Arguably, the golden age of browser gaming occurred in the 2000s, primarily revolving around Adobe Flash. This era was marked by high creativity and a low barrier to entry, allowing developers to easily share their games without the gatekeeping of app stores. Unfortunately, this golden age has passed, as security concerns led to the discontinuation of Flash. Consequently, most casual gamers have migrated to app stores for their gaming fix.
However, the spirit of browser gaming persists. Some developers continue to bring gaming back to the browser, even adapting games that were never originally intended for this platform. A notable example is a browser port of *Celeste*.
*Celeste* is an indie platformer where players climb a mysterious mountain while confronting the protagonist’s inner struggles. Initially released for consoles and PC, *Celeste* has now been brought to the browser by a group of friends—including [velzie], [bomberfish], and [Toshit] aka [r58Playz]. They took on this project as a challenge, especially after encountering someone else’s half-finished web port of the game.
The build relies heavily on WebAssembly (Wasm) and “cursed” .NET runtime hacks, which enable the port to run the community-made Everest mod loader. To maximize performance, the team uses a multithreaded and JIT-compiling version of mono-wasm, backported from .NET 10 to .NET 9.
Interestingly, the team began their work by porting Terraria to the browser before moving on to the *Celeste* port. Their dedication reflects a continued passion for browser gaming and a desire to push the boundaries of what’s possible within the web platform.
https://hackaday.com/2025/10/17/a-new-golden-age-of-browser-games/
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