Game 68: Cannon Defense

In what is now a very cluttered market, its not often that a desktop defender stands out from the crowd but this offering adds some interesting elements to a tired genre that keeps you coming back for more. Normally money is the key to unlock new items, but in this game it's a mixture of how many units you have built and how many you have destroyed. You also have air units to contend with which poses problems if you haven't built any anti-air turrets. Also have a selection of special weapons that come available once you have built them, like nuclear bombs and like.

Game 58: Warfare 1917

War isn't fair. This is a fact that you become painfully (although less painfully than in real war I imagine) aware of once you get into Warfare 1917. Set in the trenches at the end of WWI you can choose to take control of either the British or the Germans and you must deploy your troops in order to push the enemy back and claim their territory.

As you progress (surprisingly quickly) through the ranks and levels, you are awarded new troops to play with, new barrage weapons to control, and eventually a tank to rumble forward with under your command. Be careful though, as in the heat of battle your troops can be struck with fear should too many of their comrades fall by their side. Your country needs you!

Controls:

Click on the troop type of your choice and wait until loads, when it will join the battle. Then you can choose another troop - some take longer to reload than others, but all options will reset themselves when you choose a new troop. Click the switch at the bottom of the trench to see the contents of that trench and to choose when to go over the top (only 3 troops per trench).

It might sount complicated, but it's easy once in the game.

Game 57: The Blue Beanie

The Blue Beanie; A Samorostian, headwear-saving adventure from a new kid on the block.

Daphne Lim has made this adventure game with such a lovely mix of care, delicacy and humour that it's difficult not to fall for it. The plot begins with a happy family of white blob people living in a tree and washing their clothes.

Then the youngest has his beanie hat stolen by a big bird and so begins a quest with some nice interfaces, simple puzzles, cute music and pretty settings. If you liked Samorost, you'll like this. So help the little guy out won't ya?

Game 55: Fantastic Contraption

Fantastic Contraption is a physics puzzle game in which the objective in each level is to move all red objects into a rectangular goal area. To do this, you are given a blue rectangular building area and a few different materials in which you can build your device. Standing in your way, however, are a variety of obstacles, ranging from gaping gaps to a sea of circles bent on destroying your red-object-mover-apparatus.

To make your machine, click on the type of material you want, and then click or drag in the light blue "building area" to place it. At your disposal are three different wheels—a clockwise spinner, a counter clockwise spinner, and a regular wheel—as well as two different connectors—a solid "stick" and "water" rod, which can pass through other walls and wheels, but not the environment. Each of these objects has nodes (represented by small, light gray circles) that other objects can attach to so you can create more complicated contraptions.

One nice feature about this game is the keyboard shortcuts. A couple especially useful ones are:

[Shift]+mouse to move items. Note that if you click on a node when using this technique, only that connection will move, whereas if you click on any other part of the structure, the entire device will move. Also, you can use [Shift] click to pan around the level by clicking on the background.

[Command]+mouse (or Ctrl, for Windows users) to delete items.

[Space] to start or stop a test.

Game 50: Crush the Castle

Good game as time as original, where you have to crush the castle throwing stones or something like this. You have to kill all the people in the castle with only a number of shots.

The castle have diferent estructures of walls.

To throw the things you only have to click one time to start and another to throw when you want to.

Game 47: El Laberinto Esférico

Barcelona's Nacho Rodríguez puts his award winning flash animated character, Mr. Coo, in his first game, an adventure puzzler called Mr. Coo: El Laberinto Esférico ("The Spherical Labyrinth").

El Laberinto Esférico has a fun animated style like Pink Panther meets Ren and Stimpy, and a surreal imagination along the lines of Bill Plimpton with a bit of Salvador Dali.

The game starts out in an endless labyrinth, where you start the moment Mr. Coo falls to his death—but then he has a dream that turns into a "choose your own" path style of point-and-click adventure. You have several paths you can take, and each path has several different versions you can experience depending on a choice you made earlier. You usually wind up back where you started, and must repeat again. And so the game goes, a bit in circles, but finding a new path, puzzle, or a new ending is part of the fun.

