abandonware games sorted by popularity

Football Manager 3 (1993, DOS) trades grass stains for spreadsheets and proves that tension can thrive in numbers. You’re not scoring goals; you’re negotiating contract...

Released in 1982, Deadline is one of Infocom’s classic text adventures, and it doesn’t pull punches. You’re a detective with twelve in-game hours to solve a murde...

Epic Pinball is what happens when a small team says, “Sure, let’s make a pinball game,” and accidentally creates one of the most addictive shareware hits of the d...

Boston Bomb Club (1991, DOS) is a Rube Goldberg fever dream disguised as a puzzle game. Your mission: guide bombs (yes, bombs) along increasingly elaborate tracks using contraption...

Boulder Dash II is the sequel to the original Boulder Dash game. It was released in 1985 and follows the same basic gameplay mechanics as its predecessor while introducing new leve...

Turbo OutRun brings Sega's famous arcade driving style to the home computer, putting the player behind the wheel of a fast sports car and asking a very simple question: how long ca...

Meteor Mission is a classic space shooter built around a simple but timeless objective: defend yourself against relentless waves of incoming threats and keep firing until the unive...

Arctic Adventure is the sequel nobody asked for to Pharaoh's Tomb, except this time you’re freezing your butt off. As Nevada Smith (not a typo, it’s his real name), you...

Escape from Monkey Island brings Guybrush Threepwood back for another wonderfully ridiculous pirate adventure. The game mixes exploration, dialogue, puzzles, and comedy, continuing...

Star Trek: Starfleet Command (1999, Windows XP) is a dream come true for anyone who memorized warp core schematics. It’s a tactical space combat simulator that rewards patien...

Interactive fiction meets comic book in this spin-off, where you follow a fantasy story through illustrated panels and scripted choices. Zork Quest: Assault on Egreth Castle feels ...

Siege is a 1992 DOS strategy game centered on medieval warfare and the difficult business of taking fortified positions. Players command armies and must consider troop placement, a...

SuperKarts is a cheerful little kart racer that takes the basic idea of driving fast and adds enough bumps, jumps, and questionable track design to keep things lively. Released in ...

Norton Editor 2 is a text editor built for the DOS environment, aimed at users who needed something more capable than a basic command-line editor without requiring an enormous word...

You don’t need to hate spiders to fear Arachnophobia (1991), but it helps. Based on the movie of the same name, it tasks you with exterminating wave after wave of creepy craw...

Strip Poker 2 plus is an expanded take on the same basic formula, combining conventional poker rules with the deliberately risqué presentation that made strip-poker games a curiou...

In Corruption, you’re a businessman trapped in a web of deceit, murder, and paperwork. It’s an interactive fiction game where every conversation could be a clue—o...

This 1986 DOS classic sounds way cooler than it is — ACE: Air Combat Emulator promises combat, but delivers what feels like flying a lawnmower through molasses. Still, for it...

Tapper is what happens when someone gamifies bartending and gives you the reflexes of a caffeinated octopus. You’re a mustachioed bartender juggling multiple counters, pourin...

Ford Simulator 3 (1992, DOS) pushes the formula further, polishing visuals and adding enough variety to feel like a modest evolution rather than a simple update. The driving segmen...

Welcome to the skies of World War II, where dogfights are fast, fuel is low, and you probably forgot to raise your landing gear. Battlehawks 1942 (1988) is a flight sim with just e...

Darkstone tried to ride the Diablo wave in 1999, and honestly, it didn’t do a bad job. With 3D graphics (impressive for the time) and a soundtrack that takes itself way too s...

Released in 1992, Sexy Droids ventured into science fiction with a mixture of adult humor and futuristic imagery. The game embraced its unusual concept wholeheartedly, presenting s...

Are you a bad enough dude to rescue the president? If that line doesn’t make you want to punch a ninja through a hotdog stand, nothing will. Bad Dudes VS Dragon Ninja is peak...

Stronghold is a medieval strategy game that puts you in charge of castles, armies, and enough political trouble to make a peaceful life in the countryside seem terribly overrated. ...

Welcome to the most stressful job in the world - rendered in glorious 1985 DOS graphics! Air Traffic Controller lets you experience the thrill of herding aircraft without the luxur...

Family Feud from 1987 turns the popular TV show into a surprisingly tense DOS experience, proving that guessing what other people think is harder than it looks. The core idea is si...

Step into the cockpit of the Apache Longbow, a 1995 combat flight simulator where you’ll experience the thrilling sensation of trying to figure out keyboard controls before g...

If Low Blow (1990, DOS) teaches you anything, it’s that boxing doesn’t always require finesse — sometimes you just mash the punch button until your opponent stops...

Pinball Dreams 2 continues the digital pinball tradition with new tables, improved presentation, and the same addictive gameplay that made the original successful. Released in 1994...