Gilect originally began as an online gaming portal in 2018, going under a different name. As years passed, the website was reshaped, remade, and eventually closed down to make way for our brand-new free hosting service, Gilect.
In early 2023, development began for a new project: a complete remake of our original gaming portal. On March 5th, 2023, Gilect Play launched under the play.gilect.com subdomain. That website has continued to grow to this very day.
Originally launching with just about thirty games, Gilect Play has expanded to nearly 150 games which have hundreds of thousands of plays! We constantly update the website, adding more games and improving the user experience.
Here’s a list of some of the changes we’ve made over time and what’s new in the anniversary update, as well as what changes are going to be made going forward.
New Games!
The number of games on Gilect Play has increased by five times since its inception! We’ve expanded the website by adding nostalgic flash games, such as Papa’s Pizzeria and Duck Life; adding fan favorites and hit games, such as Shell Shockers and Ev.io; and adding big mobile games like Fruit Ninja and Jetpack Joyride!
For Gilect Play’s one-year anniversary, we’re choosing to highlight three games: the new version of Fruit Ninja, the new version of Jetpack Joyride, and Fireboy and Watergirl 6: Fairy Tales (coming March 4th). The web versions of Fruit Ninja and Jetpack Joyride have just received huge updates, adding new game modes and quests. Fireboy and Watergirl 6: Fairy Tales is the sixth installation of the hit game series Fireboy and Watergirl, and will be published tomorrow.
Homepage Updates
We’re making it even easier to discover awesome new games! The featured game slideshow at the top now has a video preview of the game, letting the user get a good taste of what to expect. The slideshow will constantly be updated, showcasing new and trending games.
We’ve also added a little ribbon to new or updated games, signifying to users that there is new content to play. This makes it easier to find unique and exciting games that the user hasn’t played before.
Several months ago, we also revamped the homepage a little to make it even easier to discover new games. There are now additional sorts on the homepage, such as “Iconic Games”, “Smash Hits”, or “Mobile Games on PC”. By allowing users to sift through more specific sorts, it helps them tailor games they like specifically for themselves.
Finally, we also updated the navbar that displays at the top of each page. Even though the options remain the same, there is more visual separation between buttons of different types, making for a cleaner UI. Furthermore, the navbar was made slightly thinner to fit more content on the page without having to scroll.
Revamped Search
One of the worst parts of Gilect Play was searching for specific games. The search results only showed the game title and description in one massive list. Now, the revamped search shows you just the game icon, title, and category in a 3-column grid. We felt that having the game description for each game was unnecessary, so we chose to get rid of it.
More Interface Updates
Recently, we also chose to enhance the menu bar that displays on top of games. The menu now lets the user like or dislike the game, shows the approval rating and total number of plays, and has a fullscreen button.
What’s Next
There is always room for improvement, which is why we will continue updating Gilect Play for years to come! Here are some features coming soon to our website:
- A recommendation system with an algorithm to tailor games specifically to the user and make discovering games even easier
- A better search engine to make finding a specific game a better experience. Even though we recently remade the search UI, we plan on changing the search algorithm to improve it
- Creating accounts and logging in, which allows the user to favorite games and create a list of games that they like
Gilect Play has expanded from a small website to one with hundreds of thousands of visitors. Gilect will be shifting priorities from providing internet services to offering free entertainment. The hosting portal at gilect.com will remain active but will no longer be our main focus.
We hope you enjoy the updates we push out to make Gilect Play an even better place to play all your favorite games!