Abandonware DOS retro gaming spotlight

Nice movies and shitty games

In the 80s and the 90s we all saw a lot of good blockbuster movies come out. Some of them were good, some of them were bad. Unfortunately, most of video games based on movies (called 'tie-in') were really bad. Developers tried to put everything they could in those games ...

A pint of point and click and a barrel of interactive fiction

After RPGs, a genre that is really loved among nostalgic DOS and Windows PC gamers is adventure. And by adventure I mean interactive fiction, point & click, etc. Unfortunately, the best ones are far from being abandoned: I'm talking about LucasArts and Sierra adventures aren't abandonware. From time to time ...

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: ...

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.

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.

Retro spotlight: Blade Runner

Blade Runner is one of those point & click adventure games that somewhat manages to fully capture the spirit of a cult movie without copying the original plot. Fans of the Blade Runner movie will enjoy this game, even without Harrison Ford.

Spotlight: games based on a TV series

Today, we're used to high quality TV series such as Game of Thrones, Daredevil, Madmen. This level of writing wasn't always the top priority of the producers of TV series aired a few decades ago. Anyway, lot of us old guys remember fondly series like The A-Team, Miami Vice and, ...

Spotlight: Indiana Jones games

The popular archaeologist and adventurer created by George Lucas was the star of four movies and the protagonist some of the best point and click (almost abandoned) adventures ever created for PC. Unfortunately, Indiana Jones was also the main character of some of the worst action games.All the Indiana ...

Spotlight: Interactive Fiction

Interactive Fiction, or 'text adventures' is one of the oldest adventure genres around. The first interactive fiction game, called simply Adventure, dates back to 1975. One of the most well known series is Zork, developed by one of the most popular interactive fiction companies of all time: Infocom. Other popular developers ...

Text-only games: roguelikes and interactive fiction

In the past, lots of home computer games (PC, C64, Speccy, etc.) used ascii characters (simple text) to represent the game world, the interface... well, everything on screen. These text-only video games may seem primitive and outdated now and, in fact, the genre almost died with the fast evolving graphics ...

Fansite spotlight: The myth of Leisure Suit Larry

Leisure Suit Larry series is one the pioneers of the adventure genre. And not just that, the series broke the chains of mainstream content, dealing with themes that were considered mature and dirty for its time, although they are not anything near that by today standards. And that was ...

30 years ago in retro gaming: Below The Root

Below the root is an atipycal early 2 dimensional adventure game based on the Zilpha Keatley Snyder novels: the Green Sky Trilogy. The player can choose one of many characters, each with different skills and embark in a quest to eliminate the distrust between two races: the Erdling and the Kindar.

A publisher from the past: Sierra On-Line, founded in 1979

Sierra On-Line was a developer and publisher founded in 1979, famous for point & click adventure series like Leisure Suit Larry, King's Quest, Police Quest, Gabriel Knight and many more. After some unfortunate acquisitions (by Vivendi first and Activision later), Sierra ceased to exist in 2008.