abandonware games sorted by popularity

Hoyle Book of Games is a collection of classic card and table games presented in a single package, making it the sort of software that could quietly become the default entertainmen...

Welcome to Los Angeles, where crime runs rampant and your job is to bring the chaos down with nothing but surveillance skills and a stern attitude. L.A. Crackdown puts you in the s...

In Jimmy Connors Pro Tennis Tour, tennis is stripped down to its essentials: a racket, a ball, and the growing suspicion that your opponent has somehow mastered the laws of physics...

MicroProse Soccer takes the beautiful game and turns it into a fast, energetic arcade experience where spectacular goals matter more than elaborate tactics. The controls are simple...

Firezone is one of those late-80s action titles that seems determined to test both your reflexes and your optimism. It drops you into hostile territory and expects you to cope. The...

Borland Turbo Pascal 1.0 was the first release of one of the most influential programming environments of the 1980s. It brought Pascal development to DOS in a package that was rema...

Global Conquest is strategy boiled down to its essentials, offering a streamlined take on world domination that’s easy to pick up but harder to master. You’ll move armi...

Puzzle Fun Pak is a collection of small brain teasers designed to provide a variety of challenges without requiring a complicated learning curve. Instead of committing to one puzzl...

Steel Panthers 3: Brigade Command expands the series into larger-scale warfare, putting you in charge of formations where the number of units on the map can become rather intimidat...

By 1994, LineWars 2 expanded upon the original with enhanced visuals, refined mechanics, and more varied tactical possibilities. Battles require players to adapt quickly while mana...

ELIZA, created in the mid-1960s by Joseph Weizenbaum at MIT, was one of the first computer programs to simulate human conversation. Designed as a natural language processing demons...

Before Diablo made clicking on dungeons cool, DarkSpyre was already throwing players into labyrinths filled with monsters and puzzles. Released in 1990, it combines hack-and-slash ...

Star Fleet 2: Krellan Commander builds on its predecessor with a larger and more ambitious space strategy experience. Players command a starship during a major interstellar conflic...

Boppin (1994, DOS) is a puzzle game that starts out cute and then sucker-punches you with its sinister undertone—literally. You throw blocks to match symbols, release trapped...

Frac takes a minimalist concept—navigate fractal landscapes—and turns it into something hypnotic and slightly disorienting. The visuals shimmer with mathematical flair,...

Ultrabots pits customizable robots against each other in tactical, turn-based combat that rewards planning over reflexes. Before battles even begin, you tinker endlessly with your ...

Think Top Gun but with less Tom Cruise and more pixelated explosions. Chopper Duel pits you against a friend (or the AI) in one-on-one rotorcraft carnage. It’s fast, twitchy,...

Tracon for Windows brings the air traffic control simulation into the Windows environment, preserving the central challenge of coordinating aircraft while presenting the experience...

Flying Tigers 2 (1994, DOS) doubles down on the formula of its predecessor and adds a bit more bite to the bark. The action is still brisk, but the skies feel busier, the stakes sl...

Overlord is a 1994 science-fiction action game that places the player in control of a powerful futuristic vehicle and sends them into a world where enemies, missions, and explosion...

Hamburger Hell from 1986 is one of those titles that practically dares you to ask, “What were they thinking?” The premise is gloriously absurd, and the execution doesn&...

Willow is a fantasy action adventure inspired by the world of the classic film, placing the player in a magical landscape filled with enemies, exploration, and the usual assortment...

CHAMP Galagon is a fast arcade-style shooter inspired by the classic formation-based space games of the 1980s. The premise is gloriously uncomplicated: enemies appear in patterns, ...

Rastan is Conan-the-Barbarian energy distilled into a side-scrolling adventure where your primary verb is “destroy.” The DOS port lacks a bit of arcade sparkle, but the...

Face Off! (1989) wastes no time telling you exactly what it wants to be: fast, noisy, and slightly unhinged. This DOS arcade sports game throws subtlety out of the window and repla...

Murders in Space takes detective fiction beyond Earth, placing players in a futuristic setting where solving a murder requires investigating an environment with rather fewer conven...

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...

Fish or be fished could be the motto of Bass Duel (1993), a competitive angling game that pits you against a friend or an AI in a fight to the last splash. Strategy is key: where t...

Tennis Elbow is where tennis simulation starts to get serious, almost suspiciously so. The physics are detailed, the controls precise, and the learning curve steep enough to scare ...

In Power Drive, rally racing comes with an extra dose of “don’t hit the tree.” It’s all about navigating winding tracks with a sense of timing that borders ...