abandonware games sorted by popularity

Hamburger Hell from 1986 is one of those titles that practically dares you to ask, “What were they thinking?” The premise is gloriously absurd, and the execution doesn&...

Dungeon Keeper 2 took everything its predecessor did and gave it a demonic polish. Slicker graphics, full 3D environments, and imps that finally looked like they deserved a raise. ...

If Doom and Gauntlet had a lovechild, Alien Breed would be the weird kid who hangs out in dark corridors with a shotgun. Released in 1993 for DOS, this top-down shooter throws you ...

Arthur: The Quest for Excalibur is a text adventure with occasional graphics, in which you, the not-yet-king, bumble your way through Camelot trying to prove you’re not just ...

Take everything that made Warlords 2 addictive, polish it up, throw in more content, and you get Warlords 2 Deluxe, the definitive “I’ll only play for ten minutes&rdquo...

If you’ve ever dreamed of becoming a 19th-century merchant sailing the high seas with a suspiciously optimistic outlook on international trade, 1869 is your jam. It throws yo...

Imagine being the captain of a space freighter crewed entirely by neurotic aliens, each with a personality straight out of a sitcom. That’s Psi 5 Trading Company in a nutshel...

A moody sci-fi adventure drenched in neon gloom, The Orion Conspiracy (1995, DOS) tosses you into a futuristic murder mystery where everyone seems to be hiding something—ofte...

Part puzzle, part platformer, part “what is even happening,” Bombuzal (1989, DOS) is a game where your job is to blow up every bomb on the screen—while not accide...

Ardentryst is the indie platformer that tried really hard to be a Metroidvania and kinda pulled it off. With anime-style art, RPG elements, and two playable characters, it’s ...

Omega (1989, DOS) is what happens when someone hands you a robot, a wrench, and a thick manual, then says, “Good luck out there.” Instead of piloting a mech, you actual...

Conquest of the New World (Deluxe Edition) invites you to discover new lands, build colonies, and occasionally “accidentally” wipe out entire civilizations while smilin...

Empire Earth asks a bold question: what if we took all of human history and turned it into one very long real-time strategy match? From cavemen to mech-wielding future armies, this...

The sequel no one expected takes our trench-coated hero from gothic horror to gangster ghost story. Yes, Alone in the Dark 2 (1993, DOS) swaps Lovecraftian horror for Tommy guns an...

Released in 1990, Dragon Strike dared to combine the wonder of Dungeons & Dragons with the thrill of first-person flight simulation. Yes, instead of piloting jets, you piloted ...

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...

UMS 2: Nations at War is a serious military strategy game that takes itself very seriously indeed. It simulates modern warfare with an emphasis on realism, logistics, and command s...

Ugh! answers the eternal question: what if a stone-age delivery service were the basis for an entire video game? You play as a caveman whose main skills include grunting, flying a ...

Fantasy General, released in 1996, takes the structure of classic wargames and wraps it in a richly illustrated fantasy skin. Battles are turn-based and highly tactical, emphasizin...

Alien Legacy (1994) is like SimCity crashed into Star Trek and nobody called the insurance company. It’s a real-time strategy/simulation game that has you managing a colony i...

From the people who brought you Dungeons & Dragons, here's Blood & Magic (1996), the RTS that nobody remembers but definitely deserves a second glance. You summon golems fr...

If you’ve ever looked at Tetris and thought, “This needs to be in 3D and way harder,” then BlockOut 2 (2000) is your kind of punishment. This brain-melter takes f...

In Ambush at Sorinor, tactics meet fantasy in a land where ambushing people is apparently the national sport. You’re a mercenary commander picking the right team to win missi...