abandonware games sorted by popularity

Blackthorne (1994) is what happens when a '90s action hero gets lost in a side-scrolling alien world and decides to shoot everything until it makes sense. You’re Kyle, a shot...

Police Quest: Open Season is a 1993 adventure game that takes the series into a darker and more serious direction, following detectives investigating a disturbing criminal case. Th...

Emmanuelle: A Game of Eroticism is less about eroticism and more about awkward curiosity. Released in 1989, it’s a slow, text-heavy experience filled with suggestion, innuend...

You’ve never really lived until you’ve watched a rook pick up a pawn and slam dunk it into the floor. Battle Chess (1988) turns the world’s most intellectual boar...

Another World (1991) is a cinematic platformer with big ideas, minimal UI, and a shocking willingness to let you die within five seconds of starting. You play as a scientist who ge...

Before Doom and Wolfenstein 3D turned PC gaming into a pixelated bloodbath, there was Castle Wolfenstein. A stealth game in 1984? Believe it. You sneak around a Nazi fortress, stea...

Space Invaders is a 1995 DOS release of the arcade classic in which humanity's entire defense strategy consists of moving a small laser cannon sideways and shooting descending alie...

Mick's Strip Poker combines card-game mechanics with an adult presentation, offering a digital version of strip poker that reflects the technology and attitudes of its era. The bas...

Castle of the Winds is a fantasy roguelike role-playing game developed by SaadaSoft in the early 1990s. It was designed for Windows 3.x and is notable for being one of the earliest...

Interactive Girls Club Games is one of those early ’90s curiosities that tried to blend interactivity with, let’s say, “adult-themed social simulation.” The...

If you ever wanted to run a football club without leaving your chair, The Manager (1991, DOS) delivers. This early management sim lets you buy players, balance budgets, and suffer ...

Angel 3 is that kind of DOS game where you sit down thinking "I'll give it five minutes" and three hours later you're still trying to figure out what just happened. Released in 199...

Released in 1988, Leisure Suit Larry 2: Goes Looking for Love (in Several Wrong Places) sends Larry into an increasingly outrageous international adventure filled with spies, tropi...

By 1997, Warlords 3: Reign of Heroes decided it was time to grow up a bit—or at least pretend to. Now running on Windows, it adds quests, diplomacy, and a stronger narrative ...

Altered Beast is a classic side-scrolling beat 'em up arcade game developed and published by Sega. It was originally released in arcades in 1988 and later ported to various home co...

Stunts is one of those racing games where the track designer can be more dangerous than the opponent. Rather than concentrating solely on realistic circuits, it lets players create...

Myth: The Fallen Lords is a landmark real-time strategy game that combines intense tactical battles with a remarkably dark and atmospheric fantasy setting. Players command armies a...

The Simpsons Arcade Game, developed and published by Konami, is a classic side-scrolling beat-'em-up that became highly popular in arcades during the early '90s. Players take ...

Ultimate Soccer Manager 98 puts the player on the other side of the touchline, where the biggest challenge is discovering that managing a football club is considerably more complic...

If you ever wanted to feel like you were trapped in a washing machine armed with lasers, Descent is your game. Released in 1995, this claustrophobic, six-degrees-of-freedom shooter...

Heretic is what happens when someone looks at fantasy and thinks it needs more fireballs and a lot more attitude. Built on familiar shooter foundations, it swaps sci-fi corridors f...

Contra: Locked and Loaded is like caffeine in video game form—fast, explosive, and just a little dangerous for your health. You’re running, you’re gunning, and yo...

Desert Strike: Return to the Gulf (1994) gives you one helicopter, a desert full of angry enemies, and more explosions than a summer blockbuster. It’s part shooter, part reso...

Rise of the Dragon is a 1990 adventure game set in a futuristic Los Angeles where organized crime, corruption, and strange technology create a dangerous urban landscape. Players ta...

Elvira: The Arcade Game trades puzzles for action and subtlety for pure chaos. This is fast, brutal, side-scrolling combat with monsters pouring in from every direction. Elvira&rsq...

Microsoft Flight Simulator 4.0 expands the already impressive flight simulation experience with improved graphics, more detailed environments, and a greater sense of realism. Playe...

Quest for Glory 4: Shadows of Darkness takes the series into a much darker setting, sending the hero to the ominous land of Mordavia. Released in 1993, the game blends role-playing...

Space exploration reaches impressive heights in Master of Orion, a strategy classic that challenges players to guide an interstellar civilization toward galactic supremacy. Coloniz...

OutRun is a 1989 racing game that turns driving into a bright, fast, sun-soaked fantasy where the car is exotic, the roads are beautiful, and traffic laws are apparently a distant ...

Turbo Assembler and Tools 5.0, often referred to as TASM, is an x86 assembler for MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows. As a key component of Borland's suite of development tools...