Reliving Your Childhood Entertainment, One On-Line Video Game At a Time

Although it makes me feel a bit old to admit it, my very first childhood video game was Pong. My brothers and I literally wore the knobs off the machine we played it so much; and it launched not only my strong interest in video games, but much of my current technology career.

From Pong we eventually found Atari and from there it was on to the local arcades to play amazing new (at the time) games like Galaga, Space Invaders, Pac Man and even Asteroids. These games were not only fun to play but they also served as fuel for me to begin writing video games as a potential career.

It had been years since I put a quarter in a video game, but recently on a long trip I ended up with some pretty long flights and layovers, so I decided to see if there were some on-line games to help pass the time. After a bit of searching, I landed on https://plays.org/ and started trying out some of their games.

To start, I really liked that they offered some free versions of the games I loved decades ago, and while there are all sorts of new games available, I really wanted to play something familiar…so off we go.I started off with Neon Invaders. This game will look and feel like the original Space Invaders and I really liked the simplicity I remembered in the game. Moving left and right with arrow keys and shooting with the space bar…it can’t get any easier. I quickly fell back into my gaming rhythm and before I knew it I was dusting off some invaders in rapid fire fashion. Don’t be fooled by the first few levels because once you get 4 or 5 levels in, the pace picks up and it gets more challenging. Overall this was a really fun and familiar game that before I knew it, I had played for over an hour.

Next up I hit Tetra Blocks. If you didn’t guess already, this is a Tetris-style game and it took only a few minutes for me to remember how much I loved playing this game. Tetra Block really appeals to my sense of organization and my love of the original game. Once again it starts out easy, but before you know it, the blocks are coming faster and faster. After an hour or so I managed to run up a pretty good top scores and before I knew it, my next flight was taking off (other wise I’d probably have played another hour.) The controls are simple and the game just feels fun. Overall this has to be one of my favorites on plays.org for sure.Up next I tried out Star Wars X-Wing Fighter and this one was a blast (literally). You can control the fighter with your mouse or arrow keys and it was really fun to hold the mouse button, charge up my weapons and blast the enemy. Flying was simple and shooting was addictive, especially after you build up some boost. Be sure to chase down the health hearts and pick up as many “power ups” as you can and you’ll be flying for a while. I really liked charging up my weapons and then blasting the entire group of enemy fighters. This is a really fun game that I played for a really long time during my first layover.

Up next I test drove the Star Wars Rogue One Boots on the Ground game. This games was a bit more complicated, but once I figured it out, the game was addictive, challenging but still a game you can actually win. Rescuing the pilot is the first mission and right out of the gate, the game is tricky. It took me a few tries to understand the map but in no time I was blasting the enemy bots and rescuing the pilot. Be sure to pick up the green boxes of health and use the explosive barrels to blast multiple enemy fighters in one shot. Overall the graphics are great in this game and it was really fun to try to master.

Finally I decided to try out Sprint Club Nitro because I love racing games. This one was a lot of fun and really easy to drive just using the arrow keys on my keyboard. Be sure avoid hitting the trees by make sure you hit the “N” Nitro icon for a boost of speed. Bumping other cars was fun and it actually didn’t slow you down as much as I thought it would. Most of the courses are easy to drive without letting off the gas (up arrow key). Overall I spent a lot of time just racing down the road in this game and it was much more addictive than I thought it would be.

As you can see it’s not hard to relive your childhood gaming on plays.org. If you’re not into the same games I am, there are plenty to choose from and you can even go directly to new games only if you like. If you love old school games then be sure to check out all of the game options…now for me I’m off to Defend The Sewers and try out a new game. Enjoy!