Remembering Some Old Internet Stuff, It Was Neat.

Remember When the Internet Was…Different? A Look Back at Newgrounds Memes

It’s easy to get lost in the endless scroll of TikTok and Instagram these days, but for a lot of us, the real early days of internet humor lived on Newgrounds. Seriously, does anyone remember? It feels like a different lifetime.

Newgrounds, for those who maybe weren’t online back in the late 90s and early 2000s, was this amazing place where independent animators, musicians, and game developers could just… share stuff. And share they did. It was kinda wild west, honestly, but also really creative. And a lot of what came out of Newgrounds ended up shaping internet culture as we know it.

I was digging around online – you can find a pretty good rundown of it all on the Newgrounds Wiki, actually – and it really hit me how many memes started there. Like, “All Your Base” – remember that? That incredibly broken English line from a video game? That was Newgrounds gold. It felt so silly, but everyone was saying it!

And then there was the “Badger Song.” Just… a badger singing a catchy tune. It doesn’t make a lot of sense, but honestly, a lot of early internet stuff didn't need to make sense. It was just… fun.

I even stumbled across people on Reddit talking about how they still think about the “Numa Numa Dance.” That guy, Gary Brolsma, just lip-syncing to a song? It’s amazing how something so simple could become so iconic. There was also “Dick Neck,” which… yeah, it was pretty weird, but it got a lot of views back then.

There were these really ambitious things too, like "The Ultimate Showdown,” with all these characters fighting each other. It was a really neat animation, especially for the time. And who could forget "Super Gangsta Mario?" Taking a childhood hero and giving him a rap? Genius.

It's cool to see that Newgrounds is still around, and that people are still sharing and discovering these old classics. They even have a “Memes” playlist – I checked it out, and it’s a really nice mix of old and new stuff.

Honestly, looking back, it's kind of heartwarming. Things online can feel so… complicated now. But back then, it felt like anything was possible, and a silly animation or a catchy song could bring everyone together. Plus, the Madness Combat series is still being updated even now, which is pretty incredible considering it started over 20 years ago! It really goes to show you how much impact that platform had, and still has, on internet culture.