where I get better simply by being better at the game.

This game list includes games that fit certain criteria--they have to be great time-wasters, totally free, and have that strange quality of addiction that great online games have.

1. Filler - An unlikely number one, but a game I just can't quit playing. Your object is to fill up the screen with giant balls without letting them get burst by obstacles in their way.

2. Magic Pen - You use your magic pen to draw platforms and other features to help your ball pass through all the slaloms on the level. Difficult to explain and difficult to quit playing.

3. Acrobots - There's no way to "win" this game. You just move shapes around and watch how they interact. A great game for time wasting (and for the psychedelic in each and every one of us.)

4. Pop Bubble Wrap - The name explains itself. We all love popping bubble wrap, now we can do it all day long without the expense and mess of actually popping bubble wrap.

5. Roll - Nudge your red balloon to fall down a chute. The levels get really hard really fast. A steep learning curve is another sign of a great Internet game.

6. Cubescape - Drop cubes from the ceiling to make different shapes. Like 3D Tetris with fewer rules, this game is part creative and part puzzle.

7. Bloons - You and your monkey character pop as many balloons as you can with just a few weapons. Sounds silly, but you'll find yourself losing lots of time playing this game.

8. Bloxors - Move the ball into the hole without letting it drop off the screen or be destroyed. Like a 3D version of those little games with a metal ball and a tiny hole. 33 levels of increasingly harder and harder obstacles.

9. monster Den - If you're an RPG fan or ever played Dungeons n Dragons as a kid, monster Den will hook you immediately. This dungeon crawler has you building a party of adventurers and fighting off monster. Equip your characters with a variety of weapons and try to defeat the beasts in different dungeons.

10. Exit Path - A platform style game with a simple interface and awesome black and white graphics where you're a runner trying to beat feet to the exit screen as fast as possible. Obstacles, enemies, and other nasty features try to stop you in your quest. I have personally wasted four hours at work playing this game.