abandonware games sorted by popularity

King's Quest V: Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder represented a major leap forward for Sierra, introducing hand-painted visuals, a point-and-click interface, and full voice acting ...

The Humans is a puzzle game built around a charmingly simple idea: you control a group of tiny prehistoric people and must help them reach safety by making use of their different a...

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...

Wolfpack is a naval combat simulation centered on submarine warfare, where patience, observation, and careful positioning matter far more than quick reflexes. Players command subma...

Castles 2 took everything the first game did and cranked it up with actual diplomacy, espionage, and conquest mechanics. Now you’re not just stacking bricks—you’r...

Stellar 7 takes the tank-combat formula and launches it into science fiction, giving you a futuristic armored vehicle and a whole galaxy of unpleasant things to shoot. Inspired by ...

Hugo’s House of Horrors is a classic example of early adventure gaming, complete with pixelated graphics and puzzles that require a mix of logic and guesswork. Released in 1990, ...

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,...

This 1989 game is based on the animated movie where dogs die, go to heaven, then come back for revenge (sort of). The DOS adaptation? Well, it’s more like All Pixels Go Nowhe...

Shadowlands (1992, DOS) hands you a party of adventurers and then expects you to coordinate them like a fantasy air-traffic controller. Instead of a single hero, you manage four ch...

In Corporate Raider: The Pirate of Wall Street, you’re not sailing the high seas—you’re sinking companies from the comfort of an office chair. This business simul...

Ah, Advantage Tennis—where the graphics are flat, the physics are questionable, and the grunts are blessedly absent. This DOS-era sports sim serves up matches that somehow fe...

There’s a certain audacity in naming a sequel Oh no! More Lemmings, as if the developers knew exactly what they were unleashing upon your already overworked brain. This 1991 ...

The title Dinosaur Balls might raise eyebrows today, but in 1992 it was just a quirky DOS puzzle game. Think of it as prehistoric Bubble Bobble: you fire colored spheres to match a...

If Tetris and a Rubik’s Cube had a weird love child, it’d be Brix. This 1992 brain-snapper is a tile-sliding puzzle game where every move counts and logic is your only ...

Skate or Die is the embodiment of late-’80s “cool,” complete with neon chaos, absurdly dangerous skate events, and characters who look like they stepped out of a ...

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...

Falcon 3.0 arrived in 1991 and decided that realism wasn’t enough: it wanted obsession. This sequel didn’t just improve graphics and sound, it doubled down on systems, ...

Epic (1992, DOS) lives up to its name—or at least tries very, very hard. It’s a space combat game bursting with ambition, tossing you into dogfights that feel massive e...

With a title that sounds like a deep-sea motivational poster, Big Sea: The Better One Will Win is a maritime strategy game where the stakes are high and the water’s pixelated...

Tunnels & Trolls: Crusaders of Khazan adapts the tabletop fantasy role-playing system into a substantial computer adventure filled with exploration, combat, character development, ...

Guilty from 1995 is a moody point-and-click adventure that seems to have majored in brooding. You step into a murder investigation drenched in rain-soaked atmosphere and existentia...

Remember the spandex-clad madness of 90s TV? American Gladiators brings it to your DOS screen with all the grace of a flying pugil stick. You’ll compete in various bizarre ev...

The first Ishar (1992, DOS) introduced players to a fantasy world where every decision could backfire spectacularly. You’re tasked with toppling a tyrant, but first you&rsquo...

Galaxy is a relic from the early days of PC gaming, when the idea of exploring space could be conveyed with a handful of pixels and a lot of imagination. The gameplay is simple, re...

The Ultimate Doom expands the classic demon-blasting formula with an additional episode and plenty more reasons to wonder why opening that suspicious door seemed like a good idea. ...

PHM Pegasus is a 1987 naval simulation that places players in command of a modern hydrofoil missile ship. The game focuses on controlling the vessel, managing weapons, and completi...

Strip Poker: A Sizzling Game of Chance is an early example of the adult computer-game genre, taking ordinary poker and adding a rather more provocative incentive to win. The card g...

If you’ve ever dreamed of commanding a WWII convoy while cold, stressed, and staring at a pixelated radar screen, Action in the North Atlantic (1989, DOS) has you covered. It...

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 &am...