Abandonware DOS retro gaming spotlight

Sid Meier was a pirate

Pirates! Gold is an open world game designed by Paul Murphy, developed and released by MicroProse Software in 1993 for DOS, Windows 3.x, Mac and also Sega Genesis and Amiga CD32. Pirates! Gold is a remake of the game Pirates, created by Sid Meier in 1987. Pirates! Gold gameplay is a unique ...

Grand Theft Auto 2: a worthy sequel

Grand Theft Auto 2 is the second chapter in the successful Grand Theft Auto series. GTA 2 is an abandoned top-down action-adventure / driving hybrid game developed by DMA Design and released by Rockstar Games in 1999 for Windows. In GTA 2 you are a wannabe criminal roaming the streets of a fictional city, stealing ...

Canceled game: Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans

There was one time, in the mid nineties, when Blizzard was developing a point & click adventure game set in the Warcraft universe. Unfortunately the game was canceled after a few years of troubled development. The few players that were able to grab an almost working copy weren't impressed: it ...

Maniac Mansion Deluxe: a remake

Maniac Mansion Deluxe is the unofficial sequel to the acclaimed point & click adventure game released by LucasFilm in 1987. Maniac Mansion Deluxe it's a fan-made adventure developed by LucasFans Games and released in 2004 and it's a complete remake of Maniac Mansion in every aspect, developed using the Adventure Game Studio ...

X-COM Apocalypse: a different X-COM

X-COM: Apocalypse is the third installment of the very popular X-COM franchise. After X-COM: Ufo Defence and Terror From the Deep, fans expected another smash hit. Apocalypse is quite different under many aspects, from gameplay to aesthetics. X-COM Apocalypse was designed by Julian Gollop (the same designer that brought the ...

Post-apocalyptic RPGs: from Wasteland to Fallout

Wasteland was an early party-based top-down RPG set in a post-apocalyptic world that filled a gap in RPG video games at the time (we're talking about the late 1980s): sci fi RPGs weren't many and post-apocalyptic ones were even less.There are two series of games that are part to ...

Bomb Jack: an arcade classic

Bomb Jack is a classic arcade platform game developed and published by Tecmo in 1984. The goal of the game is to collect bombs while avoiding enemies; the whole game takes place in a fixed screen. Bomb Jack for DOS is a conversion from the arcade original version. The arcade and ...

Asteroids: the abandoned remakes

The original game Asteroids was one of the most popular arcade games of the 80s; a fixed-screen shooter first published for arcade machines in 1979.Original title: Asteroids  First released in: 1979 Developer: Atari Publisher: Atari, Taito Designer: Lyle Rains, Ed Logg, Dominic ...

Mario Bros VGA: a remake

Mario Bros VGA is a fan made remake of the original Mario Bros by Nintendo, the game that popularized the character of Mario, the italian plumber first saw in Donkey Kong. Mario Bros VGA is a fixed-screen platform arcade game that truly shines when played in co-op with a friend.

Remake of the month: OpenTTD

OpenTTD, as the name suggests, is an open source remake of Transport Tycoon, a simulation designed by Chris Sawyer.Transport Tycoon was a business simulation game that puts the player at the head of a transport company to compete against rival companies. The player can build stations, airports, railroads to ...

Qix clones and remakes

Qix 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 ...

Classic Arcades: clones and remakes

When 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 ...

Sequels to action games: Gauntlet, Rick Dangerous, Xenon and more

Back in the day, sequels were not always appreciated. That number "2" after the title for many meant lack of ideas. This wasn't just about video games, everything was subject to that kind of treatment "if it's good, why change it?".I don't see this kind of hate anymore. In fact, ...

Torment: Tides of Numenera - The first hour

Tides of Numenera is out! It took only 18 years from the release of the cult classic Planescape: Torment for us to finally be able to enjoy the sequel. I already took some steps into the game and wrote about my first hour in the world of Tides of Numenera. But ...

In the making: Kick Off World

A group of Player Manager fans are developing a wonderful remake called Kick Off World. Some of you may not know that Player Manager was a managerial football game developed by Anco (Kick Off series), designed by the popular Dino Dini and published in 1990.Here's a description of Kick Off ...

Empire TV Tycoon: a remake?

Does anybody remember MadTV? MadTV was a unique business simulation published in 1991 by Rainbow Arts in which the player had to run a TV station. To my knowledge, no other similar game existed (at least not for DOS or Windows, at the time).Thanks to Steam Greenlight, now we have ...

Satellite Reign: a game for Syndicate fans

In Satellite Reign you control a team of four agents and roam in the neon-lit alleys of a big cyberpunk city. Sounds familiar? That's because Satellite Reign was developed by the creator of Syindicate Wars (NOT the original Syndicate).The objectives can be completed in different ways and Satellite Reign ...

Remake of the month: OpenMW

The Elder Scrolls is a well known series of video games. It started with Arena, now released as freeware by Bethesda. Soon Arena was followed by Daggerfall, one of he most bug ridden games of the series. And then it was the turn of Morrowind. That's when, in my opinion, ...

In the making: Pioneers

Pioneers is a unique game. It reminds me of Colonization and Oregon Trail, but it's something quite different. To quote the official website "Pioneers is a turn-based exploration/adventure RPG where you lead a party of travellers in search of treasure-rich temples, new tribes and ways to go down in ...

In the making: Painters Guild

Painters Guild is in developement and nobody knows when it will be released, but it's a really promising and interesting little game. As the official site states: "In Painters Guild you can make paintings, sell them and develop your guild into the greatest of the Renaissance.". Painters Guild is, simply ...