abandonware games sorted by popularity

Flashback: The Quest for Identity feels like a playable sci-fi movie that misplaced its budget but kept its ambition. You wake up with amnesia, which is gaming shorthand for &ldquo...

In Conquests of Camelot: The Search for the Grail, you don’t just play King Arthur—you earn your role as the guy in charge of finding a cup with magical healing powers ...

Before Wake of the Ravager, there was Dark Sun: Shattered Lands, the first CRPG to bring Athas to life. It was a bold departure from the usual Gold Box formula, with more freedom i...

Ever wanted to read Car and Driver magazine and then actually drive the cars featured in it? Well, someone in 1992 said “why not both?” and Car and Driver the game was ...

Screamer (1995) was the moment when PC gamers realized DOS could, in fact, go fast. A blistering arcade racer inspired by Daytona USA, it delivered glossy graphics, roaring engines...

A direct sequel to Deathwatch, Ancients 2: Approaching Evil is like returning to your childhood neighborhood, except everyone’s still trying to kill you. Released in 1994, it...

Star Crusader is an abandoned science fiction first-person 3D space combat simulator, developed by Take-Two Interactive and published by GameTek in 1994 for both DOS and Amiga plat...

In Moonmist (1986), you’re invited to a spooky English castle where, naturally, murder and mystery are on the menu. This Infocom text adventure mixes romance, ghost stories, ...

Rings of Medusa is a strategy / RPG developed by the German studio Starbyte Software. It was released in 1989 for various platforms including the Commodore 64, Amiga, and MS-DOS.&n...

Armaeth: The Lost Kingdom looks like a cousin of Prince of Persia who dropped out of school to study magic mushrooms. You play a vaguely heroic dude exploring a crumbling kingdom f...

If you ever wanted to explore endless, procedurally generated tunnels filled with monsters, traps, and the occasional existential crisis, Dungeon Crawl is your kind of misery. Rele...

If Frontier: Elite 2 opened the door to a vast universe, Frontier: First Encounters in 1995 basically kicked it wide open and invited you to wander in. This sequel expands the form...

Forget muscle cars and highways—Detroit (1994) is all about running your own automobile empire. Starting in the early 20th century, you’ll design cars, juggle productio...

Hardball 2 is baseball distilled into a form that manages to be both accessible and surprisingly tense. It does not overwhelm you with complexity, but it gives you enough control t...

Often overlooked, Falcon AT from 1988 is an interesting hybrid that tries to bridge hardcore simulation with a slightly more accessible presentation. While it still respects the se...

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...

Long before comic-book games became blockbuster spectacles, The Punisher (1990, DOS) delivered gritty vigilante action with a side of pixelated attitude. You step into Frank Castle...

Borland Reflex was a relational database management system (RDBMS) developed by Borland International, a software company that was prominent in the 1980s and 1990s. Reflex was rele...

Temple of Kroz blends puzzle-solving with arcade reflexes, creating a strange but compelling hybrid. You navigate traps, monsters, and bizarre hazards while collecting gems and try...

Martian Memorandum is a point-and-click adventure game developed and published by Access Software. It was released in 1991 and is the sequel to the game Mean Streets. The game is s...

F-14 Tomcat is the kind of flight simulator that makes you feel like you should be wearing aviator sunglasses and chewing gum while sitting at your desk. Released at the height of ...