What (And Where) Are The Classic Free Games? 432
An anonymous reader asks: "I'm flying from the US to Europe in a few weeks and am taking my iBook along for the ride. With a seven hour flight looming, I'm wanting to take some games along to play. But I don't want to download a bunch of freeware that may or may not be junk; I just want the classics. What are the classic free games? I've already downloaded Nethack and am looking into Freeciv. What else is there? I need something that's multiplatform (or at least has a Mac port), something that's stable and has stood the test of time, and something that is more complex and engrossing than a Tetris clone. Thanks!"
angband, cthangband, etc (Score:4, Informative)
many variants to play with, all take a good long while to complete. Think of 'em as nethack extended.
Personal favortites are pernband & cthangband, psiband isn't bad either.
oh, c'mon... (Score:5, Informative)
The Underdogs (Score:1, Informative)
http://www.the-underdogs.org/ [the-underdogs.org]
What? (Score:2, Informative)
It's still playable... =)
Still can't get enough of it sometimes
then there's always xbill when tetris has gotten the best out of you.
so there. thats what I'd bring.
an entire year of college was spent playing (Score:1, Informative)
Perhaps the most addictive game ever.
old mac shareware games rule (Score:3, Informative)
Off the top of my head, some great games were Lode Runner, Beam Wars, Hazardous, Taskmaker, Tetris, and a few more I can't remember the names of. Check for one of those shareware CD-ROMS they used to sell and the ones listed in bold are probably going to be pretty good.
Try here (Score:4, Informative)
Mac Gamer
Old games search engine (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.freeoldies.com
(And yes, I know, it does sound like a porn site)
EV! (Score:5, Informative)
Great Games (Score:5, Informative)
The Incredible Machine (TIM)
Bridge Builder 1 and 2 (from Pontifex)
Other great games are:
Blockout
Sokoban
UGH!
At least, these are the only games which I am still not bored.
Some resources (Score:3, Informative)
Some old DOS games [dosgamesarchive.com].
More recent games at Kev's Classing Gaming [cjb.net].
Re:old mac shareware games rule (Score:1, Informative)
Maelstom (Score:3, Informative)
It might not be a classic, but... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:an entire year of college was spent playing (Score:2, Informative)
Re:an entire year of college was spent playing (Score:2, Informative)
Games + kudos to Freeciv (Score:2, Informative)
If you like Nethack you should try Angband, or perhaps just (u)moria. Or from another Cygnus old-timer (umoria was from Jim Wilson), try xconq (Stan Shebs). Although umoria is ancient it has the advantage that it doesn't take incredibly long to play, which unfortunately vanilla angband does.
You can finish a game of nethack in a few hours or a few days (depending on your determination and experience level) but vanilla angband can take, gee, hundreds of hours (during any of which you can suffer an insta-death from hitting a key one too many times). It's still enjoyable but in a more serious and perverse way than nethack.
If you just need a good game to take care of a couple hours of the twitchies on an airplane, I recommend kshisen, which is a thoroughly addictive timed mah-jong-like game.
-joseph
i know where they are (Score:2, Informative)
http://mac.the-underdogs.org/ [the-underdogs.org] has everything you want. I recommend Armor Alley in particular.
Some suggestions (Score:2, Informative)
As for free/shareware, there are some nice arcade games:
Glypha III homepage.mac.com/quirinus [mac.com]
Cyclone (?)
Asteroid Storm homepage.mac.com/zarkonnen [mac.com]
Glider is fun too, as are MacChess and SigmaChess (if you're into chess, obviously).
have fun!
Re:hm. (Score:2, Informative)
What about a Game Boy? (Score:5, Informative)
1.) Size: It's not comfy to use a laptop actively on an airplane. Either you have to rest it on your lap (horrible ergonomics), or the guy in front of you will lay his seat back and make you panic for a mo.
