abandonware games sorted by popularity

X-COM: Terror from the Deep (also known as X-COM 2) is a DOS science fiction tactical strategy game and the sequel to one of the most popular DOS games in history, X-COM: UFO ...

Before Command & Conquer, there was Command HQ (1990, DOS/Mac)—an early RTS that said “what if we made World War III playable?” It’s global domination m...

Before he became better known as Alien Carnage, Halloween Harry blasted onto DOS PCs in 1993 with fast action, crude humor, and zero interest in subtlety. You play Harry, armed to ...

Flight of the Intruder aims for authenticity, placing you in the tense skies of Vietnam-era missions. This isn’t a carefree joyride; every sortie carries weight, from meticul...

Ascendancy is the friendlier, trippier cousin of Master of Orion. It’s 4X strategy in space, with bizarre alien races, psychedelic menus, and a soundtrack that sounds like it...

Laura Bow 2: The Dagger of Amon Ra is a point-and-click adventure game developed and published by Sierra On-Line in 1992. The game is a sequel to The Colonel's Bequest and follows ...

Times of Lore is an abandoned action RPG designed by Chris Roberts, developed and released by Origin Systems in 1989 for DOS and many more 8 bit and 16 bit platforms. Compared to U...

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...

Lemmings was one of the most iconic puzzle games ever made. It was also one of the most inventive. The idea behind those tiny furred punk suicidal rodents is truly a stroke of geni...

Then there’s Martian Dreams, the Ultima game where you travel to Mars in the 19th century with none other than Sigmund Freud and Nikola Tesla. Yes, it’s as delightfully...

By 1994, digging had evolved from arcade twitch action to full-on economic warfare. Diggers on DOS turned mining into a cutthroat competition between quirky alien races, each with ...

Empire Deluxe is the kind of strategy game that politely pretends to be simple while quietly stealing entire weekends from your life. On the surface, it’s a turn-based war ga...

Scorched Earth (1991) was the “mother of all games” long before Doom took the title. Two or more tanks face off on a randomly generated terrain, and your only mission i...

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...

StarCraft is a classic RTS (Real-Time Strategy) game developed by Blizzard Entertainment and released in 1998 for Windows and Macintosh. StarCraft takes the Warcraft experience to ...

Aldo’s Adventure is what you get when someone squints at Donkey Kong and decides to remake it after four cups of coffee and a long nap. You play Aldo, a brave little guy whos...

ARJ is a file compression utility and file format created by Robert K. Jung. The name "ARJ" stands for "Archived by Robert Jung." It was popular in the late 1980s and early 1990s a...

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...

Domino’s Pizza once had a mascot called the Noid and someone decided he deserved his own video game. Avoid the Noid is about a heroic pizza delivery guy trying to bring food ...

Circuit's Edge is a cyberpunk-themed role-playing game developed by Westwood Associates and published by Infocom. It was released in 1990 for MS-DOS. Set in a dystopian future, Cir...

The final Championship Manager to grace DOS—and what a send-off. Season 97/98 is the fan-favorite for a reason: every transfer, every injury, every last-minute goal feels lik...

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 ...

Crescent is a mysterious blend of action and intrigue set in a pixelated sci-fi world. The plot is sparse, dropped in cryptic hints as you battle your way through hostile landscape...

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 ...