Free flying games

What makes a good flying game

A flying game is about the feeling of staying in the air: climbing, gliding, diving and catching the wind at the right moment. Some keep it to a single button, where holding means up and letting go means down, and the whole skill is in the timing. Others give you a dragon, a biplane or a little fighter to steer freely across a whole sky.

The flying games on Kiloo come from casual, platform, adventure and shooting, with one Halloween game that appears in its season. You fly a Frisbee, a paper plane, a glowing disc, a glider cape, a dragon, a biplane, a starfighter and a bat. Several have an endless mode with a best score, some have levels with stars and medals, and a few have a relaxed mode with nothing in the way. Your progress and best scores are kept in the browser you play in.

Flying games to start with

The one-button flyers are the quickest to learn. Tap Flight lifts a glowing disc through gaps between neon pillars with every tap, and the sky changes every ten points as the gaps tighten. Paper Glider is gentler: hold to pull a paper plane's nose up, let go to dip and gain speed, ride the wind gusts and thread paper rings through a watercolour canyon, with a Zen mode that has no obstacles at all. In the Halloween season, Bat Swoop lets you hold to lift a little bat through a cave of stalactites and pumpkin lanterns.

Frisbee Forever 2 has you flick a Frisbee into the air and steer it along rollercoaster tracks over farms, rivers, temples and jungle ruins, collecting stars for medals and coins across sixty tracks in six worlds. Sky Islands is a platformer with a glider cape: run, jump, open the cape and ride the warm air between cliffs while you find thirty feathers on each of three islands.

Dragon Rider gives you a young dragon to flap, glide and dive across a painted kingdom, carrying villagers to safety, scooping lake water onto burning roofs and racing rival riders through rings, with a Free Flight over the whole kingdom. Two shooters round off the page. Sky Ace flies Biscuit the pilot dog's red biplane through eight storybook skies with a loop-the-loop that dodges anything. Star Squadron sends a chunky little fighter up through nebulae and ringed planets against weaving formations and big bosses.

Flying with the keys, a mouse or a finger

In the one-button games, Space, a click or a tap does everything. Tap Flight lifts on each press, while Paper Glider and Bat Swoop rise as long as you hold and dip when you let go. On a phone you simply hold a finger anywhere on the screen. Frisbee Forever 2 launches with a flick upwards, then you steer with the mouse, the left and right arrows or a drag.

The free-flying games use the arrows or WASD. In Dragon Rider you hold Space to flap and climb and let go to glide, J breathes fire and K drops what your talons carry. Sky Islands glides while you hold Space. In Sky Ace and Star Squadron the guns fire on their own, so you only fly; both follow the mouse too, and on a phone you drag anywhere. In Dragon Rider, gliding cools your fire, and in Star Squadron holding Shift slows you down for precise moves through a crowded screen.

Frequently asked questions