Abandonware DOS retro gaming spotlight

Darklands map of medieval Germany

Darklands was a unique isometric RPG that mixed real historical data from medieval Germany with a touch of folklore-fantasy. Unfortunately it was also the only Microprose RPG of that kind and beauty. The original game box contained a huge manual with info on european folklore (including the lives of saints!) ...

Olympic sports

In the past sports gaming on PCs was more diverse than what it is today. Simulated sports ranged from classic sports like soccer, american football, basket, to lesser followed "sports" like darts, fishing, volleyball. A sports subgenre that stood out was "olympic sports". I'm talking about Winter Games, Summer Games, ...

Black Friday on GOG

Black Friday is coming and lots of games on GOG are on sale at very low prices: The Witcher, X-Com, Anvil of Dawn, The Settlers 2, Theme Hospital, Titan Quest, Heroes of Might and Magic, Wing Commander, Ultima, Tomb Raider and many more. Also: MDK is free, go and get it.

Fighting rabbits and fat men

Apart from Mortal Kombat, One Must Fall and Street Fighter, the "fighting game" genre wasn't so popular in the 80s and the 90s on PCs. That's why you will not find many fighting games on Abandonware DOS. I tried to find a few more games fitting the genre description and ...

Virtua Cops

Since Operation Wolf, shooting gallery games (or rail shooters) became quite popular. Apart from Operation Wolf, Cabal and a few others, there wasn't much on PC until Virtua Cop ("Virtua Squad" for the american audience). Virtua Cop brought 3D to the genre, but the gameplay is the same that every ...

Humor in old video games

Here's a bunch of games involving some kind of humor in one way or another. It's not always great humor and it's not always great games either. Bad Street Brawler deserves to be played! Dilbert's Desktop GamesNord and Bert Couldn't Make Head or Tail of ItMonty Python's Flying CircusUltimuh MCMLXVII: ...

Manuals, manuals, manuals

In the old days, tutorials were a plus, something that only a few developers bothered to add to their games. Today, I find tutorials almost annoying, particularly in Real Time Strategy games.Some manuals were the result of a work of careful craftmanship: think about Infocom games or Ultima manuals. ...

Different kinds of strategy games

More games have been uploaded. Two turn-based tactics games, one wargame, one real time strategy, a real time tactics game and, the best of them all (probably) a turn based tactics game from Julian Gollop, the designer of one of the most loved PC games of all time: X-Com: Enemy ...

A few more First Person Shooters

First Person Shooters revolutionalized action gaming since the advent of Wolfenstein 3D and, later, Doom. Everyone knows about these two games, but there were a lot of lesser known old FPSs. Apart from System Shock, I bet that not much of you ever heard of every single one of these ...

RPG underdog: Legend of the Silver Talisman

Inter-Active Arts developed the DOS fantasy RPG called Legend of the Silver Talisman in 1996. Legend of the Silver Talisman is a freeware top-down perspective dungeon crawler.

More platform games

These games may not be the most popular or the best among platformers, but they equally deserves a bit of attention. Take a look at Dangerous Dave or try out Tom and Jerry, you'd be surprised...Tom and JerrySink or SwimKarnovDangerous Dave in the Haunted MansionVynil Goddess from MarsRastan

Desktop adventures for Indy and Luke

Indiana Jones and his Desktop Adventures and Star Wars: Yoda Stories are two little gems that stood the test of time suprisingly well. You probably will need a virtual machine to play both, but it's worth it.

Board games!

Here's a few DOS board games to play with your family or friends (if you still have a PC with MSDOS installed). Monopoly, Othello and Backgammon are known to everyone from age 5 to age 99. Settlers of Catan is more recent, but pretty popular. Battle of Atlantis... I don't think anyone ...

Balance of Power: The 1990 Edition

The 1990 edition of Balance of Power is an updated version of the classic Chris Crawford political simulation game. Choose the United States or the Soviet Union and try to be the winning superpower at the end of the game without destroying the world.

Games based on comic books

Comics, manga, graphic novels were always an inspiration for game developer. Sometimes someone decided to acquire a license and make a game out of the comic itself. Here are a few examples: Batman, Dylan Dog, Fantastic Four, Ranx, Snoopy, Spider-man and even Yellow Kid.

CODiE Awards: 1987

In 1987 was a grim year remembered for awful facts: Unabomber in Salt Lake City, the Black Monday crash, a typhoon in the Philippines. Thankfully, it was a great year for videogames. Here are the CODiE Awards for 1987. From the official site: "The SIIA CODiE Awards were established in 1986 so that ...

Retro game spotlight: Stunts

Stunts is a car racing (or... should I say car crashing?) simulator focused on, well, stunt tracks. Stunts was developed by Distinctive Software in 1990 and i gained a cult following over the years. Did I mention that you can design your tracks with a track editor?

Have you ever played Eternam?

Eternam is a strange blend of adventure, RPG and action game. To be honest, is more of a first-person 3D adventure (RPG elements are few) without mouse support. Something in this game reminds me of Sean Connery in Zardoz. Ugh.

Have you ever played Heroes of Might and Magic?

Have you ever played Heroes of Might and Magic? I bet you did play one of the more recent sequels, right? Heroes of Might and Magic began as a strategy-tactical son of the marvellous Might and Magic RPG series and (almost) never changed. The fact that the last one is ...

CODiE Awards: 1986

The SIIA CODiE Awards are one of the oldest still around. The first games were awarded in 1986. Cold war was a reality, USSR was a superpower and most of you weren't even born.Here's a description from the official site: "The SIIA CODiE Awards were established in 1986 so that pioneers ...