Recreation Lounge

For lots of family fun check out PopCap games. Free to play online, the games are inexpensive to buy, great fun for all ages to play, and quite addictive.

They offer free trial downloads for their puzzle, arcade, word, and card games.

Bejeweled has sold 5 million copies on the Web and is installed on 50 million cell phones in North America. It has become the biggest casual game in the 21st century so far!

You can play the games on your cell phone for 5 minutes or an hour, depending on how much time you have while waiting at the airport, in line at the grocery store, at the dentist’s office, etc. Zuma has become an extremely popular cell phone game.

Founded in Seattle by three guys named John, Brian, and Jason, these indie-game developers watched their try-before-you-buy business model became a huge success.

To quote them:

“PopCap is a fast-moving, hard-working group of people with a passion for making fun, addictive, beautiful games that anyone can play and enjoy.”

Interestingly, their gamer base is 72% female, probably because these games don’t focus on violence and don’t have the goal of getting your adrenaline pumping. Instead, they’re games that appeal to the human brain at a fundamental level. That makes them appealing to just about everyone.

90% of players are over the age of twenty-five, perhaps because of the short sessions of play, plus they’re quick to learn.

Some adults play the games as a form of ‘mental break’ – playing for 15 minutes at their desk during lunch. After all, how often does the average adult really have an opportunity to play a game for three hours?
(Ahem, I have to admit to playing Bejeweled Deluxe for 3 hours once!)

Another free and fun online game is Terralever’s Zero Gravity game, built using Microsoft’s Silverlight technology, and featuring the endearing Lt. Bennett. You have to download the Silverlight application first, but it’s a quick and light download.

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