abandonware games sorted by popularity

Hugo 2: Whodunit? continues the series with a mystery that is equal parts charming and perplexing. Released in 1991, it builds on its predecessor with improved visuals and a slight...

Overdrive is a fast-paced driving game built around the pleasures of speed, aggressive maneuvering, and trying not to turn your vehicle into an expensive collection of pixels. The ...

MinerVGA takes the familiar mining concept and gives it a colorful VGA makeover, challenging players to explore underground environments while collecting resources and avoiding dan...

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...

Alien Nations is a real-time strategy game with a lighter, more colourful personality than the usual grim business of commanding armies. Players establish settlements, gather resou...

Warhammer 40000: Chaos Gate brings the grim darkness of the far future into a turn-based tactical battlefield where subtle diplomacy has been replaced by heavily armed Space Marine...

Pong Kombat is a 1994 DOS game that combines the simplicity of Pong with the exaggerated excitement of fighting games. The result is an unusual mixture where bouncing a ball across...

In Blitzkrieg: Battle at the Ardennes, you’re not just playing a wargame — you’re being handed a clipboard, a stack of orders, and a freezing cold battlefield in ...

Blades of Exile is a classic role-playing video game developed by Spiderweb Software. It's the third installment in the "Exile" series. The game was released in 1997 for Mac OS, an...

CheckIt 3 is a DOS diagnostic utility designed to inspect the health and configuration of a personal computer. In an era when Windows could not necessarily tell you much about what...

Tron brings the neon-lit world of the famous science-fiction movie to the computer, offering a collection of arcade-inspired challenges built around speed, survival, and brightly c...

Menace is a fast-paced side-scrolling shooter from the creators of DMA Design, throwing players into a hostile alien world where everything seems determined to explode. Armed with ...

When Die Hard 2: Die Harder hit DOS in 1992, it decided the airport setting meant “time for an on-rails shooter.” Picture John McClane glued to a track, blasting bad gu...

Blade Warrior (1991) is a side-scrolling beat 'em up that looks like it was illustrated entirely in heavy metal album covers. You’re a silhouette of rage, cutting through dem...

If Conan had a bad day and took it out on a few dozen goblins, you'd get something close to Axe of Rage. This 1989 DOS hack-n-slash isn't exactly subtle—you're a barbarian, t...

Citadel of the Black Sun is a fantasy adventure built around exploration, danger, and the ominous business of investigating a mysterious stronghold. The game places the player in a...

Nobunaga's Ambition is a 1988 strategy game set during Japan’s turbulent Sengoku period, when political alliances were fragile, rival clans were everywhere, and peaceful retireme...

Despite its ominous title, Lord of Destruction from 1994 is less about theatrical villainy and more about classic DOS-era ambition. This is a game that wants to be big, dark, and d...

Imagine Tetris went on a sugar binge and had an identity crisis. That’s Zyconix (1992, DOS) in a nutshell. It’s a tile-matching puzzle game where nothing quite behaves ...

Subhunt puts you beneath the waves for a naval combat experience where finding the enemy can be almost as important as destroying it. The submarine setting creates an interesting a...

F29 Retaliator is what happens when a flight simulator decides it wants to be a blockbuster action movie. You’re piloting a fictional next-generation stealth fighter through ...

Innocent Until Caught throws you into a sci-fi noir universe where your protagonist, a perpetually broke thief, stumbles from one disaster to the next with a mix of charm, sarcasm,...

Rogue is the 1984 DOS version of one of the most influential dungeon-crawling role-playing games ever created. Players explore procedurally generated dungeons, fight monsters, coll...

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 ...

MechWarrior (1989) was one of the first games to put players inside a 3D cockpit of a giant mech, but it wasn’t just a combat game, it was also an open-ended mercenary RPG, w...

Nuclear War is an abandoned turn-based strategy game designed by Eric Hyman and Jon Van Caneghem. Nuclear War was developed and released by New World Computing in 1989 for Amiga an...

Gateworld is one of those games that seems determined to test your patience as much as your reflexes. On paper, it’s a straightforward platformer, but in practice it’s ...

Empire II: The Art of War is strategy without small talk. It improves on its predecessor by refining mechanics and deepening tactical options, making every decision feel heavier an...

Boppin (1994, DOS) is a puzzle game that starts out cute and then sucker-punches you with its sinister undertone—literally. You throw blocks to match symbols, release trapped...

Ports of Call is a 1989 shipping simulation that puts players in charge of a maritime company where success depends on careful planning and smart decisions. Players buy ships, choo...