Hundreds of Free online Brain Training Flash Games

General Memory Chat
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Just thought I’d post a whole bunch of free brain-training websites that I wrote down in my notebook over the past two years. I’ve personally played many of the games on these websites, many, many times. Have fun and tell me what you think!

Disclaimer:I have no affiliation with any of these websites, and do not make any money from them. I am just providing my fellow brain training athletes with some fun stuff for play.

Now on to the good stuff:
The website below has lots of fun ones, including Mahjong tile games, and memory games that I’ve played a lot, such as Glitter Memory, Flipped out, Memory Test, Pattern Memory, and Mario Memory. There are lots more on that website, if you just click on the “269 Free Brain Games” on the top of their webpage. I’m particularly addicted to the games on that website called “Mahjong Alchemy” and “Chinese Mahjong”, they are solitaire versions of the game. Let me know if you people have any success applying mnemonic memory techniques to these games. I’ve tried it a little bit, but haven’t really applied memory systems to the games yet.

More free memory games:

The Duel N-Back Game, free:

This one has hundreds more. I provided the link directly to the memory games section, for us memory athletes, but if you just click on “games categories” at the top you will see hundreds of other types, all free.

Just four games on this one, but they are fun and challenging:
http://brainv2.com

This one has a few dozen more:

And more:

Games for the brain website below is also a decent one.

This one at first appears to be just a kids game website, but the games are actually not too bad.
http://mypuzzle.org/

More goodies:

Fun free Othello/Reversi game online with nice music:

And for us Solitaire Mahjong addicts out there:

Go/Weiqi/Baduk, free:

This website below is free for playing against the computer, but if you want to play against other players and have access to tons of excellent chess lessons (which I have used personally), then you will have to buy a monthly subscription from them.
Western Style Chess:
https://www.chess.com/play/computer

More Western Computer Chess:

This website is particularly intriguing, since it is all about different versions of Chess. I believe you can play many of them online, if you have the right program. Let me know if anyone has luck with this one!
http://www.chessvariants.com/

Chinese Chess online:

Another Chinese Chess online site:

And another Chinese Chess site:

Play against computer, Chinese Chess:

More computer Chinese Chess:

Shogi online, free:

More Shogi:

Sudoku:

Memory Tests online free:
http://opencoglab.org/

https://www.brainturk.com/

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Hi Mnemon,

That’s an excellent list of links :slight_smile:

I’m working my way through the list in sequence. I recognize many of the sites.

I’m specifically interested in the game which is known as “Concentration” or “Memory”. That’s the game where you turn over a card, then match it with an identical, previously turned-over card. So you need to memorize many of the face-down cards.

I have a theory that the game might help my card memorization at bridge. But I distrust my own unsourced theories as much as I distrust other people’s unsourced theories. So I’m wondering if you have any links relating to memory improvement caused by these games?

Last year’s massive $2 million fine on Lumosity for false advertising has shaken my faith in memory games. So for the present I now use only the automated bridge games - with endless Undo - to practice my bridge memory.

The killer final statement in the Wikipedia article is: “There is no good medical evidence to support claims that memory training helps people improve cognitive functioning.” :frowning:

So I would be most grateful if you could provide any links to disprove that statement :slight_smile:

Thanks.
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Hi OldGrantonian. I’m glad you like the list. I was not aware that Luminosity was fined that much money last year. That is unfortunate. Their rival website, BrainHQ (Posit Science) has many articles citing studies on their website showing improvements in cognition. https://www.brainhq.com/

I paid for BrainHQ’s service last year and found it to be beneficial to my own cognition. It was founded by one the leading neuroscientists in the world, actually, named Michael Merzenich.

I also like those games where you see a bunch of cards then they turn over and you have to remember where the matching cards were. I find that even training my memory a little bit daily has significant positive side effects on my speed of thought. I can read much faster, and remember more when I train my memory daily.

I would say that you should trust your own experience more than some study. If you find that memory games seem correlate with you having significantly better focus and concentration in general, than you should believe that before some study that tells you otherwise. Good luck :))

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This looks like a good site. I’ve been trying some of the free stuff. I’m impressed with the exercises I’ve tried so far.

IMHO, I think the major complaint aginst Lumosity-type games is that the user simply “gets better at playing that specific game”. There does not seem to be any proof that some kind of general improvement will occur in one or more cognitive functions that would result in either (a) better scores for a different type of game, or (b) an improvement in some set of “real-life” features such as working memory.

Anyway, the first BrainHQ exercise that I tried was Hawk Eye. IMHO, this game is designed to improve (a) speed of reaction, and (b) the range of peripheral vision. (Maybe it says that in the introduction somewhere, but I prefer to dive straight in to a new site, in order to determine how “intuitive” it is.)

In the case of (a) it was obvious that the program was gradually reducing the intervals at which the images were displayed - meaning that I was improving (I agree). But if I deliberately took longer to give the result - or if I deliberately gave the wrong result - then the intervals became longer. That’s an improvement over some games in which the interval never reduces - it only increases, which is boring and frustrating. (BTW: There’s a recent post by JC that suggests that we should all aim for “targets” - but that any kind of bullying is self-defeating. Therefore, we should temporarily reduce our target during periods of under-performance. If the temporary respite produces no benefit - then bullying probably wouldn’t have worked either.
https://artofmemory.com/forums/purposeful-practice-can-dramatically-increase-performance )

In the case of (b) peripheral vision, for the first few attempts (with my gaze at the centre of the screen), the outer ring of birds were merely blurs. For later attempts, the blurs became birds. And even later, the single dark bird stood out quite clearly.

So I believe there was a definite increase in the range of my peripheral vision. It must be a genuine increase. I can’t imagine that for a different game my peripheral vision would return to its previous, more restricted range.

I had good peripheral vision when I was even younger than I am now. It was useful at football or rugby, when huge, sadistic opponents were competing to remove one of my legs without anaesthetic. So I think I know the benefits of being able to see backwards.

For driving, I think any improvement in peripheral vision is bound to give greater warning of any potential “off-screen” dangers.
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