abandonware games sorted by popularity

Electranoid takes the classic Breakout formula, feeds it too much caffeine, and then turns the speed dial to “panic.” This 1995 DOS version is all about reflexes, power...

Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Trainer 2.0 offers a more serious approach to personal flight simulation, putting the player behind the controls of several aircraft while demanding ...

Don’t let the title fool you — Blitz Draughts isn’t a military simulation but rather a gloriously intense checkers game from 1992. This DOS brain-bender turns the...

Vaxine is a first-person shooter with a wonderfully strange premise: you are flying through the interior of a human body, blasting viruses and other microscopic nasties before they...

In Scrooge (1991), you play everyone’s favorite miser in a faithful retelling of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol—if Dickens had access to VGA graphics and MIDI carols....

If gravity had a sense of humor, it would look like Bounce Zone. This 1990 DOS oddball is part platformer, part physics experiment, and part unintentional comedy. You bounce. A lot...

If Doom and Laser Tag had a baby raised by dial-up modems, it would be 3D Cyber Blaster. Released in 1992, this shooter has you blasting neon enemies in a world that looks like a T...

Onslaught (1990, DOS) takes the classic top-down shoot-and-survive formula and injects it with an enthusiasm that borders on reckless. Hordes of enemies sprint at you like they&rsq...

Post-apocalyptic survival meets real estate management in Burntime, where the world is ruined, but you still need to hire employees and secure water rights. It’s like Mad Max...

Released in 1988 for DOS, Fast Break is basketball distilled into pure late-80s computer logic. Don’t expect flashy presentation or TV-style commentary; instead, you get a to...

Toyota Celica GT Rally puts the player behind the wheel of Toyota's famous rally machine and focuses on the rougher, dirtier side of motorsport. Instead of smooth circuits and pred...

Transworld is an old-school strategy title that offers a broad economic and organizational challenge, asking players to manage resources and make decisions within a simulated world...

Super Cauldron is a platform adventure with a distinctly magical flavor, sending the player through colorful environments filled with enemies, hazards, and the usual assortment of ...

In Crime and Punishment, you’re not the criminal—you’re the detective, judge, and executioner rolled into one. Presented as a legal simulation, it tasks you with ...

Cyberpunk meets click-and-point in Computer Underground, a game that looks like it was programmed in someone's garage—and probably was. You’re a hacker navigating a pix...

The Games: Summer Edition is a collection of Olympic-style sporting events that lets you experience the joys of international competition without the inconvenience of actually trai...

Before there were AAA games with 100GB installs, there was Amulet of Yendor, a rogue-like so old-school it might as well come with a floppy disk and a sandwich bag of D&D dice....

Hillsfar blends role-playing elements with a variety of mini-games, creating an experience that feels both diverse and occasionally unpredictable. One moment you are navigating a c...

Chaos Overlords is a cyberpunk-themed strategy game developed by Stick Man Games and published by New World Computing in 1996. Set in a dystopian future, the game focuses on contro...

Phantis is a 1987 platform action game that sends players through colorful environments filled with enemies, obstacles, and classic challenges requiring quick reflexes. The game fo...

In 1991, Les Manley in: Lost in L.A. continued the misadventures of its perpetually unlucky protagonist with another humorous point-and-click adventure. This time, Les navigates th...

Viz is a cheeky little game based on the famously irreverent British comic magazine, and it has absolutely no intention of behaving like a respectable educational title. Released i...

World Games is a collection of unusual sporting events designed to prove that the Olympics did not have a monopoly on strange ways of hurting yourself. Instead of concentrating on ...

Kingdom Without End offers a surprisingly ambitious fantasy role-playing adventure created long after DOS had faded from the spotlight. Featuring an expansive world, engaging quest...

Great Naval Battles vol. 3: Fury in the Pacific expands the scope and the intensity, throwing you into larger conflicts with even more to manage. In Great Naval Battles vol. 3, the...

Before realistic fighting games, there was Boxer Rebellion—a 1982 title so primitive, it makes Pong look flashy. It’s boxing with fewer rules and more pixels per punch....

Released in 1987, Le Maitre Des Ames delivers an atmospheric French adventure built around mystery, exploration, and supernatural themes. Players gradually uncover unsettling event...

Long before indie developers made “roguelike” a buzzword, someone decided to fuse Doom with permadeath and ASCII graphics. The result: Doom: The Roguelike (2005). On pa...

Few games embrace confusion quite as enthusiastically as M Labyrinth. Released in 1993, it throws players into a maze that seems to have been designed by someone who firmly believe...

Tornado is a detailed combat flight simulator that asks considerably more from the player than simply pointing an aircraft at the nearest target. Based around the Panavia Tornado, ...