Old PC Games Reborn

I am, at heart, a gamer. A true nerd that delves into the land of fantasy and shoot-em-up. The thing is, I actually like the old games more than I like a lot of the newer stuff that is being produced. Next-gen games have a lot of splash and eye candy. Unfortunately the story falls short in a lot of aspects and the video game industry is notorious for hiring both bad writers and even worse voice-actors. Such as the cheesy line spoken by Wesker in Resident Evil for the Sony Playstion.

"Dont...OPEN..that...DOOR!" He sounded like a cross between Stalone and Shatner.

In games of days long past you could count on a quality story in many cases because they had to spend less time worrying about graphics. There was no such thing as clipping and polygon overlay. Sight distance or camera angles. You had 2d sprites on pre-rendered backgrounds. Life was easy. If you did any gaming in the 80's and 90's (Even earlier) then you know exactly what I'm talking about. Some of the most memorable games I recall (and still play) are the Police Quest series, Xcom, Dungeon Master, the Ultima series, Quest for Glory, Kings Quest, Zork, etc.

The fact that these games are classics is the problem. You just can't go to the store and pluck these titles off the shelves. It's also difficult to find many of these games because old DOS games are out of production. If you do manage to find a copy of an old game for sale, it usually costs as much as new games run today.

Enter the Abandonware scene.

Abandonware refers to products, be they utility software or games, that are no longer in production. Now, this doesn't necessarily mean that it is 100% legal to download items found on abandonware sites. As time progresses production companies go out of business, sell their rights, merge with other companies, change names, etc. In mergers and sales, the rights to old products are transferred to a new owner. Sometimes the new company does not support the older software. There are some companies, such as Lucasarts, that actively defend old copyrights. Some companies however make no pursuit to do so. Others outright release old material as public domain, allowing them to be distributed. You have to know what you're downloading to make sure it's legal. When they are released to public domain or simply put out there by users as abndonware they may be distributed in any format. The easiest of course, due to the relatively small size of classic DOS and windows95 games, is to simply download them. Sites such as www.abandonia.com and www.xtcabandonware.com have massive databases of old software and games from the 80's and 90's.

They typically list the games with screenshots and reviews, as well as whether or not a game is protected by the ESA. If so, there will be no download available. If the game can still be found for purchase, they often post a link t buy the software.

Modern operatng systems have a lot of problems running these older games. Not only do most old games cease to function in windows environments, the processor speeds of modern computers over the 486 DX2's of the past makes the games run faster than ever intended. So fast you can't keep up when walking, fighting, etc. There are utilities that can be downloaded to emulate an old DOS environment however.

Moslow is a program that allows you to cut your processor speed down back to the days of Yore. Definetely a must, as otherwise most old games are unplayable.

Dosbox is a virtual DOS environment. It's simple to use with help commands to take care of anyone unfamiliar with working within DOS. Yes, folks, there once was a time where everything had to be typed and there was no such thing as swapping windows, tabs, double-clicking or a start menu.

Both of these programs are easily attainable from download.com and various other sites, and are considered freeware. Free distribution and sharing with no purchase required. With these tools and the information given, the gateway is now open for you to find some of those old games you use to stay up till the wee hours playing.

Name it, and you can find it. If it's not on one of the two sites listed you can always do a google on "abandonware" to search for other abandonware distribution sites.