abandonware games sorted by popularity

Italicized title: Jack Nicklaus Golf & Course Design: Signature Edition. This expanded golf simulation delivers exactly what fans of the sport might hope for: realistic gamepla...

Captain Blood is a space exploration video game released in 1988. It was developed by the French company ERE Informatique, and it was designed by Philippe Ulrich and Didier Bouchon...

Atomix is a tile-based puzzle game released in 1990 by Thalion Software for platforms like Amiga, Atari ST, MS-DOS, and Commodore 64. The objective of Atomix is to assemble mo...

The title Alex Higgins World Snooker might imply world-class snooker. What it delivers is 1986 DOS ball physics that sometimes feel like they were modeled in an alternate dimension...

If Sorcerer Lord was about controlling armies, Sorcerian (1990, DOS) zooms in to the party level — a side-scrolling RPG that’s as odd as it is ambitious. You build a te...

Harpoon is a naval strategy game that takes itself seriously, which is both its strength and its greatest barrier. It offers a detailed simulation of modern naval warfare, requirin...

Body Blows is a 2D fighting game developed and published by Team17, released in 1993. It was initially launched for the Amiga and later ported to MS-DOS. Body Blows was one of the ...

Sherlock: The Game of Logic is a 1991 DOS puzzle game that puts deductive reasoning firmly in the spotlight. Rather than chasing villains through dark streets, players tackle a col...

Based loosely on Jules Verne’s famous tale, this game lets you live your steampunk submarine dreams with all the elegance of a DOS interface. You command the Nautilus, explor...

In Star Trek: The Rebel Universe (1988, DOS), the Enterprise is stranded in a dangerous sector where the Federation has gone rogue. You command the crew in an open-world style adve...

Ah, 3D-Maze. If you used Windows 3.x, you probably saw this lurking in the corner of your screen savers like a digital minotaur. Released in 1991, it’s not quite a game, but ...

Released in 1987, Falcon is the kind of flight simulator that politely informs you, within minutes, that you are not nearly as smart as you thought. This isn’t an arcade joyr...

Questprobe Featuring Spider-Man is a 1986 adventure game that puts the world’s most famous web-slinger into a computer-generated mystery filled with exploration, puzzles, and the...

Ever dreamed of running a transatlantic zeppelin empire during the golden age of flight? Zeppelin: Giants of the Sky lets you do just that — and it’s every bit as niche...

Set in the D&D desert domain of Har’Akir, Ravenloft: Stone Prophet blends horror and ancient-Egypt vibes into a first-person RPG that still feels unusual today. You wande...

Prophecy: The Fall of Trinadon is a 1989 fantasy role-playing game that combines adventure, exploration, and combat in a classic computer RPG format. Players journey through a worl...

Icewind Dale arrived in 2000 as a frosty sibling to the Baldur's Gate formula, trading political intrigue for glorious dungeon crawling in the forgotten corners of the Forgotten Re...

It’s cyber. It’s puck. It’s… basically cyberpunk air hockey with attitude. 3D Cyberpuck is a futuristic sport simulation from 1992 that nobody asked for, y...

Fievel's back, and this time it’s personal. An American Tail: Fievel Goes West lets you step into the little cowboy boots of everyone’s favorite Russian mouse as he tri...

Released in 1989, Ghostbusters 2 gives you another shot at wrangling ectoplasm with the world’s most overqualified exterminators. Inspired by the movie sequel, it’s equ...

Commander Keen 1: Marooned on Mars is a platform video game developed by id Software and published by Apogee Software in 1990 as shareware for MS-DOS. The game follows the adv...

Westwood Studios decided to take a break from commanding and conquering to give us Nox, a fast-paced action RPG with more personality than it has any right to. You can play as a wa...

Times of Lore is an abandoned action RPG designed by Chris Roberts, developed and released by Origin Systems in 1989 for DOS and many more 8 bit and 16 bit platforms. Compared to U...

Part Cold War thriller, part adventure game, part submarine simulator, Code-Name: Iceman is a Sierra title that demands patience, precision, and a deep respect for diplomacy and to...

Just when you thought Keen could catch a break, Commander Keen 4: Secret of the Oracle drops him into a mystical realm full of bouncing jelly beans and sentient toasters. This is w...

By the time Ultima 9 rolled around, expectations were sky-high—and the result was… divisive. It looked gorgeous for 1999, with sweeping 3D landscapes and dramatic voic...

Artura is a hack-and-slash side-scroller that looks like someone tried to draw Gauntlet from memory after a power outage. You’re some kind of Celtic warrior on a mystical mis...

Platoon is a 1987 action strategy game based on the famous Vietnam War film, placing players in a dangerous military environment where survival depends on careful decisions. The ga...