Weird & Obscure Adventure Games for Browser?

[KrunchyFriedGames]

Just wondered if anyone knows any weird, memorable, or just entertainingly crap adventure (or adjacent) games that almost no-one has heard of?

You know, the sort that about 5 people have played on Newgrounds or itchio but stood out to you for some reason.

Here are some of mine:

Ludicrous Text Adventure: Worthless Dirt Boys
Ren'Py visual novel game where you manage your Arkansas baseball team scoring points for drugs, violence, and magic (oh, and baseball). Little in the way of graphics, but if you enjoy surreal and quirky humour (and lots of strange deaths), this is worth a look.

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Rocky Rhodes and the Cracked Case
Made for a game jam with the theme of 'unstable'. Well polished detective noir adventure that gets pretty strange. Features voice acting.

View attachment 44392

Silent Bill
Duck-based horror escape game. Made for the 'I Can't Draw but Want to Make a Game' jam.

View attachment 44391

Get in Santa's Pants
Seasonal choice- not actually NSFW, but still an entertainingly distateful and innuendo-laden quest to seduce Santa as Fiss the Elf. Classic Zelda style gameplay with item puzzles and joypad support. Made with Pico 8.
View attachment 44390

Witches and Bandits and Swords (Oh My)
Our first game. Weird choose-your-own-adventure with exploration and item puzzles. Made with Unity but based on an ebook that used MS Word hyperlinks. We've got better since. I think.

View attachment 44393

 

[Iucounu]

I think Samorost (and Machinarium?) could be played in a browser, but maybe it required Flash?

 

[Morpheus Kitami]

Cube Escape used to be playable in-browser, but as with so many Flash games, it's hard to tell now if you can actually play it in browser. Not really obscure either since it was popular for such a game. They're a really good series either way.

 

[Hobknobling]

During the height of the IT bubble in 2001, the Finnish lobby group for the forestry industry (Metsäsäätiö) funded and published a game called Hiidenportti. The gist of the game was to fly around this huge "world tree" with a small airship and do missions like ferrying fantasy creatures around, trading items and of course delivering lumber to different places. The goal of the game was to gather nine keys to open a gate at the center of the world tree.

I remember it being quite fun and the biggest Finnish IT publication Mikrobitti also gave the game a favorable review. I think it was also quite hard to beat and I don't think I ever managed to do so. I know it barely counts as an adventure game in the traditional sense, but it's just such a bizarre piece of gaming history that I wanted to write this.

Someone even uploaded one of the songs from the game to YouTube:

 

[KrunchyFriedGames]

I think Samorost (and Machinarium?) could be played in a browser, but maybe it required Flash?

For Samorost 1 (it has two sequels), I can only find download and mobile versions. But it does look very cool, so I'll keep the itchio link here so I can return to it. The other one's also on their page and looks great too, but I'll try out the free stuff before paying $20.

 

[KrunchyFriedGames]

Cube Escape used to be playable in-browser, but as with so many Flash games, it's hard to tell now if you can actually play it in browser. Not really obscure either since it was popular for such a game. They're a really good series either way.

Yeah, I wish I hadn't removed Flash when my computer recommended I did. Newgrounds introduced an emulator called Ruffle- some of the old games work for me, some don't. I like the Rusty Lake games, though, so this is probably worth checking out.

 

[KrunchyFriedGames]

During the height of the IT bubble in 2001, the Finnish lobby group for the forestry industry (Metsäsäätiö) funded and published a game called Hiidenportti. The gist of the game was to fly around this huge "world tree" with a small airship and do missions like ferrying fantasy creatures around, trading items and of course delivering lumber to different places. The goal of the game was to gather nine keys to open a gate at the center of the world tree.

I remember it being quite fun and the biggest Finnish IT publication Mikrobitti also gave the game a favorable review. I think it was also quite hard to beat and I don't think I ever managed to do so. I know it barely counts as an adventure game in the traditional sense, but it's just such a bizarre piece of gaming history that I wanted to write this.

Someone even uploaded one of the songs from the game to YouTube:

Can't seem to find the game, which is a pity, because I'm curious to know what a game by the Finnish forestry lobby plays like XD
All I'm getting with Google is recommendations that I visit Central Finland, which is tempting, but maybe not in the winter.

 

[The_Sloth_Sleeps]

Cube Escape used to be playable in-browser, but as with so many Flash games, it's hard to tell now if you can actually play it in browser. Not really obscure either since it was popular for such a game. They're a really good series either way.

Do you have a download somewhere to this?

 

[Modron]

Do you have a download somewhere to this?

