abandonware games sorted by popularity

World Darts takes the humble pub game of darts and gives it a suitably digital makeover. The objective sounds simple enough: throw little pointed objects at a circular board and tr...

Ocean Ranger is a 1988 simulation that places the player in command of an offshore oil platform, which sounds like a perfectly calm occupation until you remember that the ocean, ma...

ResidualVM is an open-source game engine project created to run certain classic adventure games on modern computers by replacing their original executable code with a compatible en...

With a title like Ooze: Creepy Nites (1989, DOS), you’d expect something slimy and unsettling—and the game absolutely delivers. A hybrid of action and puzzle elements, ...

Night Hunter is a 1988 action game that embraces the idea of being a creature of the night and then gives the player plenty of reasons to regret leaving the house after sunset. The...

Star Fleet 2: Krellan Commander builds on its predecessor with a larger and more ambitious space strategy experience. Players command a starship during a major interstellar conflic...

Unreal by Ordilogic, released in 1991, is not the one most people think of, and that alone makes it interesting. It’s an action-adventure experience that blends exploration with ...

Strife from 1996 is a first-person shooter game developed by Rogue Entertainment and published by Velocity, based on the Doom engine. It's often remembered for being one of the ear...

Microsoft Diagnostics 3.01 is a troubleshooting utility designed to examine a DOS computer and provide useful information about its hardware and system configuration. In an era whe...

Microsoft Multiplan 4.2 is a spreadsheet application from the years when electronic spreadsheets were still something of a revelation. Multiplan lets users organize figures into ro...

Part racing game, part endurance test, African Trail Simulator dares you to hop on a pixel bike and brave the wild. You’ll encounter hostile terrain, wildlife, and the occasi...

Space MAX is a 1992 DOS space game that combines arcade-style shooting with a science-fiction setting and the familiar goal of surviving against increasingly dangerous enemies. Pla...

In the Dead of Night is one of those mid-90s DOS oddities that feels like it crawled straight out of a programmer’s personal nightmares. Part adventure, part horror, and part...

Dino Crisis takes the survival-horror formula and makes one very important adjustment: instead of zombies, you get dinosaurs. Because apparently undead people were not terrifying e...

Amarillo Slim's 7 Card Stud turns the classic poker variant into a computer card game with the legendary Amarillo Slim providing the name and atmosphere. Seven-card stud is all abo...

Corsarios is a maritime adventure that sends players into a world of ships, exploration, trade, and piracy. The player takes control of a vessel and must navigate waters while deal...

If Tetris and a Rubik’s Cube had a weird love child, it’d be Brix. This 1992 brain-snapper is a tile-sliding puzzle game where every move counts and logic is your only ...

Ever wanted to design a roller coaster so terrifying it’d make your pixelated patrons vomit in joy? Coaster is your twisted playground. Build loops, dives, and stomach-churni...

In Escape from Dr. Colosso, you find yourself trapped in the lair of a mad scientist whose idea of interior design seems to be “danger first, safety never.” It’s ...

Jazz Jackrabbit Holiday Hare takes the fast-paced action of the original game and wraps it in festive cheer. Released in 1994 as a seasonal special, it sends Jazz through winter-th...

Where in the USA is Carmen Sandiego? Deluxe Edition revisits the classic American geography chase with an expanded presentation and the same wonderfully simple premise: find Carmen...

Final Frontier is a late-80s slice of space ambition, the kind that assumes you’re perfectly happy staring at menus while imagining epic interstellar conquest. It’s str...

In Sito Pons 500cc Grand Prix, you’re tossed straight onto the track with the grace of a rookie who definitely didn’t read the manual. The game tries hard to recreate t...

Ever dreamed of a medieval Wall Street where knights swap swords instead of stocks? Knight Exchange turns that fever dream into pixels. Released in 1988 for DOS, this quirky strate...

Trivial Pursuit Deluxe takes the familiar question-and-answer formula and gives it a more polished computer treatment. The goal remains pleasingly simple: answer questions across a...

Released in 1990, Dawn Raider is one of those obscure DOS shooters that probably spent more time in floppy disk boxes than in actual computers. It’s a vertical shoot-’e...

If Star Trek Combat Arena had a motto, it would be “talk diplomacy later.” Released in 1989 for DOS, this game tossed Starfleet’s peaceful ideals right out the ai...

Ken's Labyrinth throws players into twisting mazes packed with monsters, hidden rooms, colorful textures, and enough secret passages to keep even the most determined explorer suspi...

Sink or Swim is basically what happens when someone asks, “What if we turned a rescue operation into a slapstick puzzle show?” You guide lifeboat-juggling hero S.S. Dav...

Math Cad 2.5 is a mathematical computing package from an era when serious technical calculations were increasingly moving from paper and calculators onto personal computers. It pro...