abandonware games sorted by release date

The Goonies is a platform adventure based on the beloved 1985 movie, sending the player into the familiar world of caves, traps, secret passages, enemies, and the sort of treasure ...

The Mist is an atmospheric adventure built around mystery, exploration, and the unsettling idea that something is very wrong just beyond the visible horizon. The game asks the play...

The Tracer Sanction is a science-fiction adventure that combines investigation, exploration and puzzle solving in a setting where the future is considerably less peaceful than the ...

The Wizard of Oz brings the familiar world of Dorothy, the Scarecrow, Tin Man and Cowardly Lion to the computer in an adventure inspired by the classic story. Players travel throug...

Tournament Tennis offers a straightforward computer interpretation of the sport, focusing on matches, rallies, timing, and the simple pleasure of trying to put a little yellow ball...

Treasure Island turns Robert Louis Stevenson's famous pirate adventure into a compact computer game, giving you the chance to chase buried treasure without having to spend several ...

Turbo Gomoku takes the ancient Japanese board game Gomoku and gives it a suitably computerised makeover. The rules are wonderfully simple: players place stones on a grid and attemp...

By Ultima 3, the series had discovered the magic of party-based adventuring. No longer a lonely trek, now you command a ragtag group of heroes who bicker only in your imagination. ...

Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar is one of the most influential and innovative role-playing games (RPGs) in video game history. Released in 1985 by Richard Garriott under the Origin ...

Voodoo Island is a classic adventure that sends the player into a mysterious tropical setting filled with strange events, dangerous situations, and the obligatory feeling that stay...

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? is the game that turned geography into an international manhunt and made millions of players suspicious of anyone carrying a suspiciously lar...

Willy the Worm is a cheerful little arcade game built around the timeless appeal of guiding a small creature through danger while trying not to become part of the scenery. The conc...

Wishbringer is a classic interactive fiction adventure that begins with an apparently ordinary errand and gradually develops into something considerably stranger. As a humble posta...

World Tour Golf is an early golf simulation built around the eternal challenge of sending a small white ball toward a hole while avoiding the temptation to blame the weather, the c...

The proto-fighting game that walked so Street Fighter could punch. Yie Ar Kung Fu is pure arcade joy: a brave martial artist named Oolong fights a rogue’s gallery of opponent...

The sequel nobody expected but everyone button-mashed through. Yie Ar Kung Fu 2 adds more characters, more chaos, and less coherence. This time you’re Lee (no relation to Bru...

You are Sherlock Holmes, and someone has committed a crime, possibly because they couldn’t handle the game’s UI. 221B Baker Street is a detective board game where your ...

This 1986 DOS classic sounds way cooler than it is — ACE: Air Combat Emulator promises combat, but delivers what feels like flying a lawnmower through molasses. Still, for it...

The title Alex Higgins World Snooker might imply world-class snooker. What it delivers is 1986 DOS ball physics that sometimes feel like they were modeled in an alternate dimension...

Think of Alter Ego: Female Version as life’s greatest hits - and a few of its flops - played out one decision at a time. From childhood tantrums to awkward teenage crushes an...

Welcome to Alter Ego: Male Version, where your life begins with a cry and a diaper and only goes downhill - or uphill, depending on your choices. This text-based simulation lets yo...

If your idea of high-octane excitement involves wind direction, tacking angles, and sail trim, then American Challenge: A Sailing Simulation is your digital paradise. This 1986 DOS...

In Amnesia, you wake up in a hotel room with no idea who you are, where you are, or why someone wants you dead. And no, this isn’t a gritty FPS—it’s a text advent...

Antarctic Adventure (1986) stars a penguin who seems to be training for the Winter Olympics — at full sprint. This early Konami game has you racing across icy terrain, dodgin...

AutoCAD 2.5 represents an important stage in the development of computer-aided design software, arriving when personal computers were beginning to become genuinely useful for techn...

Backgammon brings the ancient board game into the DOS era with a clean focus on dice, tactics and the eternal hope that probability will suddenly become your best friend. The rules...

Come one, come all, to the saddest circus ever pixelated. In Ballyhoo, you're stuck in a depressing carnival trying to solve a kidnapping while dealing with clowns, carnies, and th...

Bank Streek Writer Plus is a word processor from the DOS era, when writing on a computer still felt like a fairly sophisticated trick. Applications such as this one were expected t...

Batalia (1986) is what happens when war games and spreadsheet programs fall in love. This early DOS strategy title throws you into tactical battles with graphics that would struggl...

Before Titanic was a movie with a lot of weeping, there was Beyond the Titanic, a text adventure where surviving the iceberg is just the beginning. The game takes the historic disa...