Retro games, abandonware, freeware and classic games for PC and Mac
Author: Maddie - Published: 5 June 2025, 9:07 pm
Bomb Jack is an arcade platformer created by Tehkan (later known as Tecmo) and released in 1984. The game was designed by Michitaka Tsuruta and Kazutoshi Ueda (also known for the arcades Lady Bug and Mr. Do! and for Bonk's Revenge among other things). The arcade featured the acrobatic hero Jack collecting bombs while avoiding enemies across colorful single-screen levels inspired by famous landmarks and monuments. It was subsequently ported to numerous home computers, including the Commodore 64, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, and MSX, with each version facing unique challenges in recreating the arcade experience.
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Author: Maddie - Published: 5 June 2025, 8:07 pm
Seven Cities of Gold: Commemorative Edition is an enhanced remake of Dan Bunten's groundbreaking 1984 exploration and colonization game. The remake was developed by SEGA and released by Electronic Arts in 1993 for MS-DOS systems. The original Seven Cities of Gold was a revolutionary title that combined exploration, resource management, and strategic thinking in ways that would profoundly influence future game designers, most notably Sid Meier.
Dan Bunten's original masterpiece cast players as Spanish conquistadors exploring the New World, seeking the legendary seven cities of gold while managing relationships with native populations, establishing colonies, and dealing with the logistical challenges of 16th-century exploration. The game was remarkable for its time, featuring randomly generated maps that made each playthrough unique, a sophisticated trading system, and moral complexity rare in early computer games. Bunten's design philosophy emphasized player agency and emergent gameplay - concepts that would later become cornerstones of games like Sid Meier's Civilization and Sid Meier's Pirates!. The influence on Meier was direct and acknowledged; the exploration mechanics and "just one more turn" compulsion that would define the Civilization series can be traced directly back to Bunten's pioneering work.
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Author: Maddie - Published: 5 June 2025, 6:33 pm
Smash T.V. is an arcade game created by Eugene Jarvis and Mark Turmell for Williams Electronics and released in 1990. It was later ported to several platforms, including Genesis, Amiga, Atari ST, NES, Master System, SNES, and many others.
The game presents a dystopian vision where contestants fight for their lives on live television, battling through rooms filled with murderous robots, mutants, and psychopaths for the chance to win "big money, big prizes!" Players are dropped into this televised bloodbath where survival means mowing down endless waves of enemies while collecting cash, keys, and power-ups scattered across each arena-like room. The gameplay builds directly on Jarvis's earlier masterpiece Robotron: 2084, using the same twin-stick control scheme where one joystick moves your character while the other fires in eight directions. Players progress through increasingly chaotic rooms, each packed with different enemy types - from basic grunts to heavily armed soldiers, spiders, and screen-filling boss monsters. The genius lies in the risk-reward mechanics: while survival is paramount, greed drives you to dash into danger for cash bonuses and weapon upgrades like the devastating bazooka or the rapid-fire toaster gun.
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Author: GN Team - Published: 2 June 2025, 11:56 pm
The Simpsons: Bart vs the World is a 1991 platformer developed by Imagineering and published by Acclaim, originally for the NES. It followed the commercial success of Bart vs the Space Mutants and attempted to expand the formula by offering a globe-trotting adventure starring Bart Simpson. The story revolves around Bart winning a trip around the world in a Krusty the Clown art contest—rigged by Mr. Burns, of course—with each level taking place in a different international location.
On NES, the gameplay is a traditional side-scrolling platformer with occasional mini-games and simple puzzle elements. Bart explores locations like China, Egypt, and the North Pole, avoiding enemies, solving basic platforming challenges, and collecting items such as Krusty heads and trivia cards related to The Simpsons universe. The controls, however, are often criticized as clunky, with sluggish jumping and awkward collision detection making platforming frustrating rather than fun. Graphically, the NES version is colorful but suffers from repetitive backgrounds and choppy animations.
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Author: GN Team - Published: 1 June 2025, 12:41 pm
Shadowfire, released in 1985 for the Commodore 64 and other 8-bit platforms, is a unique blend of tactical strategy and sci-fi adventure. It stood out sharply from the crowd in its era. Developed by Denton Designs and published by Beyond Software, the game was designed by Steven Cain, whose innovative vision helped push the boundaries of interface and gameplay design during the early home computer era.
At its core, Shadowfire is a mission-based tactical strategy game where the player controls a team of six elite operatives known as the Enigma Team. Each character has specific skills, stats, and equipment, and it’s up to the player to plan their infiltration into the enemy’s base, free a captured diplomat, and escape — all within a real-time countdown of 100 minutes. Every decision counts, from who carries which items, to how team members are split up or grouped together for specific tasks.
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Author: GN Team - Published: 31 May 2025, 4:28 pm
Cybercon III is a first-person sci-fi adventure game released in 1991 for the Atari ST and Amiga and later ported to MS-DOS in 1993. Designed by Ricardo Pinto, it stands as a remarkable example of complex, atmospheric gameplay that pushed the limits of 16-bit computers in the early '90s.
Ricardo Pinto was no stranger to the gaming world. Before creating Cybercon III, he had already demonstrated his technical and design skills, contributing to titles such as Carrier Command, which helped define the genre of strategic vehicle simulation. Pinto's work on Cybercon III reflects a similar ambition: fusing action, exploration, and problem-solving into an immersive, large-scale environment. You will see similarities with other games such as Driller and Damocles: Mercenary II.
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