abandonware games sorted by popularity

Zona 0 is a top-down action game from Spain that blends cyberpunk aesthetics with frenetic gameplay and a dash of existential dread. You play a cyber-agent navigating a dystopian c...

TV Sports Baseball from 1991 tries to bottle the magic of America’s pastime and pour it into your DOS machine, complete with commentary and a surprising amount of personality. Th...

Redhook's Revenge is a 1993 DOS adventure game built around exploration, danger, and a pirate-flavored setting. Players take part in a swashbuckling journey filled with mysterious ...

Despite the name, Aquaphobia (1992) doesn’t help you overcome your fear of water. In fact, it might just make it worse. This is an action-platformer where you try not to drow...

Mystical is an atmospheric adventure that blends exploration, fantasy, and puzzle solving into a journey through a world filled with strange locations and mysterious events. Player...

Mindshadow presents a mysterious adventure in which the protagonist awakens with no memory and must gradually reconstruct his identity by exploring an unfamiliar world. The game co...

No Exit is a 1990 fighting game with a title that sounds like a warning, which is probably appropriate because the player is about to enter a series of increasingly violent battles...

Eagle's Rider is one of those early ’90s DOS games that feels slightly unhinged in the best possible way. You control a futuristic rider soaring through abstract landscapes, ...

Released in 1986, Dragons: A Challenge in Chivalry leaned more toward interactive storytelling than traditional gameplay. You weren’t just hacking at dragons—you were r...

Joe Blade is a classic arcade-style action game in which the titular hero has apparently decided that one man is sufficient to deal with an entire collection of dangerous criminals...

Skifree is an adorable downhill romp… at least until the monster shows up. You start by zipping peacefully through flags and jumps, enjoying the zen simplicity of early Wind...

Black Friday (1983) isn’t about shopping mayhem—though you might wish it were after trying to figure out what’s going on. This early DOS title is part stock marke...

Released in 1985, Space Commanders 2 didn’t reinvent the wheel — it just made it spin faster. The sequel adds smoother animation, a few new enemy patterns, and a slight...

Roller Coaster Rumbler is a 1989 DOS game built around the wonderfully simple idea of causing trouble in a theme-park roller coaster environment. Players must navigate the ride and...

England Championship Special (1991, DOS) is the kind of football game that doesn’t pretend to know what the Premier League will look like in 30 years—it just wants you ...

Trump Castle: The Ultimate Casino Gambling Simulation attempts to recreate the experience of a casino on a home computer, offering players a selection of gambling games and the cha...

The Invaders is a straightforward arcade-style shooter built around one of gaming's oldest and most reliable ideas: things are flying toward you, so shoot them before they become y...

For those who got hopelessly addicted to the card game inside Final Fantasy VIII, Triple Triad Gold (2000) was like someone saying, “Here, now you can ruin your productivity ...

Side Arms Hyper Dyne is a 1988 DOS shoot-'em-up adapted from Capcom's arcade game, putting players into a futuristic combat suit and sending them directly into a hostile alien batt...

Oubliette is a 1983 role-playing game and an important early example of the dungeon-crawling tradition that would influence generations of computer RPGs. Players create characters,...

Think of Bass Tour (1992) as the road trip version of virtual fishing. More simulation than arcade, it lets you travel, pick locations, study conditions, and obsess over bait types...

Welcome to Border Zone (1987, DOS), where the Cold War is hot and your only weapon is your brain (and maybe a good map). This text-based espionage thriller from Infocom combines sp...

Tera: La Cité des Crânes is a moody adventure that leans heavily on atmosphere and mystery. The world feels strange and slightly unsettling, with puzzles that require patience an...

Metaltech: Battledrome focuses on competitive BattleMech combat, putting players directly into intense one-on-one encounters where tactical decisions matter as much as firepower. C...

Sherlock Holmes: Another Bow is a 1985 DOS adventure featuring Arthur Conan Doyle's famous detective in a mystery that requires observation, deduction, and a willingness to investi...

QBasic 1.1 is Microsoft's approachable programming environment for DOS and one of the easiest ways an entire generation learned that computers could be told exactly what to do. It ...

Hocus Pocus is the kind of platformer that seems to run on pure sugar and cheerful chaos. You play as a young wizard with more enthusiasm than common sense, bouncing through colorf...

Monopoly brings the classic board game of property, rent, and increasingly strained family relationships to the computer. Players buy streets, build houses, negotiate trades, and a...

NCSA Mosaic was one of the earliest web browsers to appear on the market. It was developed at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illino...

Fort Apache drops you into the Old West with the subtlety of a saloon door kicked off its hinges. Strategy and action mingle as you defend your frontier outpost from relentless att...