Remember to click "English" at the start if you can't read Spanish!

You only have to watch the first scenes twice, from the 3rd time you die you get a shortcut version.

Also if you enter any correct password, you get this shortcut path.

Game 46: Polcarstva

Polcarstva is a gorgeous piece of interactive art that comes from the amazing talents of Denis Stepkin and U Studio of Russia.

Your goal here is to help a group of children to make their way through a surreal world, using standard point-and-click mechanics, and enjoy the music and scenery along the way. Not too difficult to get through, and yet just the right kind of diversion for an afternoon tea. Open the windows and let the summer air in while you play Polcarstva.

(If the game screen doesn't load properly, just hit F5 to refresh the page)

Game 43: The Goat in the Grey Fedora

I give you, The Goat in the Grey Fedora. A strange and offbeat point-and-click adventure with a black and white film noir atmosphere. This is a superb 3D type graphics mystery, with tremendously atmospheric audio (from the moment "a dame walks in and asks you something totally bizarre"). The downside is that it takes ages to load and the first two real puzzles are bit complicated compared to everything else. That aside, it really is a fantastic game. In my opinion, this is best played full screen, so hit that little ol' maximize button.

Mouse click to select items or menus (or click the "Use" symbol of an item in the inventory then drag it onto the main screen).

The game gives every item three options (usually "Look at/ Examine", "Take", and something else) for a reason - make sure you don't miss any.

Game 38: Electric Box

A new, creative puzzle game has surfaced, and it rocks: A little gem from Candystand that's called Electric Box. The premise is quite simple, and I'm sure you'll agree: You've got some power at point A, so get some to point B. There are many tricks and gadgets you will have to use to win, like doodads that give power out, or things that take it in.

Electric Box is quite a pleasant sight; Its chain-reaction gameplay makes me want to play all night. Enjoy.

Game 35: Shadez - The Black Operations

In this real time strategy game you are "the General of a mercenary force hired by the governments around the world to fight the wars they don't want to fight." Excited yet?!

Rather than the A-Team you control a beautifully rendered army of soldiers with an increasingly powerful arsenal of weaponry. As you choose your troops and artillery wisely, they stream from left to right across the misty, Vietnam-esque landscape battling whatever approaches from right to left. With enough scope to keep you involved for hours on end, this could be another job-destroyer. Don't blame me.

Have your clicking finger at the ready and unleash hell. Click on the various options across the bottom to pick troops, arrange air strikes, roll in the artillery and more. All in the name of death... War is an expensive business!

Plan for the future... just having missiles doesn't mean you have to use them... but as long as you have them, then you can use them if things get hairy. Don't think the opponents are gonna hold back!

Game 33: The Animator v Animation Game

The Animator v Animation Game takes the fun, desktop battlefield antics of the Animator v Animation episodes and turns it into a fully interactive fighting game! 

You can play as either the animator or animation (after unlocking the latter), each trying his best to eliminate the other player. Your arsenal is composed of common drawing tools found in the animation environment. Each tool has a slightly different effect depending on which character you play. For example, the line tool allows the animator to fire "arrows", but if the animation grabs it it becomes a staff. As the animator you control the cursor and have two objectives: torture the stick character, and preserve the timeline at the top of the screen. Your arsenal is weak compared to the animation's weapons, but they're flexible and give you a wide range of freedom. As the animation, your goal is to attack the cursor and, secondarily, the timeline. The stickman's moves are much more destructive than the animator's, though your target is much more difficult to hit. Playing as the animation can be overwhelming at first, as this character uses a dozen keys for movement and attack. With a little practice, however, it becomes second nature.

The Animator v Animation Game preserves the grin-inducing fun of the episodes and makes it completely interactive. It's any desktop warrior's dream come true!

Game 29: Gride

Gride is an arcade-style action game in which the objective is to apply and remove abilities to an always-moving little pink car at just the right moments to make it as far as you can along the never-ending terrain. The controls to Gride are simple, but using them well is not. Rest your hand on any of the three keyboard layouts, or get ready to click the four icons at lower right with the mouse, then learn your upgrades: Anti-Gravity makes the car leap into the air. Feather speeds the car up. SuperDrag gives you a smaller speed boost than Feather, but works on steeper (and slipperier) slopes. And DeGride turns Feather and SuperDrag off.

