The best science fiction games

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...

CHAMP Galaxia is a retro arcade shooter that looks back fondly at the early days of computer space combat. The action revolves around controlling a small craft, blasting waves of h...

Deus is an ambitious science-fiction adventure that blends exploration, combat, puzzles, and role-playing elements into a sprawling futuristic journey. The game drops you into a my...

In Diggers 2: Extractors, released in 1995, the digging franchise doubled down on strategy while adding a dash of science fiction flair. This time, your miners aren’t just bu...

Earthrise taps into late Cold War anxieties, presenting a future shaped by political tension and hard choices. Part strategy, part simulation, it tasks you with managing global sys...

Doubling down on chaos, Fire and Forget 2 turns the volume up and asks questions later. The concept remains deliciously simple: speed forward, blast everything, try not to explode ...

Yes, it’s called Fish!, and yes, it’s as quirky as the exclamation mark suggests. This is a puzzle-platformer with personality, placing you in surreal environments that...

Galactix continues the grand space-shooter tradition with enthusiasm and a healthy disregard for your survival odds. You control a small but determined ship facing waves of enemy f...

Hovertank One is an early first-person combat game that places you inside a futuristic armored vehicle and sends you into hostile environments. The idea is delightfully direct: dri...

Mega Man Legends takes Capcom's famous blue hero in a very different direction from his traditional side-scrolling adventures. Instead of running through neatly arranged platforms,...

MicroMan is a wonderfully strange platform adventure that shrinks its hero down to microscopic proportions and sends him into a world where ordinary objects become enormous obstacl...

Nanotank is a 1993 Windows 3.x strategy game that takes the concept of armored warfare and shrinks it down to a delightfully miniature scale. Instead of commanding enormous armies ...

ShadowForce (1994, DOS) is what happens when someone decides subtlety is overrated and replaces it with explosions. This tactical action romp drops you into a near-future mess of m...

Starglider 2 takes the original's flying and shooting formula and expands it into a much larger science-fiction playground. Released in 1989, it gives players a futuristic craft ca...

Based loosely on Jules Verne’s famous tale, this game lets you live your steampunk submarine dreams with all the elegance of a DOS interface. You command the Nautilus, explor...

Ever wondered what would happen if a roguelike and a B-movie had a radioactive baby? AlphaMan is the answer. Set in a post-apocalyptic world where mutant banana slugs might be your...

Sci-Mutant Priestess (1989) is French, weird, and proud of it. You play as a rebellious mutant in a post-apocalyptic, sci-fi world ruled by bio-psychic cults. Obviously. It’s...

Thexder is a wonderfully odd hybrid of shooting and exploration, built around a small transforming robot that can switch between walking and flying forms. That transformation is no...

Released in 1990, Imperium offers strategy fans a chance to rule, conquer, and inevitably mismanage resources on a grand scale. It combines empire-building with military planning, ...

Star Wars: Rebel Assault is a 1993 interactive action game designed to recreate the cinematic excitement of the original trilogy through pre-rendered sequences, scripted missions, ...

No, not that Battlestar. Battlestar (1996) is more obscure than a reboot that never happened. Set in deep space with a top-down view and UI only a Windows 3.x user could love, it m...

B.A.T. is a cyberpunk-themed adventure game released in 1989 by UBI Soft for various platforms, including Amiga, Atari ST, MS-DOS, and later the Commodore 64. It blends adventure, ...

If Lorna were a comic book, it would be the kind your parents warned you about. Based on the Spanish sci-fi heroine by Alfonso Azpiri, this 1990 action-platformer on DOS is a cockt...

Armour-Geddon is what you get when someone combines Wargames with a midlife crisis. Set in a post-nuke world where you pilot tanks, helicopters, and laser cannons to stop a doomsda...

Wing Commander Academy takes the combat system of the famous series and strips away much of the campaign structure, allowing players to concentrate on what they presumably came for...

Released in 1988, Alien Fires 2199 AD looks and plays like someone tried to translate a fever dream into a sci-fi RPG. You control some dude with a chin of steel and a crew that se...

Starglider is a 1986 science-fiction action game that combines fast flying with shooting, exploration, and a surprisingly open environment. Players pilot a futuristic craft across ...

Released in 1988 for DOS, Star Trek: First Contact (not to be confused with the later movie) is more puzzle-solving than phaser-firing. You take control of the Enterprise crew as t...

If Doom and Laser Tag had a baby raised by dial-up modems, it would be 3D Cyber Blaster. Released in 1992, this shooter has you blasting neon enemies in a world that looks like a T...

Kaeon is one of those obscure role-playing adventures that quietly invites players into a fantasy world without relying on flashy presentation. Exploration, character growth, and t...