Retro games, abandonware, freeware and classic games for PC and Mac
Author: Maddie - Published: 13 June 2025, 2:08 pm
Ikari Warriors is a vertical-scrolling shooter coin-op created by SNK and published in 1986. It was ported to many home platforms, including Commodore 64, Apple II, NES, and Amstrad CPC. The Amiga version was released in 1988, and it was published by Elite.
Created by the team behind SNK's military-themed arcade games, Ikari Warriors puts players in control of commandos Ralf and Clark as they infiltrate enemy territory armed with machine guns and grenades. The arcade original featured innovative rotary joysticks that allowed players to move in one direction while firing in another, creating dynamic combat scenarios as soldiers could strafe and retreat while maintaining offensive pressure. This control scheme became a defining characteristic that separated Ikari Warriors from other top-down shooters of the era.
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Author: GN Team - Published: 12 June 2025, 4:41 pm
Scorched Earth is a turn-based artillery game developed by Wendell Hicken for DOS and released originally as shareware in 1991. The game became one of the most popular shareware titles of the early 1990s and helped define the artillery game genre on personal computers.
The gameplay is deceptively simple yet endlessly engaging. Players control tanks positioned across randomly generated 2D terrain and take turns firing projectiles at each other, adjusting angle and power to account for wind conditions and topography. What sets Scorched Earth apart from earlier artillery games like Tank Wars or the classic Artillery is its incredible variety of weapons and customization options. Beyond standard shells, players can unleash devastating nuclear warheads, cluster bombs, napalm, and even more exotic ammunition like "Death's Head" or "Funky Bomb," each with unique destructive properties and visual effects.
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Author: Maddie - Published: 12 June 2025, 1:16 pm
Need for Speed: Most Wanted is a racing game developed by EA Canada and Piper Interactive and released in 2005 for the Game Boy Advance. This handheld adaptation of the console blockbuster attempts to capture the high-octane police chase experience of its bigger brothers, though with mixed results due to the inherent limitations of Nintendo's portable hardware.
The GBA version strips away much of the open-world exploration that defined the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and PC versions, instead presenting a more linear progression through a series of circuit races and pursuit events. The core gameplay revolves around building your reputation through street races while evading increasingly aggressive police forces, echoing the formula established in earlier entries like Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit and Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit. However, the execution feels constrained compared to the ambitious console experience designed by the team at EA Black Box.
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Author: Maddie - Published: 11 June 2025, 9:39 pm
Curse of the Azure Bonds is a computer RPG created by Strategic Simulations Inc. and released in 1989 for the Commodore 64, Apple II, and MS-DOS. The Amiga, Atari ST, and Macintosh versions were released in 1990.
The game was directed by George MacDonald, utilizing SSI's revolutionary Gold Box engine that had established new standards for computer-based Dungeons & Dragons adaptations.
The game continues the adventures that began in Pool of Radiance, utilizing SSI's acclaimed Gold Box engine, which would power numerous Advanced Dungeons & Dragons computer games throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s. Players import their characters from the previous game or create new ones, embarking on a quest to remove five magical bonds placed upon them by unknown enemies. The story takes the party across the Forgotten Realms, from the frontier town of Tilverton to the desert city of Haptooth Hill.
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Author: Maddie - Published: 11 June 2025, 7:37 pm
Overlander is a futuristic racing-combat simulation developed by Elite Systems and designed by Simon Cook. It was initially released in 1988 for the Amiga and Atari ST. The game presents a post-apocalyptic vision of motorized warfare where heavily armed vehicles battle across devastated landscapes, combining high-speed racing with vehicular combat in a way that predated many similar concepts that would become popular in the 1990s. It was later ported to other platforms, including Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, and ZX Spectrum.
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Author: Maddie - Published: 11 June 2025, 5:45 pm
Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior (Death Sword in the United States) is a one or two-player fighting game developed by Palace Software.
The game, released in 1987 for the Commodore 64, was created by Steve Brown. It revolutionized fighting game visuals through its groundbreaking use of digitized graphics, capturing real human movements and translating them into pixel art with unprecedented realism for the era. It was subsequently ported to numerous platforms, including Amiga, Atari ST, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, DOS, and various other home computers.
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