Abandonware DOS retro gaming spotlight
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Space simulations: combat, trading and exploring space
13th April 2019simulationSpace simulation games are part of a niche genre that appeals to specific gamers, not everyone like it. I think we can categorize two main groups of space sims players: the ones who only want to fight in space (no trading, no mining, etc) and the ones who like full ... -
The Underdogs on Abandonware DOS
11th April 2019actionNo, I'm not talking about the long gone site Home of the Underdogs, a milestone in the abandonware website scene, I'm actually talking about games available on Abandonware DOS that almost no one pay attention to (myself included).Download count for these games is low and - for a few ... -
Qix clones and remakes
6th April 2019remakes and sequelsQix is that very old arcade game in which you have to draw rectangles in order to claim portions of the screen. Like other classic arcade games of the time, Qix was later ported on quite a few platforms. A few developers took inspiration from the original Qix and created ... -
Horror-themed games from the past
30th March 2019adventure, RPGSometimes I like to spend quite some time looking at Google Analytics statistics of Abandonware DOS. I'm amused that "horror" (and variants) is a much searched keyword.What is that you like in horror games of the past? Did they scare you? I remember that the game that scared me ... -
Game Critics Awards (E3): 2000
23rd March 2019top games and awardsThe Game Critics Awards is a annual award event that happens just after the very popular E3 video game conference. The Game Critics Awards take place since 1998.In 2000, Black and White won a lot of prizes (good for you Peter Molyneaux). Neverwinter Nights was a personal favourite: it deserved both ... -
More RPGs: Might and Magic, Wizardry, Elder Scrolls
16th March 2019RPGWhile browsing the Abandonware DOS database, I noticed that a few very popular RPGs were missing. How could I forget to include them? I had to add them to the already long list of old school RPGs, even if they are not technically abandoned (and you can't download them for ... -
Wargaming everywhere
23rd February 2019strategyAs I add to Abandonware DOS every game I can think of, week after week, I get increasingly astonished by the sheer number of wargames available back in the day. I had no idea that wargaming was so popular in the 80s and the early 90s.With this update I ... -
First-person shooters: future, present, past
16th February 2019shooterFirst-person shooters is a pretty straightforward subgenre of action games. Gameplay mechanics are simple and straightforward: run away from enemies, shoot them, find items and power ups and go on.What I always liked in FPSs was the variety of theme/setting from game to game. Here's a few examples. ... -
Obscure abandoned DOS RPGs
8th February 2019RPGThere are a lot of role-playing games already on Abandonware DOS: from the Ultima series to Might and Magic, from the Wizardry series to Rogue.I periodically convince myself that I covered every possible RPG published for DOS and periodically I find out that I missed a few ones. The ... -
Flight simulations at dawn
12th January 2019simulationFor a game collector like me, flight simulators are something to look for. The original big boxes of flight sims published a few decades ago included all sort of items: keyboard layouts, maps, huge manuals. I own a few and I plan to buy some more.Anyway... I have to ... -
It's winter time! Snow, Santas and trains
22nd December 2018action, sportsChristmas is coming and I decided to add a few games in theme with the holiday season. Winter, Christmas, snow... every ingredient that makes "winter time" is present in the following games. A few of them are special editions of games already published (Skyroads, Jetpack). Transarctica is a peculiar one; ... -
Strategy in the far east: Japan, China, the Pacific
17th December 2018strategyI'm a fan of turn-based strategy games, but I have to admit I've never played KOEI games. KOEI was a Japanese company founded in 1978 (!) known for the Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Nobunaga's Ambition series. Romance of the Three Kingdoms wasn't the only game that deserve some praise. With ... -
Classic Arcades: clones and remakes
8th December 2018remakes and sequelsWhen I talk about abandoned games I usually think about games published at the end of the eighies and through the nineties. There are some "ancient" games that deserve the definition of "classic". Everyone knows them: Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Defender, Donkey Kong.To be honest, I don't think they can ... -
Cars: racing and building vehicles on wheels
24th November 2018racingI just added a bunch of car-racing games, including a couple of top-down fixed-screen ones that I always liked. It seems there were a lot of racing games being published back in the nineties that I couldn't remember, but I've never been interested in cars anyway. Actually, one of them ... -
Police Quest: 1, 2, 3 and "4"
3rd November 2018adventureSierra On-Line published lots of games back in the 80s and the 90s and was famous for the various "Quest" series. Think about King's Quest, Quest for Glory, Space Quest, Leisure Suit Larry ("Love Quest"?). I'm sure you remember a few.Police Quest wasn't perhaps one of the most popular ... -
Free Games Utopia has been updated
30th October 2018deals and free gamesIt's been a while since I created and nurtured my other project: Free Games Utopia. What is it? As the name suggests, Free Game Utopia is all about free games: free-to-play, fully free and liberated games.After a couple of years, Free Games Utopia changed, but the purpose of ... -
Solving murders and simulating detectives
27th October 2018simulation, strategyPure and simple detective stories are hard to find in video gaming today. Everyone goes for fantasy, sci-fi, horror, but the good old murder to solve is not so popular. Back in the 90s (or the 80s) you could play some adventure games based on a detective story. There was ... -
Dizzy, by the Oliver Twins
20th October 2018action, adventureEvery gaming platform has its video game mascotte: Mario, Sonic, etc. Codemasters came up with their own character: an egg shaped... thing... called Dizzy. This strange fellow was the protagonist of a series of action adventure games on Spectrum, C64 and many other systems, PC included. Here are some Dizzy ... -
It's GOG.com birthday!
5th October 2018deals and free gamesGOG is 10 years old and is giving away Shadow Warrior 2. If you're interested in such things, there's also an history of GOG page. If you're looking for games on discount, there are a few "10 anniversary collections": Shadow Tactics, Theme Hospital, Homeworld Remastered, System Shock 2, Dungeon Keeper 2, Kingdom Come Deliverance, etc. -
Pinball: the art of bouncing balls
1st October 2018actionPinball is a very specific subgenre of action games that can't be assimilated to other kind of games. It's not a platformer or a shooter, and there were a lot of pinball games in the 80s and the 90s, so I think it's only fair that there's a whole category ...