Credit: BlueMaxima
Vintage internet, preserved for the ages.
One of the best things about the internet in the early to mid 2000s was the copious amount of games. There were oodles of sites back then with games catering to just about any niche. From the all-encompassing tastes of Miniclip and Newgrounds to the family friendly destinations like Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon’s sites, there was a game for any mood, any occasion, all rendered in glorious Adobe Flash.
Unfortunately, after multiple security concerns, Flash is on its way out, and when it disappears from the internet, many of these classic games will go with it. That is simply too tragic, which is why one group of net historians have taken it upon themselves to round up every last Flash game they can before they’re gone for good. To say they’ve done a pretty good job so far would be an understatement.
BlueMaxima has assembled over 38,000 Flash games, as well as 2,400 animations, from around the web into a dedicated launcher they’ve named Flashpoint. Any game within Flashpoint’s impressive library can be freely downloaded and played, no strings attached. The collection features entries from multiple sites, including ones featuring licensed characters like Spongebob. BlueMaxima has stated that if any company asks them not to include a game in their collection, they’ll remove it, though instances of this have been thankfully limited so far. BlueMaxima is also taking suggestions for additional games to grab until Flash officially goes belly-up at the end of 2020.
You can download the current version of the Flashpoint launcher from BlueMaxima’s website. There are two versions; one has all of the games in the collection included and ready to go, while the other only downloads the games you specifically choose. The full collection version is around 290 GB, so if you don’t have the patience to download all of that, I’d recommend the on-demand version.