2.) Battery life: I realize Macs are efficient and all, but it IS an issue. With a GBA, just bring an extra set of batteries. You shouldn't need more than 4 AA's total on your trip. (Psst tip: Don't bring more than 4 AA's on an airplane trip. I did that on a trip recently and one of the security personell mentioned that looked supsicious and recommended I carry no more than 4.
3.) Startup/shutdown time: May not seem like much, but there's a big difference between 60 seconds of bootup or shutdown, and 'click' your GBA is off.
4.) Control: Control is horrible on a laptop for most games. If the ergonomics don't get you, the lack of space for a mouse to move will.
5.) Carry on: I find it to be a nuisance to unpack and put away a laptop on a plane. I can imagine most people who've tried this have the same sentiment. Not like a GBA where you just slip it in your pocket.
I know my suggestion doesn't meet all your requirements. I thought I'd mention it though because I had a similar problem myself a couple of months ago. Despite the fact that I have a teeny weeny laptop, I came to the conclusion that a GBA with a couple of games and a couple of Douglas Adams books were far more suitable and comfortable than a laptop. My laptop didn't turn into an interesting game machine until I got to the hotel. The nice thing about a GBA is that it plays nearly all GB games (dirt cheap), it's efficient with batteries, and it's form factor is quite suitable for a plane.
Interactive fiction of course! (Score:2, Informative)
Start grabbing the winners from previous years... they're almost always fantastic. There are links to interpreters for almost every platform... I know for a fact that my personal favorite (Frotz) isn't available for Mac, but ZIP is.
Enjoy!
-jf
Armagetron (Score:2, Informative)
Some great AbandonWare sites... (Score:3, Informative)
- www.abandonwarering.net [abandonwarering.net]
- www.abandonware.org [abandonware.org]
- www.classic-trash.com [classic-trash.com]
They have some really cool games on those sites.DOPEWARS! (Score:5, Informative)
Angband! (Score:2, Informative)
Elite! (Score:3, Informative)
There's a portable version at www.newkind.co.uk [newkind.co.uk] if your platform can run Allegro (don't worry about Allegro barfing during the build on the x86 assembler bits - they are't actually required for things like X. I've got Allegro working happily on my Sun.) Elite: The New Kind runs happily on Solaris, Linux, Windoze and anything that's supported by Allegro.
Ambrosia, Delta Tao, Flaming Pear (Score:2, Informative)
Re:EV, Warnings and More Warnings (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Hah! How interesting... (Score:2, Informative)
You went to all that trouble and didn't install Master of Magic [the-underdogs.org]?
Enjoy Freenet [freenetproject.org] & Frost [sourceforge.net] while you can.
Nobody have an Amiga? (Score:1, Informative)
The Amiga had/has EVERYTHING game-wise, and usually beter than the PC counterparts.
You need a ROM for UAE to work (get one from a real Amiga or pay for Amiga Forever from www.cloanto.com [cloanto.com]), but if/when you have one you can go to back2roots.org [back2roots.org] and download tons of stuff.
Mostly commercial games. The website has got permission from all of the relevant software companies to host the games on the site.
For all of your ROM needs... (Score:2, Informative)
There are over 3000 ROMs.
Oh, and only download the ROMs that you are legally allowed to play.
Re:nethack (Score:2, Informative)
It actually forces one to use the arcane thing called a keybord to play the game.
Nethack normally does not contain a point-and-drool user interface - unless one compile in such support. (Its available)
Most players however seam to prefer the old interface since it's makes it faster to play the game.
I've spent far to many hours playing nethack.
Emulated old Apple games (Score:1, Informative)
Re:EV, Warnings and More Warnings (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Digger (Score:1, Informative)
this game is a great classic. just downloaded it for my dad this morning cause he still likes to play it after like 10 or 15 years
Come here to download the golden oldies ! (Score:5, Informative)
Here's where you go to download those golden oldies, including classic games
http://directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Softwar