abandonware games sorted by popularity

Yu-Gi-Oh! Online takes the collectible card game into a persistent digital environment where players can build decks, duel opponents, and spend a suspicious amount of time discussi...

If Grand Theft Auto had a German uncle who worked in finance, it might look a lot like Dime City. Released in 1995 for DOS, this oddball title blends business simulation with under...

Dr. Sbaitso is one of the more memorable curiosities from the early era of computer speech software. Developed by Creative Labs, it presented itself as a virtual doctor capable of ...

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 ...

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...

Spy Hunter is a 1984 DOS version of the classic arcade action game, putting the player behind the wheel of a heavily armed sports car with a very simple mission: drive fast and mak...

Master of Magic remains one of the finest fantasy strategy games ever created, blending empire building with spellcasting in a world where powerful wizards compete for absolute dom...

Test Drive 3: The Passion takes the “driving simulator” label and adds just enough early-’90s flair to make you feel like a rebel with a V8. Forget endless racetr...

Ultima 5 takes a darker turn. Lord British is missing, and his regent, Lord Blackthorn, has turned Britannia into a police state where virtues are enforced at sword-point. You know...

ADOM is what happens when a rogue, a wizard, and a hungry troll walk into a dungeon and never come out. Released in 1996, this roguelike classic is brutal, brilliant, and unapologe...

The year is 1995, and Abuse brings us one of the slickest, darkest run-and-gun shooters ever to crawl out of a DOS/Linux/Mac basement. You play a guy in prison for a crime he didn&...

Let’s be honest: Cobra Mission is remembered less for its RPG mechanics and more for its... risqué content. The first “eroge” RPG translated into English, ...

Sports management usually involves tactics, budgets, and serious planning. M.U.D.S. - Mean Ugly Dirty Sport decides those are merely optional suggestions. This delightfully outrage...

If you ever wanted to roleplay in a text adventure where a coconut is of utmost importance, Beyond Zork has your back. This is Infocom at its most delightfully weird: part RPG, par...

Released in 1996, Leisure Suit Larry 7: Love for Sail sends Larry aboard a luxurious cruise where romance, mystery, and comedy collide with spectacular enthusiasm. The hand-drawn a...

From the creators of Dragon’s Lair, Space Ace (1989, DOS) is a gloriously over-the-top animated adventure where timing is everything — literally. You play Ace, a muscle...

Wipeout is a futuristic racing game built around speed, aggressive competition, and vehicles that apparently have no interest whatsoever in ordinary road safety. The anti-gravity c...

Premier Manager 2 polished the formula, giving football nerds even more stats to obsess over. If you thought juggling line-ups and balancing books was fun in the first game, this s...

The adventures of Willy Beamish is a point-and-click adventure that perfectly captures the chaos of being a kid with too much imagination and not enough discipline. Willy is consta...

Forget Rambo. Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines is what happens when you drop six experts behind Nazi lines and tell them to behave tactically… or else. Every mission is a deadl...

Wolfenstein 3D is one of the landmark first-person shooters, placing players behind the eyes of an Allied soldier fighting through Nazi strongholds packed with guards, dogs, secret...

Back in 1992, The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Serrated Scalpel set the bar for pixelated deduction. A famous actress is dead, and every gentleman in London seems...

Few games capture the feeling of “the galaxy is huge and you are spectacularly insignificant” quite like Frontier: Elite 2. Released in 1993, this ambitious sequel thro...

Star Saga: Two - The Clathran Menace continues the science-fiction role-playing adventure of its predecessor, expanding the story and sending players deeper into a galaxy threatene...

Ah, Dungeon Keeper, where you’re not the hero—you’re the evil overlord. And it feels so good. Released in 1997, this Bullfrog classic flipped the script on fantas...

World Class Leader Board is a classic golf simulation that takes a fairly serious approach to the ancient art of hitting a tiny ball into a distant hole. Rather than turning golf i...

If you’ve ever wanted to conquer a fantasy world while feeling like a medieval accountant with anger issues, Warlords 2 has you covered. Released in 1993, it’s a turn-b...

Blade of Destiny is old-school RPGing at its most unapologetic. Based on the German tabletop system Das Schwarze Auge, it throws you into a world where character creation alone fee...

Indiana Jones and His Desktop Adventures is a charmingly odd experiment that shrinks globe-trotting archaeology into bite-sized missions designed for quick play sessions. Viewed fr...

Ah yes, Blood (1997)—the cheerful little game where you rise from the grave, wield a pitchfork, and quote evil-sounding movie lines while setting cultists on fire. It’s...