The basic strategy in Gride is to use Feather and SuperDrag to gain speed, then Anti-Gravity to jump over the steepest parts of the hill. But be careful! If you land upside-down or start sliding backwards, it's Game Over. You have to finish on your wheels to get a high score, and high scores are the whole point: Gride has only two levels, but they both go on forever! How far can you get?

At first you may find Gride to be a little too difficult to make it very far at all. Remember, though, you're not expected to beat the game, just get as far as you can! Use your attempts to learn what terrain is coming and how best to handle it. It may take a while to get the hang of things, but with practice you will get better at it.

Game 27: Climate Chaos

Rabbits are blue and red, seals enjoy sea shells, and foxes make successful hotel owners. Those are just a few of the lessons we learn from Climate Chaos, an adventure game set on a group of small islands. The main character is Blue Rabbit, who, like your average rabbit, equipped with a digital camera, sets out on a quest to help the natives of the various islands to solve their problems with the local weather. Upon your arrival on the island, you are greeted by the island's hotel's owner, who advises you to check in. You can take that advice, or you can talk to the locals first, to get a feel for the game. Some people will only appear after you have checked in, so don't forget to do that. From there, it's up to you to follow the storyline. 

A brief tutorial at the beginning introduces you to the intuitive controls as well as to the nicely done symbolic language that is used throughout the game. With just 3 icons, Dancing Seal tells you that he loves the sea. The system is vaguely reminiscent of Tork, though it aims to make communication easy as opposed to making it part of the riddles. Give it a go, I'll bet you enjoy it!

Game 26: Boomshine

Boomshine is a new take on the chain-reaction action pioneered by Omega's Every Extend. The goal is to remove a given number of the colorful, floating dots moving around the screen. Simply click the mouse to trigger an explosion; any dots that come into contact with the resulting circle will also explode, although after about 3 seconds each explosion will shrink and vanish. Every level increases in demand for the number of dots that must be removed, from level 1's laughably easy 1 out of 5 to the formidable 55 out of 60 in level 12. You'll want to make your first explosion count, because that's all you get. After setting off the chain-reaction, sit back and watch the explosions play out and, if you've removed enough dots, advance to the next level.

It would be a stretch to call Boomshine relaxing—watching those dots float by milliseconds after your chain-reaction begins to shrink is a little too agonizing for relaxation—but it is certainly refreshing, and a nice, albeit simple addition to a rapidly growing category of casual games. Enjoy!

Game 25: Haluz

Haluz is a game of the point-and-click variety that contains several scenes and a variety of simple puzzles that must be solved to advance.

What do you do when a very large bird makes off with your rooftop satellite dish? Well, use the resources around you to your best advantage and get it back of course.

Haluz is a beautiful game within its class and the closest I've seen come to the stunning imagery seen in Samorost, which is without a doubt the inspiration behind this game. Although similar in appearance, the puzzles here are sometimes more awkward and confusing than in Samorost. Still, if you love games like this you will definately enjoy Haluz, too. 

Game 24: fl0w

flOw is a mesmerizing game of primordial life, evolution and survival. Dive deep into the wild blue to seek out and consume other organisms on your path to simple cell nirvana. Begin life as a microscopic multi-cellular organism with a semi-circular shaped 'head' for feeding and for locomotion. The organism moves by following the mouse cursor, moving as it moves and always in pursuit. Click and hold the mouse button to accelerate its movement, though doing so will make it more difficult to steer and to make sharp turns.

The starting location is at the top of a very deep pool, 20-levels deep. The top level is indicated by the game's "flOw" logo, which can be seen when the game begins. On the top level you will also find another organism with a small red dot "." in its middle. This organism can be found on all but the deepest of levels, since eating it will take you down one level. There is a similar organism with a blue dot "." on all but the top level; consuming it will take you up one level. If either of these two creatures ever leaves the screen of the current level, small ripples, in corresponding red or blue, will appear along the edge in the direction that it can be found. Just follow the ripples as it is also an indication of where there may be food as well. To eat another organism as food, for example one smaller than you, simply navigate your creature so that the 'food' comes within its circular 'mouth' and it will consume it. In later levels where there are even larger organisms, steer for the bright circular shaped cells within the body cavity. When an organism (including your own) loses all of these life-giving cells, it will perish.

