Text-based games: ASCII, etc. sorted by release date

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 These text-only video games may seem primitive and outdated and, in fact, the genre almost died with the fast evolving graphics of modern games.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.

Most popular text-based games

Norton Commander 5.5

applicationDOS

Borland Turbo Basic 1.0

applicationDOS

Zork I: The Great Underground Empire

adventureDOS

Text-based games

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Sherlock Holmes: The Vatican Cameos

DOS19864/5 Magicom Multimedia
Skullduggery: Adventures in Horror

DOS19863.1/5
Star Trek: The Promethean Prophecy

DOSMac19864/5 TRANS Fiction Systems
Trinity

DOS19864.2/5 Infocom
Turbo Prolog 2.0

DOS1986protected4.1/5 Borland Software Corporation
Wall Street Raider

DOS19864.1/5
Wordstar 4

DOS19864.2/5 MicroPro International
Acheton

DOS19873.7/5
Anacreon: Reconstruction 4021

DOS1987freeware3.9/5 Thinking Machine Associates

Anacreon: Reconstruction 4021 is one of the first 4x turn-based strategy games, ASCII based. Anacreon is set in space, as most 4x sci-fi games are, and was published by Thinking Machines Associates and designed by George Moromisato who later re-released the game as freeware.
Beyond Zork: The Coconut of Quendor

DOS19873.9/5 Infocom
Border Zone

DOS19873.8/5 Infocom
Borland Eureka 1.0

DOS19873.9/5 Borland Software Corporation
Borland Turbo Basic 1.0

DOS19874.1/5 Borland Software Corporation
Borland Turbo C v1

DOS19874.3/5 Borland Software Corporation
Bureaucracy

DOSMac19873.9/5 Infocom

Bureaucracy is an abandoned text-adventure game designed by Douglas Adams (yes, the writer of The Hitchhiker Guide of the Galaxy), developed and published by Infocom in 1987. Bureaucracy is a peculiar interactive fiction; the game challenges you to solve frustrating bureaucratic problems in a world populated by strange characters.
Business simulator

DOS19873.9/5 Reality Technologies
Dragonriders of Pern

DOS19873.1/5 Everlasting
Empire: Wargame of the Century

DOS19874/5 Northwest Software
Indiana Jones: Revenge of the Ancients

DOS19874/5 Angelsoft
Inside Trader

DOS19874/5 Cosmi Corporation
Kingdom of Hamil

DOS19873/5 Topologika Software
Lawn Mower

DOS19874/5
Mission: Mainframe

DOS19873.8/5
NetHack

DOS1987freeware3.7/5
Nord and Bert Couldn't Make Head or Tail of It

DOS19873.4/5 Infocom
Plundered Hearts

DOSMac19873.9/5 Infocom
President Elect

DOS1987protected3.7/5 SSI Strategic Simulations Inc.
Silicon Dreams

DOS19873.6/5 Level 9 Computing
SRAM

DOS19873.5/5 ERE Informatique
Star Saga: One - Beyond the Boundary

DOS19873.6/5 Masterplay Publishing Corporation