The best text-based games

A Dudley Dilemma (1988) sounds like the title of a children’s book, but it’s actually a very British text adventure for DOS where the stakes are politely quirky and mil...

Released in 1989, this game has you exploring a tomb filled with ancient evils. Navigate through dark corridors, solve puzzles, and confront the awakening demons. It's like playing...

A loving parody of science fiction tropes, EGA Trek takes obvious inspiration from Star Trek and runs with it, humor first. You command a starship, making decisions that range from...

The 1996 Hamurabi remake takes one of the oldest strategy concepts in gaming and gives it a modest DOS-era facelift. At its core, it’s still about managing resources, feeding...

Super ZZT expands the classic ZZT concept into a larger adventure and creation toolkit, giving players worlds to explore as well as tools with which to build their own. The game co...

Ever wanted to combine your love for trivia with Old Testament knowledge and 256-color DOS graphics? Bible Builder is here to test your biblical memory one verse at a time. It's li...

If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to be a criminal economist in 1980s New York, Drug Wars has your fix—pun intended. This early DOS classic throws you into t...

Ah, Championship Manager 93, the game that taught us yelling at pixels is a valid emotional outlet. It's you, a keyboard, and a list of players with stamina ratings. No fancy graph...

Hollywood Hijinx feels like stepping into a puzzle-filled mansion where logic occasionally takes a coffee break. Released in 1986, this text adventure blends humor with brain-teasi...

A year earlier, the other Omega (1988) hit DOS and Linux, and no, it’s not the same game wearing a disguise. This one blends sci-fi exploration with tactical decision-making,...

Based on Anne McCaffrey’s novels, Dragonriders of Pern (1987) is an odd duck. It tries to blend diplomacy, strategy, and a dash of action into one package. You don’t ju...

Mindwheel is a distinctive science fiction adventure that combines interactive storytelling with a strange, dreamlike atmosphere and a focus on exploration. Players encounter unusu...

Pac Gal is a 1982 maze game inspired by the arcade phenomenon that had everyone running through corridors while being chased by colorful ghosts with questionable social skills. Pla...

Welcome to 2112, a game that predicted a grim techno-future back when floppy disks still ruled. This DOS-era oddity throws you into a world that’s part cyberpunk, part fever ...

Despite the ominous title, Caverns of Chaos (1992) plays like the lovechild of rogue-like masochism and old-school dungeon crawling. There’s loot, traps, monsters, and more w...

Put on your mental trench coat, because Codebreaker is here to make you feel smart—or incredibly foolish. It’s a brain-teasing logic game where you deduce secret number...

Released in 1987, Kingdom of Hamil delivers an old-school fantasy role-playing experience where exploration and perseverance matter far more than flashy graphics. Players venture t...