abandonware games sorted by popularity

Stunt Car Racer is an abandoned first-person 3D perspective racing game designed by Geoffrey J. Crammond, developed and released by Microstyle in 1989 for DOS and many other platforms. The peculiar tracks are what makes Stunt Car Racer stand out: you race on a suspended track with the risk of driving off the edges.

Tyrian 2000 is an old DOS science fiction classic shoot'em up, developed by Eclipse Software and designed by Alexander Brandon, Jason Emery, Daniel Cook. Tyrian 2000 is one of the most popular shoot'em ups ever published for DOS and it's still remembered by retro gaming fans to this day.

Ascendancy is a science fiction themed turn-based strategy game developed by The Logic Factory and released in 1995 for DOS. Ascendancy is a classic 4X game (eXpand, eXplore, eXploit, eXterminate), similar to Master of Orion, yet with a few differences such as a technology tree.

VisiCalc was the first spreadsheet software for personal computers, and it played a pivotal role in the early history of personal computing. It was developed by Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston and first released in 1979 for the Apple II computer. VisiCalc is often considered the first electronic spreadsheet, and its success had a significant impact ...

Panger General is a turn based strategy wargame developed by SSI set in World War 2. The player can choose Axis or Allies and fight against the AI or another human player in more than 30 scenarios on a classic hex based map.

Solomon’s Key is an arcade puzzle-platformer developed by Tecmo and released in 1986. It gained popularity for its challenging gameplay and was later ported to various home systems, including the NES, Commodore 64, and others.You play as Dana, a wizard tasked with retrieving the titular Solomon’s Key, a powerful artifact hidden in a dan...

Phantasmagoria is a point-and-click horror adventure game developed and published by Sierra On-Line, released in 1995. Directed by Roberta Williams, Phantasmagoria departed from Sierra's usual fantasy and comedic themes to explore a darker, more mature narrative.The game follows the story of Adrienne Delaney, played by Victoria Morsell, and her hus...

Ever wanted to experience the grim, claustrophobic life of a WWII submarine captain without leaving your desk? Aces of the Deep (1994, DOS) delivers that dream in spades — torpedoes, sonar, periscopes, and lots of tense waiting. It’s haunting, quiet, and deeply strategic, like chess played underwater with depth charges. If you’re ...

Champions of Krynn is a RPG released in 1990 by Strategic Simulations, Inc. (SSI) and is the first game in the Dragonlance Gold Box series. It is based on the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons ruleset and set in the world of Krynn, known from the Dragonlance novels. Players create a party of up to six characters, choosing from the standard AD&am...

Business Simulator is an abandoned business simulation game developed and released by Reality Development in 1987 for DOS only. Business Simulator is a text-based management simulation designed by an university professor.

Space Rogue is a science fiction RPG developed by Richard Garriott's Origin and desined by Paul Neurath. Space Rogue combines a 3D space simulation with a top down view RPG gameplay. As a space pilot you can hunt bounties, buy and sell goods, land on starbases or outposts and talk to NPCs, do quests, etc.

Magic Carpet is an action shooter game set in a fictional Middle East developed by Bullfrog and released by Electronic Arts in 1994 for DOS and Macintosh. Your goal is to fly around a magic carpet and collect mana to expand your castle. When you reach the required mana "equilibrium" you move on to the next world and so on.

Another World (1991) is a cinematic platformer with big ideas, minimal UI, and a shocking willingness to let you die within five seconds of starting. You play as a scientist who gets teleported to an alien planet where everything wants to kill you — from tentacle monsters to prison guards to your own poor timing. It’s beautiful in a sta...

Castle of the Winds is a fantasy roguelike role-playing game developed by SaadaSoft in the early 1990s. It was designed for Windows 3.x and is notable for being one of the earliest graphical RPGs for that platform. The game features a top-down perspective and incorporates elements of dungeon crawling, exploration, and character development.The game...

Capitalism 2 is simulation game designed by Trevor Chan, developed by Ensemble Studios and released by UBI Soft in 2001 for Windows and Macintosh. Capitalism 2 is the quintessential capitalistic simulation and involves stock exchange, business management, marketing, etc.

Hugo's House of Horrors is an adventure game developed by David P. Gray and released in the early 1990s. The game is a text-based adventure with simple graphics, and it gained popularity for its witty and often tongue-in-cheek approach to the horror genre.The story of the game revolves around the main character, Hugo, who receives a letter from his...