The most popular cold war games

There was a time when the two major political superpowers on Earth were at war, but it was a strange kind of war. U.S.A. and the former U.S.S.R. used spies, subterfuge, blockades, political and military influence all over the world to gain power on a global scale. The so called "Cold War" era lasted decades and ended in 1989 with the fall of the Berlin wall. Games set in the cold war often include espionage and strategy elements.

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Code-Name: Iceman

DOS1989 Sierra On-Line

Part Cold War thriller, part adventure game, part submarine simulator, Code-Name: Iceman is a Sierra title that demands patience, precision, and a deep respect for diplomacy and torpedoes. You play as a super-agent with a license ...

Chuck Yeager's Air Combat

DOS1991 Electronic Arts

Chuck Yeager's Air Combat is a combat flight simulation video game released in 1991 by Electronic Arts. The game is named after and endorsed by the real-life aviation legend, Chuck Yeager, who was the first pilot to break the soun...

Shadow President

DOS1993 DC true

Shadow President is a geopolitical simulation video game developed by DC True in 1993 for MS-DOS. In Shadow President, players take on the role of the President of the United States, tasked with managing both domestic and internat...

Night Hawk: F-117A Stealth Fighter

DOS1991protected MicroProse Software

Balance of Power: The 1990 Edition

Windows 3.x1989freeware Mindscape

Balance of Power: The 1990 Edition is a geopolitical strategy game developed by Chris Crawford and released in 1985. It is considered a classic in the genre of political and strategic simulation games. The game is set during ...

688 Attack Sub

DOS1989 Electronic Arts

Dive, dive! This 1989 DOS simulator puts you in control of a nuclear submarine, though most of the action involves pushing buttons and waiting very patiently. Think of it as the “Microsoft Excel of naval warfare,” only...

A-10 Tank Killer

DOS1989 Dynamix

Explosions? Check. Missiles? Check. Graphics that look like someone spilled gray soup on your monitor? Double check. A-10 Tank Killer lets you pilot a flying war machine and rain chaos upon tiny pixel tanks that may or may not be ...

Crisis in the Kremlin

DOS1991protected Spectrum HoloByte

Crisis in the Kremlin lets you step into the shoes of a Soviet leader during the late 1980s, facing the impossible task of guiding the USSR through economic collapse, political unrest, and the ever-present threat of the Cold War g...

Rush'n Attack

DOS1989 Konami

Command HQ

DOSMac OS1990 Ozark Softscape

Before Command & Conquer, there was Command HQ (1990, DOS/Mac)—an early RTS that said “what if we made World War III playable?” It’s global domination meets real-time tactics, minus the explosions and p...

Nuclear War

DOS1989 New World Computing

Nuclear War is an abandoned turn-based strategy game designed by Eric Hyman and Jon Van Caneghem. Nuclear War was developed and released by New World Computing in 1989 for Amiga and, later, for DOS, and it's loosely based on a car...

The Operative: No One Lives Forever

Windows XP/98/952000 Monolith Productions

The Operative: No One Lives Forever is a first-person shooter with stealth gameplay elements, developed by Monolith Productions and released by Fox Interactive in 2000 for Windows, Mac and PS2. As Cate Archer, a spy working for a ...

Red Storm Rising

DOS1989 MicroProse Software

Red Storm Rising is a submarine simulation video game developed and published by MicroProse in 1988, based on the novel of the same name by Tom Clancy and Larry Bond. The game is set during a hypothetical World War III scenario, f...

B-1 Nuclear Bomber

DOS1981 Avalon Hill

Ever wanted to be responsible for ending the world in fewer than ten keypresses? B-1 Nuclear Bomber (1981) gives you that chance, wrapping global annihilation in glorious monochrome and a user interface that feels like it was desi...

Megafortress

DOS1991protected Artech Studios

Hacker 2: The Doomsday Papers

DOS1986 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 comput...

The Cardinal of the Kremlin

DOS1990 Capstone Software

The Cardinal of the Kremlin is an abandoned simulation game involving espionage, politics and govern management set in the cold war years. It was designed by Kenneth Rothschild, developed by Capstone and released by IntraCorp...

MiG-29M Super Fulcrum

DOS1989 Simbiosis Interactive

The Grandest Fleet

DOS1994 Quantum quality productions

Conflict: Korea

DOS1992protected SSI Strategic Simulations Inc.

Step into the Korean War with Conflict: Korea, where you command UN forces and discover that even in strategy games, North Korea is a problem. It follows the same system as the rest of the Conflict series: cold interfaces, hot war...

Berlin 1948

DOS1989 Time Warp Software

Berlin 1948 throws you into post-war Germany as a secret agent on a noir-flavored mission through a city drenched in trench coats and suspicion. It’s one part spy thriller, one part historical fiction, and three parts trying...

Buzz Aldrin's Race into Space

DOS1993 Strategic Visions

Finally, a game where you don’t blast aliens—you launch real people into space, with all the white-knuckled tension of 1960s NASA. Buzz Aldrin’s Race into Space is a strategy sim with rocket science and Cold War ...

The Fourth Protocol

DOS1987 The Electronic Pencil Co.

The Fourth Protocol is a 1985 interactive fiction video game inspired by Frederick Forsyth's 1984 Cold War spy novel of the same name. Developed by the Electronic Pencil Company and published by Hutchinson Computer Publishing, the...

The Third Courier

DOS1989 Manley Associates

The Third Courier is an abandoned (atypical) adventure / role playing game set in Berlin during the cold war era and, of course, it's a spy game. The Third Courier was developed by Manley Associates and released by Accolade in 198...