abandonware games sorted by popularity

Released in 1989 for DOS and Mac, The Transinium Challenge is a classic TNG-era adventure game with a wholesome dose of techno-babble. You guide Picard and the crew through an inve...

Van Buren was a science fiction post-apocalyptic RPG being developed by Black Isle Studios and never published. Van Buren was the direct sequel to Fallout 2, part of the Fallout fr...

Ultimate Soccer Manager 2 refines the original formula, adding more depth, more leagues, and a slightly more approachable interface. It still revolves around data, decisions, and d...

Known as Exhumed in some regions, Powerslave is a first-person shooter with a heavy dose of Egyptian flavor. Think mummies, scarabs, and plenty of mystical traps, all wrapped up in...

Fidelity Chessmaster 2100, released in 1989 for DOS, is chess with a very clear mission: beat you, patiently and without mercy. At the time, it was a serious achievement in compute...

Dark Ages Volume III: Dungeons of Doom closes out the trilogy with—you guessed it—more doom, dungeons, and ways to fall off platforms you swear you landed on. The serie...

Ninja Gaiden, released in 1988 for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and later to other platforms, is a side-scrolling action-platformer developed by Tecmo. It follows the st...

Released in 1989, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade takes the film's adventure and translates it into a point-and-click experience with surprising elegance. It captures the charm,...

Enchanter is interactive fiction with teeth. As a text adventure, it relies entirely on imagination, yet it manages to feel richer than many graphical games of its era. You play as...

By the time Premier Manager 3 rolled around, the series had cemented its reputation as the thinking fan’s football fix. Released in 1994, it refined the formula once again, o...

In Battle Chess 2: Chinese Chess (1990), the classic formula gets an eastern makeover—complete with new rules, a new board, and a fresh batch of animated fatalities. If you t...

By 1994, the Ishar series decided subtlety was overrated. Ishar 3 is bigger, bolder, and occasionally more confusing than its predecessors. Your party once again explores vast land...

Gauntlet 2 is proof that sequels sometimes mean “more of the same, but louder.” The 1989 upgrade takes the chaotic dungeons of the original and adds new enemies, nastie...

Car Builder is less about speed and more about spreadsheets—just with axles. In this 1982 gem, you don’t race cars, you design them. From gear ratios to weight distribu...

Mech Commander: Gold (1999) is tactical perfection for fans of giant robots and careful planning. Set in the BattleTech universe, the game puts you in command of a mercenary squad ...

Released in 1983, Moon Patrol is the game that proved moon driving is a terrible career choice. You control a buggy with a suspension system that would make NASA jealous, jumping o...

Football Manager 3 (1993, DOS) trades grass stains for spreadsheets and proves that tension can thrive in numbers. You’re not scoring goals; you’re negotiating contract...

ADOM is what happens when a rogue, a wizard, and a hungry troll walk into a dungeon and never come out. Released in 1996, this roguelike classic is brutal, brilliant, and unapologe...

Ballistix asks: “What if air hockey was controlled by futuristic cannons?” The answer: chaos. You frantically shoot pucks with directional blasts while the physics engi...

If Rambo had a twin brother who preferred hiding behind sandbags and tossing grenades like candy, Cabal would be his biography. This over-the-top shooter puts you in the boots of a...