abandonware games sorted by popularity

Harley-Davidson: The Road to Sturgis is less about racing and more about the journey, which sounds poetic until you realize the road can be quite unforgiving. You ride across the U...

The sequel nobody asked for, but we’re still kinda glad happened. California Games 2 adds even weirder sports: jet-skiing, hang gliding, and bodyboarding, which is like surfi...

Balance of Power: The 1990 Edition is a geopolitical strategy game developed by Chris Crawford and released in 1985. It is considered a classic in the genre of political and strate...

Heimdall 2: Into the Hall of Worlds expands on the original with more content and a broader scope, as if the developers decided one world was simply not enough. The gameplay remain...

Narco Police is a 1990 cyberpunk action game that throws the player into a future where crime has become sufficiently unpleasant to require heavily armed officers, futuristic techn...

Boulder Dash is a classic action-puzzle video game that was first released in 1984 by First Star Software. In Boulder Dash, players control a character named Rockford as he di...

Elona looks innocent, almost cute, and then immediately proves it has no interest in your comfort. This roguelike RPG is bizarre, unpredictable, and gleefully cruel. You can become...

The Duel: Test Drive 2 turns the fantasy of high-speed driving into a straight-faced competition between exotic cars, winding roads, and an alarming number of opportunities to disc...

Instead of another platform adventure, Mario's Game Gallery invites players to enjoy a collection of classic tabletop games alongside Nintendo's cheerful mascot. Chess, checkers, d...

Quest for Glory III: Wages of War is an adventure/role-playing game developed and published by Sierra On-Line in 1992. The player takes on the role of the Hero, who has journe...

Gunship is a landmark helicopter simulation that treats you less like a player and more like a trainee pilot who forgot to read the manual. It demands attention to instrumentation,...

Released in 2001 for PC, Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds is what happens when someone looks at Age of Empires II and says, “This is good, but what if there were AT-ATs stom...

In The Lost Vikings (1993, DOS), three Viking warriors with more brawn than brains find themselves kidnapped by aliens. Instead of raiding villages, they’re solving puzzles w...

Loom is a graphic adventure game developed and published by Lucasfilm Games (now LucasArts). It was designed by Brian Moriarty and is known for its unique gameplay mechanics and em...

Stunt Car Racer takes the humble racing game and removes almost everything sensible about it. Instead of ordinary tracks, you get enormous elevated circuits filled with ramps, jump...

If you like your RPGs verbose, Betrayal at Krondor is basically a fantasy novel you play. Set in Raymond E. Feist’s Midkemia, the game oozes with narrative depth, detailed ch...

In Freddy Pharkas: Frontier Pharmacist, Sierra took the Wild West and decided it needed more jokes, more puns, and significantly more medical malpractice. Released in 1993, this po...

Uncharted Waters invites you to sail the high seas in 1990, back when exploration meant patience, curiosity, and occasionally getting very lost. This isn’t a game that rushes you...

If you ever wanted to fly a helicopter that looks like it belongs in a Michael Bay fever dream, Comanche: Maximum Overkill (1992, DOS) is for you. This voxel-powered beast puts you...

Before immersive sims were a buzzword, there was Ultima Underworld. Dropping you into a massive first-person dungeon, it gave players freedom unthinkable at the time. Want to negot...

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 ...

Eishockey Manager is proof that spreadsheets can, in fact, be thrilling—if you really love ice hockey. Released in 1993, this is a hardcore management sim that skips the flas...

SimCity 3000 continues Maxis's famous city-building series with a larger, more detailed simulation and considerably more ways for a mayor to make questionable decisions. Players de...

Ports of Call is a 1989 shipping simulation that puts players in charge of a maritime company where success depends on careful planning and smart decisions. Players buy ships, choo...

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 ...

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...

Ski or Die is a winter sports-themed video game that was originally released in 1990 for various platforms, including the Commodore 64, Amiga, and MS-DOS. The game was developed by...

River Raid remake is a 1995 DOS reinterpretation of the classic vertically scrolling shooter, bringing the familiar thrill of flying low over rivers, forests, bridges, and enemy in...

Conflict is a turn-based war game where you get to play Commander-in-Chief and yell at your virtual generals when things go wrong (which they often do). It's part military sim, par...