abandonware games sorted by popularity

Super Mario Fusion: Revival is a fan-made platform adventure that mixes classic Mario-style gameplay with a more modern homebrew approach. The emphasis is on jumping, collecting, e...

There was a time when digitized sprites and surprisingly loud crowd noise felt like cutting-edge sports science, and FIFA Soccer 96 proudly lived in that moment. The big selling po...

Space Hulk is a 1993 tactical game based on the Warhammer 40,000 board game, placing squads of Space Marines inside enormous abandoned spacecraft known as hulks. These dark corrido...

Lemmings 95, released for Windows in 1994, packages the classic puzzle experience with updated presentation while preserving everything that made the original games so addictive. H...

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...

If you ever wanted to run a football club without leaving your chair, The Manager (1991, DOS) delivers. This early management sim lets you buy players, balance budgets, and suffer ...

If your childhood involved model trains and elaborate setups that your cat kept destroying, 3D Ultra Lionel Traintown is digital therapy. Released in 2000 for Windows XP, it mixes ...

Boppin (1994, DOS) is a puzzle game that starts out cute and then sucker-punches you with its sinister undertone—literally. You throw blocks to match symbols, release trapped...

Released in 1988, Life & Death offers an unusually serious medical simulation where players assume the role of a surgeon responsible for diagnosing illnesses and performing delicat...

Penthouse Hot Numbers is a 1993 DOS puzzle game that combines number-based challenges with the visual style and presentation typical of its era. Players must use logic and observat...

Fade to Black (1995) aims high and mostly lands on its feet, delivering a cinematic science-fiction adventure that feels ambitious even today. As a sequel to Flashback, it keeps th...

What do you get when you mix Mad Max, Car Wars, and a fondness for vehicular homicide? You get Autoduel (1985, DOS), a top-down driving RPG where your car is your castle and your g...

Lamborghini: American Challenge (1992) is what happens when arcade racing meets a poster-covered teenage bedroom. You race exotic cars across the U.S., earn money, upgrade vehicles...

Days of Thunder (1990) is what happens when Hollywood’s love affair with Tom Cruise collides with DOS racing. Based on the movie of the same name, it’s an attempt to ca...

Ah, B.A.T. 2, the cyberpunk sequel that decided the future needed more trench coats, tech jargon, and inexplicably confusing interfaces. Released in 1992 for DOS, this game throws ...

Karateka combines cinematic storytelling with martial arts action in a way that was remarkably ambitious for its time. Players guide a lone warrior through a fortress filled with g...

Strip Poker 3 continues the long-running tradition of taking a perfectly respectable card game and giving it an entirely different reason to attract attention. The core gameplay is...

When Links: The Challenge of Golf appeared in 1990, it immediately set new standards for realistic golf simulations. Beautifully designed courses, convincing physics, and carefully...

Turok: Dinosaur Hunter throws the player into a first-person adventure where prehistoric creatures have apparently decided that modern civilization was a terrible idea. Armed with ...

Ever dreamt of running ancient Rome without the toga chafing? Caesar hands you the reins of a budding province and expects you to not burn it to the ground—ideally. This city...

Theme Hospital takes the serious business of healthcare and turns it into one of the funniest management simulations ever made. Instead of simply treating ordinary illnesses, you r...

Frogger needs very little introduction, yet it still deserves respect. Originally released in 1983, this deceptively simple game asks you to guide a frog across busy roads and trea...

Long before Minecraft let us build worlds, Adventure Construction Set handed you a digital Lego box and said, “Go nuts.” Want to make a dungeon full of orcs and ham san...

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...

In Al-Qadim: The Genie's Curse (1994), you’re not some grizzled barbarian or pointy-hatted wizard - no, you’re a noble corsair with charm, a sword, and a knack for gett...

If Oil Barons is Monopoly with attitude, Oil Imperium is its slightly more serious cousin who read a business textbook once and won’t let you forget it. Released in 1989, thi...

Arkanoid: Doh It Again revisits the classic brick-breaking formula with the familiar paddle, ball and increasingly fragile-looking collection of blocks. The objective remains wonde...

Desert Strike: Return to the Gulf (1994) gives you one helicopter, a desert full of angry enemies, and more explosions than a summer blockbuster. It’s part shooter, part reso...

Midtown Madness turns the streets of Chicago into one enormous playground for chaotic driving, where racing is only one of several excellent excuses to ignore traffic laws. Players...

Legend of the Red Dragon (1989) isn’t so much a traditional game as it is a slice of online history. This BBS door game allowed players to log in, fight monsters, flirt with ...