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 These text-only video games may seem primitive and outdated and, in fact, the genre almost died with the fast evolving graphics of modern games.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.
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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Norton Commander 5.5
DOS1998 Peter Norton Computing
Norton Commander was one of the most popular and influential file management applications ever released for MS-DOS. Introduced in 1986, it featured an innovative, dual-pane interface that allowed users to perform tasks like copyin...
Turbo Assembler (TASM)
DOSWindows XP/98/951989 Borland Software Corporation
Turbo Assembler and Tools 5.0, often referred to as TASM, is an x86 assembler for MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows. As a key component of Borland's suite of development tools, TASM was packaged alongside Turbo Debugger (TD),...
Rogue
Windows XP/98/95DOSLinuxMac OS1984 Artificial Intelligence Design
Rogue is one of the first RPGs in the history of video gaming. It's a text-based dungeon crawler in which you have to fight your way in the dungeon to recover the Amulet of Yendor. Rogue became popular around 1980 on mainframes an...
DOSBox
Windows XP/98/95LinuxMac OS2002freeware
DOSBox is an open-source emulator that allows you to run software and games designed for the MS-DOS operating system on modern computers. As you probably already know, MS-DOS was a popular operating system used in the 1980s and ea...
Wordstar 4
DOS1986 MicroPro International
WordStar 4 was a popular word processing software program during the early days of personal computing. WordStar 4 included features typical of word processors in that era, allowing users to create, edit, and format documents....
QBASIC
DOS1991 Microsoft
QBasic, or QuickBASIC, was an interpreted version of the BASIC programming language developed by Microsoft. It was designed to be easy to learn and use, making it accessible to beginners and hobbyist programmers. QBasic was part o...
Ancient Domains of Mystery (ADOM) v1.1
Windows XP/98/95DOSLinux1996freeware
ADOM is what happens when a rogue, a wizard, and a hungry troll walk into a dungeon and never come out. Released in 1996, this roguelike classic is brutal, brilliant, and unapologetically text-heavy. Permadeath is the norm, the st...
GW-BASIC 3
DOS1988 Microsoft
GW-BASIC (short for Gee Whiz BASIC) is a dialect of the BASIC programming language that was developed by Microsoft. It's one of the early implementations of BASIC and was included as the default programming environment in early ve...
Wall Street Raider
DOS1986
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
DOSMac OS1984freeware Infocom
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a humorous free text adventure game based on the novel of the same name written by Douglas Adams (if you never read it, shame on you!). The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was designed by D...
Star Trek: The Promethean Prophecy
DOSMac OS1986 TRANS Fiction Systems
Zork I: The Great Underground Empire
DOS1982 Infocom
Zork is one of the most popular text-adventures and one of the first interactive fiction games ever created. The first Zork was developed in the seventies and ported on various platform by Infocom in the early 80s. Infocom wa...
Borland Turbo Basic 1.0
DOS1987 Borland Software Corporation
Borland Turbo Basic was a programming language developed by Borland, a software company that was prominent in the 1980s and 1990s. Turbo Basic was part of the Turbo series of programming languages and development tools that Borlan...
Ascii Sector
Windows 10/11LinuxDOS2007freeware
Ascii Sector is what happens when someone takes Privateer, removes the graphics, and replaces them with pure ASCII and sheer willpower. It’s open-world space sim meets roguelike: you trade, fight, explore, get stabbed in sha...
Spellcasting 201: The Sorcerer's Appliance
DOS1991protectedNSFW Legend Entertainment
Spellcasting 201: The Sorcerer's Appliance is an adventure game released in 1991, developed by Steve Meretzky and published by Legend Entertainment. It’s the second installment in the "Spellcasting" series. In Spellcast...
Castle Adventure
DOS1984freeware
Championship Manager 2: The Italian Leagues Season 96/97
DOS1996 Eidos Interactive
A Mind Forever Voyaging
DOSMac OS1985 Infocom
If you ever wanted to play a video game that doubles as a philosophical think piece, A Mind Forever Voyaging (1985) is your ride. Released for DOS and Macintosh, this is one of Infocom’s most ambitious works - a text adventu...
Quattro Pro v4
DOS1991 Borland Software Corporation
1893: A World's Fair Mystery
Windows XP/98/95Mac OS2003
1893: A World's Fair Mystery is an interactive fiction game developed by the American studio Illuminated Lantern and released in 2002. Set during the Chicago World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, the game combines historical ficti...
The Fool's Errand
DOS1989freeware Synergistic Software
The Fool's Errand is a puzzle-adventure computer game created by Cliff Johnson and released in 1987 for Macintosh and later for MS-DOS. The game follows the journey of a nameless fool through a magical land inspired by Tarot ...
A-Maze
DOS1989 New Era Software
If you’ve ever thought, “What if Pac-Man got lost in a modernist art gallery?”, then A-Maze is your oddly specific dream come true. Released in 1989 for DOS, this game is a labyrinthine puzzle fest where the grap...
Zork II: The Wizard of Frobozz
DOS1983 Infocom
You survived Zork I, and now it’s personal. In Zork II, you face off against the enigmatic Wizard of Frobozz, who exists mostly to mess with you like a magical prankster with way too much free time. The puzzles get harder, t...
Zork Zero: The Revenge of Megaboz
DOS1989 Infocom
With Zork Zero, Infocom decided to throw everything into the cauldron: graphics, mouse support, and a jester who won’t shut up. A prequel to the original trilogy, it’s stuffed with puzzles, jokes, and deeply Zorkian no...
Borland Turbo C v1
DOS1987 Borland Software Corporation
dBASE III
DOS1984 Ashton-Tate
dBASE III is a relational database management system (RDBMS) that was popular in the late 1980s. It was developed by Ashton-Tate, a software company. dBASE III was a successor to the earlier dBASE II and was part of a series of dB...
James Bond 007: Goldfinger
DOS1986 Angelsoft
Dungeon Crawl
Windows XP/98/95DOSLinux1997freeware
Dungeon Crawl (also known as Linley's Dungeon Crawl from the name of the original programmer: Linley Henzell) is a classic roguelike: an RPG with permadeath, procedural generation and high replayability. Dungeon Crawl was released...
Adventure Game Studio (AGS)
Windows 10/11LinuxMac OS1997freeware
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 adve...
Super ZZT
DOS1992 Epic MegaGames