Play Free Games From Square-Enix in Your Browser with Core Online

Core Online was launched today built by Hapti.co, a subsidiary of Square-Enix. Core Online allows you to play games in your browser, for free. Currently you can play Hitman: Blood Money and Mini Ninjas (which is available from the Google Chrome Store). It’s pretty interesting to see this from a game publisher.

So how does it work exactly? I’m not sure what engine they are using but it’s something from Google. That means it’s going to run the sweetest if you are using Chrome but will also work in Firefox and Internet Explorer 9 (IE 10 I’m assuming also). Even though it’s free there is a little catch. You start off with some playtime but if you want to continue you have to “earn” minutes. You earn these minutes by watching ads. A 26 second ad got me 8 minutes, while a 1:15 ad got me 26 minutes. You can go to a new tab while it’s doing it’s thing either. If you do the commercial stops and you resume where you left off. You can opt to skip ads on a per level basis by paying a small fee. Hitman was $0.49/level.

“Square Enix is at the forefront of experimentation of new business and services models in the game industry,” said Yoichi Wada, chief executive officer of Square Enix Holdings. “Through our COREONLINE technology service, users can access our content easily through the browser.” Who better to try this out than Square-Enix with their massive library of games? More games will be coming soon and over the next year with Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light being the next title slated to come out in October.

Take a look at the trailer for the service below and then go check it out!