Candy Box is the stupidest, most addictive thing since Cow Clicker

At first glance Candy Box seems stupid. As an ASCII-based browser game, all it initially allows you to do is accumulate candies over time that you can either eat or throw on the ground. I'm not sure what the purpose of either of these is, but stick with it and before you know it you'll be able to purchase weapons, go on quests and buy items from the "candy merchant."

Created by indie developer aniwey, Candy Box is a very silly game that just keeps getting sillier. Several of its options seem to make no difference, but then every so often you'll plunge deeper into its inner workings and discover how to farm lollipops and conquer challenging quests.

The best part is you don't have to do anything. Simply leave the browser open and new options will be added like a deranged text-based Animal Crossing. There are no ads or micro-transactions or any of the things that usually make up social games. Instead, it's a bit like Facebook parody game Cow Clicker. You'll laugh at it, think it's dumb, but then get sucked in anyway because in the course of a work day you'll accumulate 12K candies, farm some lollipops and ooh, how can you resist the option to "use 30 lollipops to make lollipop powder to polish your candy sword and make it awesome (and more powerful)?"

You probably can't, I say. While you're out enjoying the sorta sunny post 60 degree pre-summer weather, don't forget to keep Candy Box running in a tab and feel like you're accomplishing something simply by being alive.