YAGA - Yet Another Gaming Article

Over a minute has passed since a gaming article was published, hence we happily step into the breach. Game playing seems popular on the Interweb: combining Google and free online games appears to be a likely possibility for a generating a few hundred words combined into sentences.

In the interest of pure research, we propose composing a search phrase, submitting that phrase to a Major Internet Search Engine, and analyzing the results. This strategy rarely fails to provide engaging fodder.

Our search engine phrase shall be: free online google games. No quotes, no filters, no document restrictions or other decorations shall be submitted. We'll observe what happens. Major Internet Search Engines rarely dissapoint, and we expect no disappointment to ensue here.

We suspect that more games exist than online game players, but that's a topic for another thesis. Tens of thousands of time-killers present themselves to sentient but unwary humans. We cannot endorse linear methodologies obligating the execution of every free online game, but herein we present a pseudo-random sampling of a few titles.

In all honesty (implying that to this point we have not acted honestly?) we selected our test subjects based on titles. A game that is online and free and called "Gravity Duck" cannot be ignored, even of we do have a grant from the NSF to study games not called "Gravity Duck."

Superheroes abound. Cool guys like Batman get to appear in major motion pictures and comic books, but many of the lesser known crime-fighting fellows languish in flash games. We've never met a free online flash game about ducks we didn't like. Gravity Duck provides minutes of entertainment worth every electron expended.

This big massive head that doesn't look like Donald Trump wants your duck to deliver 40 golden eggs. No problem. According to Wikipedia, which is almost never wrong about this type of thing, an average duck can lay an egg every day except when it's molting. In less than 2 months this game should be winnable.

A functional keyboard makes this game possible. Mouse input is ignored in favor of liberal applications of the 'x' key and the left/right arrows. Your duck controls gravity and avoids little widgets that look like leftovers from Commander Keen outtakes. Scoop up the golden eggs before boredom captures your attention.

Games with trailers are really cool. You imagine rooms of highly skilled multimedia designers, graphics wizards, and crackerjack programmers laboring over every pixel and frequency. There's so much backstory that a trailer obligates. The game presents levels of complexity such that that play cannot proceed without a behind-the-scenes music video.

OK.

A woman swims in what appears to be a fresh-water canal in the backyard of Miami's moneyed. She floats happily. A shark eats her.

The trailer sets the bar sufficiently low. After that, any free online game would be exciting.

Deploy the arrow keys to maneuver your snarky shark through the troubled waters of Miami. Slam the 'A' key to incite a skyward leap. Your goal appears to be eating man-made devices and vehicles, except when you're not supposed to. Some ostensibly edible items should be avoided: we never quite figured out the difference.

Graphics are not half bad. Perhaps 1/8 bad would be accurate. Your aquatic attacker leaps high enough to snag onto police helicopters. His teeth must be hewn from the enamel of Aargard: once attached, he hangs on for miles and miles. Your score increases according to the stuff your shark chomps.

Should you score big, you may be invited into the Miami Shark Hall of Fame. Your points will be enshrined along with your name in a database somewhere in The Cloud. We scored about 65 thousand points. We believed that to be a good score, given that our direct experience with shark attacking free online video games tends to be on the lean side. Unfortunately a cadre of shark warriors eclipsed our score by several orders of magnitude.

We conclude that free online flash games are fun. Go play.