Summer may be boring for some, but many students find ways to keep it fun and interesting — and for free. These are three unique games that you can play for free on the Internet that you may never have played before, all recommended by students.

Achievement Unlocked

Meg Brandl, a senior majoring in English, recommends an Adobe Flash-based platformer called Achievement Unlocked, which can be found at armorgames.com. This game was created by the head of game development for Armor Games and is based on one of his earlier flash games called This is the Only Level.

The rules are simple: just unlock as many achievements as you can. The player must discover ways to unlock the achievements in the sidebar of the game through jumping, dying or just doing absolutely nothing.

“What amuses me the most are all the ridiculous achievements. To win, you must get all of them,” said Brandl.

However, Brandl said, achievement collecting may get frustrating.

Achievement Unlocked is also very laptop friendly. You can use your arrow keys on your computer to control your character, a tiny blue elephant.

The simpler controls may cause several issues, though, like controlling the jumps of your elephant over spikes. Regardless, you will most likely get an achievement for any mishap caused by control issues.

What makes this a choice game for students is that this game has very little to no commitment. It is easy to start and simple to play. According to Brandl, Achievement Unlocked is “a good time-waster” between studying and classes.

Curveball

The Flash game Curveball by Paragon Digital Media is an interesting twist on the old arcade game Pong.

William Noble, a junior majoring in international studies and history, enjoys this take on the side-scrolling physics game because of its simplicity and challenge.

This game is very similar to ping-pong and is played from a first person perspective. In order to hit the ball, you must move the mouse quickly enough before it reaches out of bounds. As you increase in levels of difficulty, the ball curves more and moves faster.

While some may find the difficulty curve frustrating, Noble said the game offers a challenge for the reflexes.

“It gets ridiculously hard as you progress into the higher levels, but it’s not a bad thing.” Noble said.

However, Noble warns that this game may not be as control-friendly as other free Internet games.

“Curveball requires extreme hand-eye coordination. You must have a mouse to play,” he said.

Overall, Curveball is a great game for students to play to test their accuracy and speed. However, do not try to play on a laptop without a mouse. The speed of the game increases significantly within minutes of play.

This Flash game may be found on several different sites like freeworldgroup.com or albinoblacksheep.com.

Grepolis

If you enjoy building and battling ancient civilizations in your spare time, Blake Franklin, a junior majoring in music therapy, suggests the game Grepolis may be the best online-based option.

Grepolis is a battle and civilization strategy game set in the times of the ancient Greeks. It is very similar to other game series such as “Age of Empires,” except that you are given access to the powers of the Greek gods.

Players can build cities, as well as form alliances with other cities. By forming alliances with nearby players, you are more able to protect your cities from sieges. It is also very important to collect as many resources as you can in Grepolis as they can be used to trade with other players online.

However, according to Franklin, there are many disadvantages of playing with other people online, especially when it comes to paying actual money for accessories and upgrades. Players are given the option to purchase bonuses that upgrade their civilizations faster, such as an “administrator” that helps build structures faster by allowing you to place more construction bids.

According to Franklin, these upgrades can really hurt players who do not spend much time on Grepolis.

“I am not as serious a Grepolis player as other people, so there is no reason to pay for those advantages.” said Franklin.

Although Grepolis may be more of a commitment for many, Franklin said he believes  this game is great for those who enjoy civilization games.

Grepolis can be found at en.grepolis.com. The game is free to play; however, many of the upgrades are not free.

Tiara Dees is a senior majoring in music and visual journalism.