abandonware games sorted by popularity

There are games with subtle titles, and then there is Fuck Quest, which clearly decided subtlety was overrated. Released in 1998 for DOS, it belongs to that peculiar era when share...

Mech Commander: Gold (1999) is tactical perfection for fans of giant robots and careful planning. Set in the BattleTech universe, the game puts you in command of a mercenary squad ...

The 1990 adaptation of Tim Burton’s Batman hit DOS screens with a moody mix of driving, platforming, and side-scrolling bat-beatdowns. Batman: The Movie swings between genres...

Microsoft Decathlon was a popular sports video game released by Microsoft in 1980. It was one of the earliest sports simulation games, notable for its variety of events and competi...

With a title like Dogfight: 80 Years of Aerial Warfare, you know you’re in for a serious history lesson disguised as a game. Released in 1993, this DOS flight sim spans decad...

Xonix is one of those deceptively simple games that quickly becomes an obsession, tasking you with carving out sections of the screen while avoiding relentless enemies. The mechani...

Before Football Manager devoured your social life, there was Championship Manager. With graphics as bare as a locker room and stats as detailed as a tax form, it’s a numbers ...

With Chess88, you’re entering the elite club of DOS chess nerds who appreciate ASCII art and precision time controls. Compared to its 1981 predecessor, it’s a leap forw...

Ascii Sector is what happens when someone takes Privateer, removes the graphics, and replaces them with pure ASCII and sheer willpower. It’s open-world space sim meets roguel...

Released in 1984, Hack is one of those games that quietly shaped an entire genre while pretending not to care if you understood it or not. This early roguelike doesn’t bother...

SimCity (or SimCity Classic) is a popular city building simulation in which you, the mayor of a city, have to build a metropolis from the ground up. You can build police and fire d...

When in Gaul, punch like the Gauls do. In Asterix and Obelix (1996), you control the iconic French duo on a globetrotting beat-‘em-up adventure that mostly involves sending R...

Carl Lewis Challenge is a sports simulation video game that was released in 1992 by Psygnosis for various platforms, including the Amiga, Atari ST, and DOS. Named after the famous ...

Powermonger takes the god-game formula of Populous and gives it teeth. Instead of playing benevolent deity, you’re more like a slightly cranky warlord, sending little soldier...

If you ever wanted to play a point-and-click adventure where the protagonists have the combined IQ of a slice of cheese, Beavis and Butt-Head in Virtual Stupidity is your masterpie...

J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, Vol. I is an abandoned fantasy top-down DOS RPG game set in the The Lord of the Rings universe. The Lord of the Rings I was developed a...

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...

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) is an arcade game released in 1989 by Konami. It is based on the popular Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise. The game was initially released...

Italy 1990 captures the football fever of the World Cup with arcade-style simplicity and competitive energy. Released during the tournament itself, it thrives on accessibility and ...

NeoPaint 3.2 is a raster-based graphics editing software designed for DOS. It is a lightweight yet powerful alternative to more complex image editing programs like Photoshop. NeoPa...

Few adventure games manage to feel as effortlessly cool as Full Throttle. Released in 1995 by LucasArts, it places you in the boots of Ben, the gravel-voiced leader of the Polecats...