Play Your Favorite Video Games Online for Free

If you've recently shopped for or purchased a video game, no matter what type, you know the prices are through the roof. The latest, hottest games are almost always priced between $39 and $70. But you can shave the costs considerably if you make the move to play your favorite games online for free. If the price sounds right, keep reading!

Places like MSN Games, part of the MSN Internet portal, make it simple for you to play a wide range of games online for free, from text twisters to arcade challengers to trivia to more educational fare aimed at your child. Some of the games are versions or variants of big name gaming titles like Tetris while others are completely unique. With dozens of game choices, there truly is something for everyone. You can play your favorite games online for free (usually) there if you visit http://games.msn.com.

While many of the games let you play solo, you have several choices that place you up against other online players to match your wits and skill level. Your best bet is to try out several of the various games and see which make the right fit for you. My favorites are the word games like Text Twist; these are designed to give your vocabulary - and spelling - skills an athletic style workout. Yet you might like the tumbling gems or other games which you play against a ticking clock to add to the gaming tension.

Games you can play online for free with MSN are divided into popular categories like Poker and Casino (Tik's Texas Hold 'Em and Twistingo Bingo, to name a few), Action and Arcade (try Chicken Invaders 2 or Tradewinds 2), Word and Trivia (with two kinds of Scrabble as well as the fun Greedy Words), and Pop Culture (which features versions of Family Feud and Wheel of Fortune). You'll also discover some other popular board games there like Mah Jong which is hardly just for women who do teatime. For the inveterate gamblers among you, there are also play-for- cash options, but the cash you bet - of course - is not free.

Here's another big advantage, besides the free price tag: MSN Games Zone lets you download copies of some of these video games that you can play on your PC, whether you are connected or not. Now, most of these games have a built-in obsolescence, which means that you can play a certain number of days or specific number of times before the game is disabled.

To keep playing the downloaded game version, you need to pay a registration fee, which can run anywhere from a few dollars to $25-35 and most of the games make it easy for you to do this online with your credit or debit card. However, you can also just go back on the Internet to continue to play your favorite games online for free, no registration or hidden costs required. This is usually what I do, unless a particular game just seems like something I absolutely have to play when my Internet connection isn't otherwise available, such as late at night in bed or in the car on my way somewhere - assuming, of course, I'm not driving since I doubt I could steer well along the interstate while playing Text Twist.

One thing to notice: the games you can play online for free tend to change. While tried-and-true favorites tend to stick around, you (fairly) frequently see newcomers arrive as well. This is true on many gaming sites. Keep your eyes tuned and you never know when a new favorite will come your way.