abandonware games sorted by year, newest first

Vectorball is a futuristic sports game that takes the basic idea of ball games and throws it into a neon-soaked science-fiction arena. Players compete in fast-moving matches where ...

Virus is a fast, strange little arcade game that feels as though someone took a futuristic flying machine, dropped it into a hostile landscape, and then removed any concern for sen...

Visions of the Aftermath: The Boomtown presents a bleak vision of survival in a world that has already suffered the unpleasant consequences of civilization going spectacularly wron...

Vixen is an action game built around a rather unusual combination of fantasy, combat, and transformation. The player takes control of a heroine capable of using magical abilities w...

Vulcan: The Tunisian Campaign is a detailed wargame focused on the Allied invasion of North Africa during World War II. Released in 1988, it asks players to manage military units, ...

Released in 1988 for DOS, Wasteland is the kind of game that quietly changed history while pretending to be just another post-apocalyptic RPG. Long before wastelands were fashionab...

Weird Dreams is exactly the sort of title that does not bother pretending to be normal. Released in 1988, it sends the player through a bizarre nightmare world filled with surreal ...

Wheel of Fortune New Second Edition offers another computer interpretation of the famous television quiz show, once again putting contestants in front of a big wheel and a collecti...

Where in Europe is Carmen Sandiego? sends players across the continent in pursuit of Carmen and her increasingly slippery gang of thieves. The basic formula is wonderfully effectiv...

Who Framed Roger Rabbit brings the manic world of Roger Rabbit to the computer in an adventure built around investigation, exploration, and the search for answers. The story follow...

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...

Win, Lose or Draw transforms the popular drawing-and-guessing game show into a computer party game. The concept is immediately recognizable: one player gets a word or phrase and at...

Winter Olympiad 88 brings a selection of winter sporting events to the computer, allowing players to experience the excitement of the 1988 Winter Olympics without having to put on ...

Wizardry 4: The Return of Werdna flips the script by letting you play the villain, which is as delightful as it is diabolical. You control Werdna, an evil wizard with a knack for c...

Heart of the Maelstrom brings epic dungeon crawling to dizzying heights, challenging players with sprawling levels, fiendish enemies, and puzzles that seem to require a PhD in pati...

World Class Leader Board is a classic golf simulation that takes a fairly serious approach to the ancient art of hitting a tiny ball into a distant hole. Rather than turning golf i...

Xenon, released in 1988, was a vertically scrolling shoot 'em up video game developed by The Bitmap Brothers. Xenon was initially released for the Commodore 64, and later, it was p...

You thought running a government was hard? Try doing it with a smug civil servant and a budget crisis every five minutes. In Yes, Prime Minister, you play as Jim Hacker, the PM him...

Yuppi's Revenge is what happens when ‘80s satire meets office rage. You’re a disgruntled ex-yuppie on a rampage through the corporate world—armed with a golf club...

Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders is a graphic adventure game developed and published by Lucasfilm Games (now known as LucasArts). It was first released in 1988 for various p...

Zany Golf is what happens when someone says, “Let’s make miniature golf, but with teleporters, hamburgers, and anti-gravity pads.” Part mini-golf simulator, part ...

Zoom! is a puzzle game that desperately wants to be cool. You're a sunglasses-wearing smiley face cruising down psychedelic gridlines while dodging blobs and filling in tiles like ...

Interactive fiction meets comic book in this spin-off, where you follow a fantasy story through illustrated panels and scripted choices. Zork Quest: Assault on Egreth Castle feels ...

Time to hit the lanes in 10th Frame, a bowling simulator so committed to realism it even simulates the wait between turns. You line up your shot, set your spin, and pray the ancien...

Released in 1987, this is less of a simulator and more of a fever dream where you pilot a flying box over a grid pretending to be terrain. 3-D Helicopter Simulator was ambitious fo...

In ACE 2 (1987, DOS), you and a buddy can engage in split-screen dogfights so slow they make real air combat look like fast-forwarded ballet. The graphics are simple, but the charm...

Ace of Aces (1987, DOS) is a game where you pilot a WWII plane via a series of still-image panels that suggest action more than deliver it. It’s like a flipbook with ambition...

Acheton (1987, DOS) is one of those text adventures where the game cheerfully tries to kill you every five minutes — and does so with words. You're tossed into a sprawling, b...

Long before Minecraft let us build worlds, Adventure Construction Set handed you a digital Lego box and said, “Go nuts.” Want to make a dungeon full of orcs and ham san...

Adventure Fun Pak is a collection of small adventure-oriented games designed to offer several different experiences rather than one enormous epic. That makes it an interesting snap...