 

[Don Peste]

Here's some old shit I curated: https://indieplague.blogspot.com/

 

[The_Sloth_Sleeps]

During the height of the IT bubble in 2001, the Finnish lobby group for the forestry industry (Metsäsäätiö) funded and published a game called Hiidenportti. The gist of the game was to fly around this huge "world tree" with a small airship and do missions like ferrying fantasy creatures around, trading items and of course delivering lumber to different places. The goal of the game was to gather nine keys to open a gate at the center of the world tree.

I remember it being quite fun and the biggest Finnish IT publication Mikrobitti also gave the game a favorable review. I think it was also quite hard to beat and I don't think I ever managed to do so. I know it barely counts as an adventure game in the traditional sense, but it's just such a bizarre piece of gaming history that I wanted to write this.

Someone even uploaded one of the songs from the game to YouTube:

This also, I cannot find.

 

[Poseidon00]

Cube Escape used to be playable in-browser, but as with so many Flash games, it's hard to tell now if you can actually play it in browser. Not really obscure either since it was popular for such a game. They're a really good series either way.

Yeah, I wish I hadn't removed Flash when my computer recommended I did. Newgrounds introduced an emulator called Ruffle- some of the old games work for me, some don't. I like the Rusty Lake games, though, so this is probably worth checking out.

Newgrounds alone has quite the trove of weird and obscure but oddly playable games, so if we are going to add those in, I would add Linion RPG to the list. I always remembered it for the simple fact that it allowed you to fight any NPC in the game, at any point, even if they were severely over-leveled compared to what you could possibly be at. And they all had fun and unique attack patterns, and you had to time your dodges and hits. Just went the extra mile in terms of game design.

 

[Hobknobling]

During the height of the IT bubble in 2001, the Finnish lobby group for the forestry industry (Metsäsäätiö) funded and published a game called Hiidenportti. The gist of the game was to fly around this huge "world tree" with a small airship and do missions like ferrying fantasy creatures around, trading items and of course delivering lumber to different places. The goal of the game was to gather nine keys to open a gate at the center of the world tree.

I remember it being quite fun and the biggest Finnish IT publication Mikrobitti also gave the game a favorable review. I think it was also quite hard to beat and I don't think I ever managed to do so. I know it barely counts as an adventure game in the traditional sense, but it's just such a bizarre piece of gaming history that I wanted to write this.

Someone even uploaded one of the songs from the game to YouTube:

This also, I cannot find.

https://archive.org/details/Hiidenportti

That contains the .BIN and .CUE files for the game. You need to mount the files in order to run the game.

I don't think there are language options available so you have to learn Finnish before you can play.

 

[KrunchyFriedGames]

Here's some old shit I curated: https://indieplague.blogspot.com/

Thanks. This list definitely needs some more entertaining shit. These all look pretty good, just without the strong presentation of the other games.

 

[KrunchyFriedGames]

Cube Escape used to be playable in-browser, but as with so many Flash games, it's hard to tell now if you can actually play it in browser. Not really obscure either since it was popular for such a game. They're a really good series either way.

Yeah, I wish I hadn't removed Flash when my computer recommended I did. Newgrounds introduced an emulator called Ruffle- some of the old games work for me, some don't. I like the Rusty Lake games, though, so this is probably worth checking out.

Newgrounds alone has quite the trove of weird and obscure but oddly playable games, so if we are going to add those in, I would add Linion RPG to the list. I always remembered it for the simple fact that it allowed you to fight any NPC in the game, at any point, even if they were severely over-leveled compared to what you could possibly be at. And they all had fun and unique attack patterns, and you had to time your dodges and hits. Just went the extra mile in terms of game design.

Oh, damnit, found Linion RPG here, but it doesn't play for me. Again, I lament having uninstalled Flash.

 

[Poseidon00]

Cube Escape used to be playable in-browser, but as with so many Flash games, it's hard to tell now if you can actually play it in browser. Not really obscure either since it was popular for such a game. They're a really good series either way.

Yeah, I wish I hadn't removed Flash when my computer recommended I did. Newgrounds introduced an emulator called Ruffle- some of the old games work for me, some don't. I like the Rusty Lake games, though, so this is probably worth checking out.

Newgrounds alone has quite the trove of weird and obscure but oddly playable games, so if we are going to add those in, I would add Linion RPG to the list. I always remembered it for the simple fact that it allowed you to fight any NPC in the game, at any point, even if they were severely over-leveled compared to what you could possibly be at. And they all had fun and unique attack patterns, and you had to time your dodges and hits. Just went the extra mile in terms of game design.

Oh, damnit, found Linion RPG here, but it doesn't play for me. Again, I lament having uninstalled Flash.

I recently tried it again on Newgrounds Ruffle emulator and it worked.