Continue your advance deeper and deeper to discover what lies in waiting within this absolutely magnificient piece of interactive art.

Game 22: Questionaut

Step into another surreal world created by Amanita Design (creators of Samorost). Commissioned for BBC's Bitesize series, with eight totally separate environments, Questionaut feels like stepping into a story book and becoming one of its characters. And thanks to Questionaut's powerful imagery, it feels like a living universe that continues to exist even after you've shut down your browser. Just delightful.
I know what you're thinking. "Oh no, not another game where your friend's hat gets carried away by a bubble, and you have to chase after it in your hot air balloon fueled by pure knowledge! When will game designers come up with some new ideas?" I understand. I'm sympathetic. But give it a chance, as despite the fact that the target audience for Questionaut is primary school students, there is enough wonder and imagination here for gamers of all ages. As usual, Amanita has loaded its game with soothing mossy textures and rickety mechanical systems. Each level is a self-contained environment floating in the sky, with its own placid inhabitants, surreal logic, and gorgeously quirky music. 

So... Enjoy.

Game 21: Tipping Point

You've been looking for some kind of escape — a vacation to paradise, maybe, but you'd probably just settle for a nap. So, here, you now find yourself sitting in front of this screen once again. But why are you wearing those pale green socks?

Welcome to Tipping Point, a point-and-click adventure with serene, highly detailed graphics and soft music, this game is a break away from the ordinary. 

In the first chapter, you'll find yourself stuck in front of the TV, with nothing better to do than channel surf. This will soon change, as you begin to be followed by great blue herons and answer a call for help. In the second chapter, you'll be scrambling for clues along a deserted beach. Well, deserted except for the herons. They must like you. The third chapter whisks you away to a tropical rain forest with exotic birds and bugs buzzing all around. There is even a treehouse to explore.

Tipping Point is slightly strange, moderately challenging, and intensely beautiful. While the storyline is little odd and surreal, the puzzles are straightforward and logical; most can be solved just by exploring and clicking around, so don't be afraid to do a little hunt-and-clicking. As soon as the game starts to seem too simple though, you may suddenly find yourself stuck, and pushing towards your own Tipping Point!

Game 20: Quadradius

Quadradius is an online, multiplayer, turn-based game that takes the skeleton of the board game checkers, and pumps it up with a massive list of power-ups and new strategies that turns the game into an addictive and very compelling new concept. In fact, calling it checkers is an oversimplification that does not do it any justice. The best way to see what I mean is to jump in and have a go for yourself.

- Don't worry about reading instructions, click here for a 99 second video tutorial. It tells you everything you need to know, in, you guessed it, 99 seconds.

- Sometimes you have to wait a minute or two for opponents to join the game when playing as a guest. The game will make a sound to notify you when more players join, so feel free to check your facebook while you wait!

Game 19: CDX

Launched by the BBC History team (along with the design and technical prowess of Preloaded), CDX is a multi-episode adventure game that uses real actors and video segments to spin a tale of mystery and intrigue around an ancient Roman sacrificial blade.

The format of the game is a point-and-click adventure; you're presented with a brief cutscene introducing you to the story and your role, which is entirely live action video. You're then dropped into a room in which you must figure out how to move forward in the story.

Attention to detail and high production values set this effort apart from other online point-and-click adventures, and the acting is top-notch. There are even selectable dialog sequences in which the actors will play out a scene based on the choices made by the player.

CDX is an amazing effort from the BBC and Preloaded teams, they have created an engaging and compelling interactive experience that is hugely enjoyable. 

- You need a good broadband connection to enjoy this game fully

- It takes a couple of minutes to load, please be patient

- Best played in fullscreen

- Ensure your volume is turned up!