abandonware games sorted by popularity

Forbidden Quest (1983, DOS) belongs to that early era when imagination did most of the heavy lifting. Sparse visuals and text-driven cues invite you to picture grand dangers lurkin...

The Shadows of Mordor is a dark fantasy adventure that feels like a lost chapter from an old-school Tolkien-inspired novel. You explore a grim and dangerous world filled with monst...

Omnicron Conspiracy (1989, DOS) is a detective adventure wrapped in a cozy sci-fi blanket. You play as a Galactic Patrol agent solving crimes across alien worlds, all rendered in c...

Hot on the heels of the first, Caverns of Kroz 2 (also 1989) doesn’t mess with the formula—it sharpens it. More puzzles, more monsters, more reasons to scream at fallin...

Starquake is a weird DOS science fiction platform game developed by Bubble Bus Software in 1988 and designed by Stephen Crow and Dave Collins. The Commodore 64 version bo...

Black Friday (1983) isn’t about shopping mayhem—though you might wish it were after trying to figure out what’s going on. This early DOS title is part stock marke...

In Archimedean Dynasty, humanity did the logical thing after wrecking the surface world: moved underwater and started shooting each other in submarines. It's part tactical sim, par...

Ever wanted to design a roller coaster so terrifying it’d make your pixelated patrons vomit in joy? Coaster is your twisted playground. Build loops, dives, and stomach-churni...

Crossfire is what happens when you throw a tank into a maze, give it infinite ammo, and tell it to go wild. Released in 1982, it’s all about twitch reflexes and precise shoot...

Humans 3: Evolution - Lost in Time takes the familiar formula of guiding small, vulnerable characters and adds a time-travel twist. Released in 1995, it challenges you to manage gr...

Not many people know that the first games created by Sid Meier were flight simulations. Solo Flight was published by MicroProse in 1983 for Commodore 64, Apple II, Atari, and a yea...

Evets is a puzzle game that proves simplicity can be deceptive. With minimal graphics and a straightforward premise, it invites you in gently before revealing its true complexity. ...

By 1992, Vol. 3 wrapped up the trilogy with even more complex scenarios. At this point, the series had become less of a game and more of an interactive textbook—though that&r...

Saddle up for an awkward mix of minigames that vaguely resemble rodeo events. Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show tries to recreate the excitement of a 19th-century traveling circus but ...

The name screams “budget shareware,” and Bubble Pop delivers. It’s the digital equivalent of popping bubble wrap, except someone decided it needed high scores and...

Released in 1995 for DOS, Zorlim's Arcade Volleyball is what happens when someone decides regular volleyball isn’t chaotic enough. Picture stick figures with the agility of c...