Created for a Kongregate game design contest in 2007, Cursor*10 gave players control of nothing but a mouse cursor, tasked with guiding a tiny character up a tower before time ran out. Its central twist made it unforgettable: once a run ended, players started over with a recording of their previous cursor movements now acting alongside them, eventually stacking up to ten simultaneous echoes of their own past attempts.
Puzzles Built From Your Own History
Each of the ten recorded cursors could pick up items, flip switches, or block enemies exactly as they had during their original run, turning every playthrough into a puzzle about coordinating with your own past selves. Success meant planning several attempts ahead, using an early run to set up a switch that a later run would depend on.
A Small Contest Entry With an Outsized Idea
Cursor*10 never needed elaborate art or a large budget to make an impression — its recursive time-loop structure was enough to make it one of the most discussed and replayed entries to come out of Kongregate's contest scene, a reminder that Flash's low production barrier could still reward pure conceptual ambition over technical polish.
Its ten-cursor time-loop concept would go on to influence a small wave of later puzzle games built around recorded playthroughs, proof of how far a single clever idea could travel from a contest entry.