The most popular abandonware action games

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...

It’s Bomberman (1992, DOS), the legendary bomb-dropping game where you play a suspiciously cute guy with an infinite bomb supply and questionable indoor safety habits. You mo...

Disney’s The Jungle Book asks the eternal question: can a small boy raised by wolves really out-dance a bunch of monkeys while dodging snakes? The answer is yes, but not with...

The Blues Brothers is a platformer that follows the adventures of Jake and Elwood Blues as they try to put their band back together. The player controls one of the Blues Brothers t...

At first glance, Fury of the Furries looks like a cheerful platform game starring colorful fluffballs. Spend a few minutes with it, however, and you’ll realize those adorable...

Metal & Lace: The Battle of the Robo Babes is a video game developed by Megatech Software and published by Forest Interactive in 1993. It's an adult-themed fighting game for MS...

Released in 1995, Psycho Pinball is what happens when traditional pinball eats too much sugar and loses its mind. It’s loud, colorful, and gleefully unhinged, with four disti...

Gal Pani X is the sort of arcade puzzle game that looks innocent for about five seconds before revealing its true nature: a frantic test of nerves where drawing lines is somehow mo...

Doh is back, and he’s mad - presumably because no one understood what he was in the first place. Arkanoid 2 takes the original formula and dials everything up: more levels, m...

Arkanoid is a classic arcade video game that was first released in 1986 by Taito. It is a breakout-style game, which means that the primary objective is to break a wall of bricks o...

Mario Bros VGA is a fan made remake of the original Mario Bros by Nintendo, the game that popularized the character of Mario, the Italian plumber that first appeared in Donkey Kong...

The Amazing Spider-Man is a side-scrolling action game developed by Oxford Digital Enterprises and published by Paragon Software for MS-DOS, Amiga, and Atari ST. The plot revolves ...

The Great Giana Sisters is a platform video game developed by Time Warp Productions and published by Rainbow Arts. It was originally released in 1987 for the Commodore 64 and other...

Mortal Kombat is one of the most popular one-on-one fighting games, and it's no surprise that it has spawned numerous sequels. Players choose from seven digitized characters and ba...

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...

Elvira: The Arcade Game trades puzzles for action and subtlety for pure chaos. This is fast, brutal, side-scrolling combat with monsters pouring in from every direction. Elvira&rsq...

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...

Often mistaken as a Dig Dug clone, Digger is more like its eccentric cousin who insists on bringing a disco soundtrack to every family gathering. Released in 1983 for DOS, it combi...

The Smurfs is a bright and cheerful platformer that brings the tiny blue heroes to life in a world full of mushrooms, forests, and cartoon danger. You run, jump, and bounce your wa...

Ultra Mortal Kombat Vendetta is a fan-made love letter to excessive violence and familiar characters, created well after the peak of the franchise it imitates. It throws subtlety o...

Hercules brings mythological heroism into the late 90s with the kind of enthusiasm that only that era could produce. It mixes action and platforming in a way that occasionally feel...

The classic bomb-defusing, platform-hopping, enemy-dodging chaos of Bomb Jack gets a fresh coat of pixels in this 2002 DOS remake. You’re still the tiny superhero hopping aro...

Ms. Pac-Man is a classic arcade game released by Midway in 1982 (1984 for DOS) as a follow-up to the original Pac-Man (1980), developed by Namco. While its core gameplay ...

Before co-op brawlers were everywhere, there was Double Dragon (1988 on DOS). Two brothers, one kidnapped girlfriend, and enough street thugs to populate a small city—that&rs...