abandonware games sorted by popularity

La Grande Armée (1991) returns to Napoleonic warfare, but with a sharper focus on military tactics than imperial administration. This strategy game puts you in charge of mas...

Simple concepts often age remarkably well, and Mah Jongg Solitaire proves the point beautifully. The objective is straightforward: remove matching tiles while ensuring each selecti...

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...

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 ...

Freddy Hardest introduces a hero whose name suggests subtlety was never on the table. This action-platformer throws you into alien-infested territory armed with a blaster and a stu...

Fallen Angel, released in 1989, is one of those games that feels slightly mysterious even while you’re playing it. Blending action and light adventure elements, it drops you ...

In 1988, kids with floppy disks instead of smartphones got Designasaurus, a quirky blend of education and prehistoric fantasy. The premise: design your own dinosaur and see if it s...

If Krazy Ivan (1996, Windows XP) had a motto, it’d be “Blow it up first, ask later.” You pilot a massive mech across post-apocalyptic battlefields, obliterating a...

There’s a certain dark humor baked into Global Thermo War, a game that tackles nuclear conflict with a mix of strategy and unsettling realism. It’s not exactly cheerful...

Beast is ASCII horror at its most gloriously minimal. You’re a brave soul (well, a smiley face) trapped in a dungeon with sentient blobs (the titular beasts) that want you ve...

Steel Thunder puts you behind the controls of a modern tank and asks a deceptively simple question: how long can you survive when practically everything around you wants to turn yo...

Ah, BurgerTime. The game that asked the important question: what if we made a platformer about a tiny chef assembling giant burgers while being chased by sentient hot dogs? You gui...

Indenture is a small, relatively obscure DOS adventure that thrives on mood rather than complexity. Set in a bleak, oppressive world, it uses minimalistic visuals and text-driven s...

Thud Ridge is a military flight simulation built around the dangerous skies of the Vietnam War, putting the player behind the controls of combat aircraft and asking for considerabl...

Invaders 78 in 2000 is a loving revival of classic arcade shooting, bringing retro alien-blasting into the modern era with affectionate energy. It understands exactly what made the...

Forgotten Worlds is what happens when gravity politely excuses itself and lets you spin in circles while shooting absolutely everything. Originally an arcade spectacle, this DOS ve...

Reaping The Dungeon is a 1993 DOS dungeon adventure centered on exploration, combat, and the traditional pleasures of crawling through dangerous underground environments. Players v...

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...

Goody throws you into the shoes of a small-time thief in a colorful, chaotic city that feels like it was designed by someone who really wanted to punish jump timing. As you sneak a...

Zyclunt is a side-scrolling action game developed and published by Phantagram in 1995. The game is set in a dystopian future where incurable diseases and a rise in criminal activit...

Now with more charts than ever! Baseball Mogul 2006 lets you relive the thrilling world of late-season trades and player salary negotiations in glorious Windows XP-era style. It&rs...

The Blue & the Gray is a strategy game built around the American Civil War, giving players the chance to command forces on either side of the conflict. Released in 1993, it focuses...

Deus is an ambitious science-fiction adventure that blends exploration, combat, puzzles, and role-playing elements into a sprawling futuristic journey. The game drops you into a my...

The Godfather is a strategy and management game inspired by the world of organized crime, putting the player in charge of a criminal empire where loyalty, money, territory, and inf...

At-slow4 is an obscure DOS utility whose name alone sounds like something that might have been typed into a command prompt by a programmer at three in the morning. It belongs to th...

Hovertank One is an early first-person combat game that places you inside a futuristic armored vehicle and sends you into hostile environments. The idea is delightfully direct: dri...

Released in 1983, this is your grandpa’s Battleship—minus the plastic pegs, but with all the tension of blind naval warfare. There are no fancy graphics, no Hollywood e...

PC*Bert is a 1997 DOS puzzle game that clearly takes inspiration from classic arcade ideas while adding its own personality. Players guide a character through challenging levels fi...

MDDClone is a modern retro-style project that deliberately looks back toward the golden age of classic computer games. Rather than chasing photorealistic graphics or enormous open ...

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...