Abandonware DOS retro gaming spotlight

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 ...

Play Rick Dangerous in your browser

Rick Dangerous is a very nice platformer reminiscent of Indiana Jones. Actually, it's more than a parody. Compared to recent platform games, Rick Dangerous is fiendishly difficult. Take my advice: play it... one of the best parts comes right at the beginning.

They made worlds: Space Rogue, by Origin

Space Rogue is a science fiction RPG developed by Richard Garriott's Origin and desined by Paul Neurath (Ultima Underworld 1 and 2). Space Rogue combines a rough 3D space simulation experience with a top down view RPG gameplay when in stations or on planets. As a space pilot you can ...

Death and rebirth of 3D Dungeon Crawlers

Dungeon crawling was the main purpose in the first CRPG (Computer Role-Playing Game) ever to came out on a computer. The first CRPGs were a sort of early roguelikes back then, and by "back then" I'm talking decades ago. Anyway... after a few years, thanks to the capabilities of the ...

Keyword: god games (it's good to be god)

In the so called god games, the player takes the role of a divine entity (or something similar). Gameplay involves controlling people, units or even the environment on a large scale. God games usually show some artificial intelligence in the form of autonomous NPCs.

Electronic Games Arcade Awards - 1992

What happened in 1992? Quite a lot! Bosnia Herzegovina declares independence, starting the war we all know about. The Maastricht treaty is signed and the European Union is officially born. Microsoft releases Windows 3.1: the DOS era is slowly coming to an end. 1992 also gave us some video game classics such as ...

Ultima 6 map of Britannia

Ultima cloth maps were some of the finest feelies (i.e. items you could find in old video game boxes) ever produced for a videogame, back when digital gaming was literally non-existent. The one you see here is a scan of the Ultima 6 cloth map of Britannia. Can you read ...