If there’s one thing we’ve learned from our time on the Internet, it’s that the web is full of incredibly mind-numbing games (also, porn). From the simplest Flash game to the most expansive MMORPG, online diversions keep folks playing and procrastinating for hours. One could say that all these online games are a waste of time, but most games have some sort of real-world benefit to the player. Some games improve hand-eye coordination and typing skills, others foster an online community that can extend outside the internet, and almost all games have at least some sort of goal or ultimate end that gives the player a sense of accomplishment when reached.

Introducing Cookie Clicker, a virtually pointless, terrifyingly addictive, in-browser game about one of life’s simple joys: baking cookies. Released in August 2013 by avant-garde game designer Julien Thiennot (AKA Orteil), the gameplay is simple: players click a giant chocolate chip cookie, which then creates a virtual cookie for each click. Bake 15 virtual cookies and you can buy a cursor that will automatically bake a cookie every 10 seconds. Buy a few cursors and you’ll be automatically generating a few cookies per second, until you can afford a grandma who automatically creates a cookie every two seconds.

At first Cookie Clicker is all about spastically clicking your mouse to make cookies, but once the player has bought a few upgrades, the game escalates exponentially. Eventually the automatic cookies generate so fast that manually clicking the cookie is barely worth the effort. The player simply watches cookies generate on their browser and then spends cookies on upgrades which will increase the automatic output of cookies per second, until your cookie farms, factories and mines are baking hundreds of thousands of baked treats in a matter of moments.

And that’s the game. Players can eventually bake millions and billions of virtual pastries in seconds, but there is no number of cookies that will “win” the game. Even so, Cookie Clicker is ridiculously addicting.

Since August, the game has spread across all manner of social media with untold thousands having played the game. There are mobile versions of Cookie Clicker, an entire wiki dedicated to the game and even a Breaking Bad spinoff version. So why is it so damn popular?

While its attention to detail and cute graphics might initially draw a player in, the appeal of Cookie Clicker comes in its absurdity. The game is at first glance a “non-game,” a time-waster that within minutes of gameplay pretty much plays itself. But a closer look shows that the game parodies the very act of “gaming” in the first place.

Once a stream of automatically generated cookies starts, the computer itself will create cookies infinitely, even when the browser tab is minimized. But as the mesmerizing cookie counter counts up and up, the player inevitably feels obligated to manage and increase pastry production, even though the game itself doesn’t ask them to. In an interview with Polygon.com, Ian Bogost, a game designer and researcher at the Georgia Institute of Technology, said he sees Cookie Clicker as a game created for a computer, not a person, to play, saying that the compulsion some have to interact with the game might come from a simple “love of the click.” Cookie Clicker is in fact one of many games (sometimes referred to as “Idle Games”) which emphasize the primal urge to click, such as click-based predecessor Candy Box 2.

In any case, the game has been continuously updated since its release and people are still logging on to click cookies (about 9000 players are on the game at any given time, according creator Thiennot). Right now I’ve got a few billion cookies stored away and (counting). If you think you can best my total, give the game a click.

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