Developers and others place new games on some sites as a part of their strategy for achieving a viral buzz. While many will lack much educational value, they can be rich hunting grounds for productive games and other online activities. Find out more at friv.com and kongregate.com
Land of Me - Chapter One can be accessed free and the others are modestly priced – the games encourage imagination, making things and even rhythm and dance.
Samorost 2 – the narrative emerges organically from bizarre and wonderful extra-terrestrial environments in a series of puzzles.
Spore - A game enabling players to fashion life from a microscopic level right through to terra-forming planets (free, home/school, science and technology, KS2).
Smokescreen - this Channel 4 Education program helps young people become more canny about their own on-line behaviour by following the stories of a group of teenagers signed up to an imaginary social network site (free, home/school, PSHE, KS3-4).
1066 - Players are taken into the thick of momentous battles against invading Viking and Norman armies – crammed with accurate historic evidence and accounts (free, home/school, history, KS3-4).
Trafalgar Origins - The crews manning Nelson's ships that fought the French were multinational – a fact that quickly emerges in this highly researched game (free, home/school, history, KS3-4).
Launchball - An award-winning physics-based game from the Science Museum.
The Great Sperm Race - A collaboration between the Wellcome Trust and C4 – players attempt to manoeuvre a sperm during its quest to fertilise an egg (may be unsuitable for under-13s).
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