abandonware games sorted by popularity

Sleuth: A Murder Mystery is a 1983 detective game that puts the player in the role of an investigator trying to solve a murder through deduction and careful examination of evidence...

Released in 1993, Hannibal is a strategy game that asks you to think like a military commander facing impossible odds—and occasionally impossible interface decisions. Inspire...

When Last Ninja reached DOS in 1988, it brought its stylish martial arts adventure to a wider audience with challenging action and memorable level design. Guiding a lone ninja thro...

Based on the Disney movie that taught us cats can sing, dance, and apparently navigate 1980s New York, Oliver & Company for DOS (1989) is a surprisingly earnest platformer. You...

One of the best licensed games of the '90s, Blade Runner (1997) puts you in the rain-soaked shoes of Ray McCoy, a detective tracking down replicants in a world where it's always ni...

Super Solvers: OutNumbered! takes arithmetic and turns it into a frantic chase against villains, proving that mathematics becomes considerably more interesting when somebody is try...

After publishing a plethora of Gold Box titles, SSI decided to release a fantasy RPG based on the Forgotten Realms scenarios of Dungeons & Dragons where the player could create...

In Commander Keen 2: The Earth Explodes, the stakes go from “oops, stranded on Mars” to “uh-oh, Earth is doomed.” The Vorticons have planted death lasers in...

Planetfall is a 1983 interactive fiction adventure created by Infocom that combines science fiction, humor, and clever writing into a memorable journey. Players explore an abandone...

If Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego had a caffeinated younger cousin, it would be Bush Buck: Global Treasure Hunter. You race around the globe chasing clues, dodging rivals, a...

International Rugby Challenge brings the physical chaos of rugby to the computer, giving players control over matches where possession can change quickly and apparently everybody h...

Grandmaster Chess is not here to hold your hand, compliment your moves, or pretend that losing is part of the fun. In Grandmaster Chess, you are up against a computer that takes it...

Math was never supposed to be this exciting. In Number Munchers, you’re a green blob with an appetite for multiplication tables, gobbling up correct answers while dodging &ld...

Skale Tracker is a music tracker designed for composing and arranging electronic music on a computer, continuing a tradition that began with classic tracker software on Amiga and D...

Into the Eagle's Nest from 1987 is a top-down action game where stealth and gunfire coexist in uneasy partnership. Players infiltrate enemy territory, rescue prisoners, and survive...

The Blues Brothers 2: Jukebox Adventure follows Jake and Elwood into another platforming adventure, this time with an even stronger emphasis on the colorful, chaotic style of the s...

Exterminator, released in 1990, is one of those games that knows exactly what it wants to do and wastes no time doing it. You’re thrown into a top-down action scenario with a...

Karadoc’s back, and apparently inflation hit the dungeon economy hard—he wants his gold! Cadaver: The Payoff is less a sequel and more a direct continuation, like findi...

Bright colors, imaginative worlds, and wonderfully smooth animation make Magic Pockets an overlooked platforming gem from the early 1990s. You guide a quirky hero armed with magica...

Kingdom of Kroz is a delightful blend of action, puzzle solving, and exploration that quickly became one of the defining entries in the famous Kroz series. Armed with limited resou...

Microsoft Word represents one of the most important steps in the transformation of the personal computer into an everyday writing machine. Early versions were a far cry from the en...

Autodesk Animator Pro was a serious animation package for DOS at a time when creating computer animation required considerably more patience than it does today. It provided tools f...

Dig Dug is a classic maze arcade action game that was first released by Namco in 1982 as a coin-op and later for a number of other systems. The gameplay of Dig Dug involves digging...

Sherlock Holmes: Another Bow is a 1985 DOS adventure featuring Arthur Conan Doyle's famous detective in a mystery that requires observation, deduction, and a willingness to investi...

Maupiti Island (1991) is what happens when classic detective fiction meets tropical paranoia. You arrive on a peaceful-looking island for a relaxing vacation, only to discover that...

When in Gaul, punch like the Gauls do. In Asterix and Obelix (1996), you control the iconic French duo on a globetrotting beat-‘em-up adventure that mostly involves sending R...

Might and Magic 3: Isles of Terra is where the series starts to feel confident, like a dungeon master who has finally figured out how cruel they can be before players revolt. The l...

Ms Pac PC offers a faithful computer interpretation of the classic maze-chasing formula, putting players in control of a determined yellow heroine who has no intention of allowing ...

By 1993, Lemmings 2: The Tribes expanded the original formula with a remarkable collection of new abilities and themed tribes, giving players dozens of fresh ways to rescue their r...

L'Empereur (1991) is one of those games that looks at Napoleon and says, “Yes, but what if we made it complicated?” This DOS strategy title drops you straight into the ...