Retro games, abandonware, freeware and classic games for PC and Mac
Author: GN Team - Published: 11 May 2025, 5:48 pm
Sid Meier's Gettysburg! is a wargame released in 1997 for Windows by Firaxis Games. Sid Meier and Jeff Briggs founded the studio after they departed from MicroProse. It marked a significant shift for Meier, best known for turn-based strategy titles like Sid Meier's Civilization or Sid Meier's Colonization (designed by Brian Reynolds). With Gettysburg!, Sid Meier and his team ventured into real-time strategy while preserving the tactical depth and historical accuracy that characterized his previous games.
The game recreates the iconic 1863 Battle of Gettysburg, one of the pivotal clashes of the American Civil War. Players can command either the Union or Confederate army through a series of scenarios that range from small skirmishes to the entire campaign. What sets it apart is the dynamic campaign system: the player's choices shape how the battle unfolds, potentially rewriting history.
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Author: GN Team - Published: 10 May 2025, 11:29 pm
Moonstone: A Hard Days Knight is an action role-playing game developed and published by Mindscape for the Amiga in 1991.
It is one of the most iconic and controversial games ever released on the Amiga. Developed by Rob Anderson and published by Mindscape in 1991, it blends brutal real-time action, fantasy exploration, and light strategy into a dark and bloody medieval world inspired by folklore and 1980s fantasy films. A dark medieval world not different from the one found in Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior.
The player takes on the role of a knight chosen to retrieve the legendary Moonstone. The game map is divided into regions, each filled with monsters, dangers, and secrets. Gameplay progresses in turns across a board-like grid, but when battles begin, they switch to real-time combat sequences filled with surprisingly fluid and grotesque animations. Decapitations, dismemberment, and splashes of blood were so graphic for the time that the game stirred controversy, even being censored in countries like Germany.
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Author: GN Team - Published: 10 May 2025, 1:19 pm
Chris Crawford’s Eastern Front (1941) is a wargame released in 1981 for the Atari 8-bit family. It is widely recognized as one of the earliest examples of a truly sophisticated computer wargame for home systems. Published by Atari, it stood out not only for its historical setting but also for its remarkable technical and design achievements. At a time when strategy gaming was largely confined to the realm of hex-paper board games or primitive computer adaptations, Eastern Front (1941) offered something ambitious and new: a detailed, dynamic simulation of the German invasion of the Soviet Union, rendered with smooth scrolling graphics and an intuitive interface.
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Author: GN Team - Published: 10 May 2025, 12:29 am
Rise of the Triad: Dark War is a first-person shooter developed and published by Apogee Software in December 1994 for MS-DOS.
It is a fast-paced first-person shooter that stands as one of the most over-the-top and experimental entries of the Doom era. Originally conceived as a sequel to Wolfenstein 3D, the project morphed into a distinct game after id Software withdrew the rights. What remained was a strange hybrid of classic run-and-gun mechanics, wild design choices, and gleeful absurdity.
You play as a member of H.U.N.T. (High-risk United Nations Taskforce), sent to a remote island to stop a fanatical cult bent on world domination. You choose from several characters, each with slightly different stats, and dive into a sprawling maze of levels filled with cultists, traps, and power-ups.
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Author: GN Team - Published: 10 May 2025, 12:10 am
Shadow of the Beast is a side-scrolling brawler created by Reflections for the Amiga and published by Psygnosis in 1989. It is often remembered as one of the most visually striking and technically ambitious games of its era. Designed by Martin Edmondson and Paul Howarth, it was an audiovisual showcase meant to push the limits of the Amiga hardware—and it succeeded.
At its core, Shadow of the Beast is a side-scrolling action platformer with elements of progressive beat-em-up. You play as Aarbron, a man transformed into a monstrous creature by the evil beast lord Maletoth. As memories of his human past begin to resurface, Aarbron sets out on a brutal journey of revenge. The story is told with minimal dialogue, relying instead on atmosphere, haunting landscapes, and otherworldly enemies to immerse the player in a dark fantasy world. You can find a few similarities with the SEGA arcade Altered Beast (not just the title).
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Author: GN Team - Published: 9 May 2025, 5:41 pm
Arkanoid: Doh It Again, released for the SNES in 1997, is a modern reinterpretation of the classic arcade game Arkanoid. The original game, released in 1986, was itself an evolution of Atari’s legendary Breakout. It was released 10 years after Arkanoid: Revenge of DOH, the sequel to the original coin-op. Developed by Taito, this installment brings the iconic block-breaking gameplay to home consoles with updated visuals, refined mechanics, and an impressive amount of content.
The core gameplay remains unchanged: the player controls the Vaus, a small paddle-like spaceship that must bounce a ball to break all the blocks on the screen. Some blocks release power-ups such as lasers, extended paddles, multiballs, or the ability to catch the ball. In this version, power-ups are more varied, and the difficulty curve is better balanced than in the arcade original.
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