The most popular text-based games

In the past, lots of games used ASCII characters (text) to represent the game world. These text-only video games may seem primitive and outdated and, in fact, the genre almost died with the fast evolving graphics of modern games.
A few genres traditionally linked to the beautiful world of ascii characters still survives: roguelikes (nethack, angband, etc.) and interactive fiction, for example.

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Arj

DOS19904.3/5

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 as a compression tool for MS-DOS and other systems. ARJ offered high compression ratios and various features, such as archive encryption and error recovery.

IBM Assistant 2.0

DOS19864.1/5 IBM

The Lurking Horror

DOS19874.1/5 Infocom

Microsoft Word

Windows XP/98/95Windows 3.x19833.5/5 Microsoft

Lynx

DOS1992freeware3/5

The Shadows of Mordor

DOS19883.7/5 Beam Software

The mist

DOS19853.9/5 Angelsoft

Adventure Game Studio (AGS)

WindowsLinuxMac1997freeware3.9/5

Adventure Game Studio (AGS) is a software development tool that enables users to create point-and-click adventure games. It was originally created by Chris Jones and has been used by game developers to produce a variety of 2D adventure games. AGS provides a scripting language, a visual editor, and various other tools to simplify the game developmen...

Mind Mirror

DOS19863.6/5

Amulet of Yendor

DOS19853.6/5 Keypunch Software

Championship Manager 93

DOS19934/5 Domark Software

Rawcopy

DOS19924.2/5

A Mind Forever Voyaging

DOSMac19854.1/5 Infocom

The Patcher 6.1

DOS19933.8/5

Sorcerer

DOS19844.1/5 Infocom

CheckIt 3

DOS19902.8/5

Hack

DOS1984freeware3.8/5

Indiana Jones: Revenge of the Ancients

DOS19874/5 Angelsoft

Deadline

DOS19823.8/5 Infocom

Borland Turbo Pascal 1.0

DOS19834/5 Borland Software Corporation

Kingdom of Kroz

DOS1988freeware3.7/5 Apogee Software

Corporate Raider: The Pirate of Wall Street

DOS1988protected3.8/5 SoftServ

Star Trek: the Kobayashi alternative

DOS19854/5 Micromosaics

Legend of the Red Dragon

DOS19893.5/5 Robinson Technologies

Wall Street Raider

DOS19864.3/5

Dragon World

DOS19844.2/5 Telarium

A-Maze

DOS19894.2/5 New Era Software

Hacker 2: The Doomsday Papers

DOS19863.7/5 Activision

Hacker II: The Doomsday Papers is a video computer game developed by Steve Cartwright and published by Activision. It was released in 1986 and is a sequel to the original Hacker game. The game was available for various home computer systems of the time, including the Apple II, Commodore 64, and MS-DOS.In Hacker II: The Doomsday Papers, players take...