Boxhead

Boxhead is one of the simplest, yet most playable action Flash games of the mid-2000s — a top-down view of the scene, the player controls a character with the keyboard and aims with the mouse, while ever-new waves of zombies attack, multiplying and growing tougher as time goes on. The goal is to survive as long as possible, collect ammo and weapons scattered around the small arena, and manage the space effectively so as not to get surrounded.

Sean Cooper built the game on a recipe that dozens of other titles would repeat in the following years — a limited arena, waves of enemies, a simple but satisfying feel of shooting — and Boxhead was among the first to popularize this model on Flash portals. The graphics are deliberately austere, the characters just colored blocky silhouettes, but this very austerity allowed the game to run smoothly even on weaker computers and to focus all attention on the action itself.

The success led to several sequels with bigger maps, cooperative multiplayer on a single computer, and new weapons, but the basic loop remained the same. Boxhead is mentioned today as one of the early examples of the top-down horde shooter genre, which later influenced many other games building on a similar principle of enemy waves.

Why play it: For fans of simple action arcade games without unnecessary complications — it takes just a few minutes to understand, and the game then offers a solid challenge in surviving as long as possible.