Best old games

[heroquestelf]

I have a circa 2008 laptop that was limping along on XP that I recently converted over to Ubuntu to try and extend it's shelf life until I can afford to buy a new one. I've been really happy with the operating system so far, as it can do 95% of what I need my laptop for. It has a good office suite, it has a good web browser, it can run VideoLAN (VLC) and it can run Audacity.

The one thing that I miss is that I had all of these old games pre-installed on my laptop that I either can't seem to get to run or I've lost the install CD for them. I'm curious as to what the community has to say on this. I'm looking for *old* games. I have a 1.3 gig processor and 2 gigs of RAM. Anybody got any good suggestions for really great, bang up games that can run on this kind of system? I'm looking specifically for either low cost games and/or games that can run native on Linux. I don't want to throw a lot of money on a game that I might not play for the long haul.

(For the record I have and *LOVE* "Battle for Wesnoth")

[deadflowr]

Why not simply browse the software center?

Plenty of old games there.

[heroquestelf]

I have, and I do, but obviously I don't have time to play test them all. I was hoping for some recommendations. Which ones are worth the time and which ones are not?

[deadflowr]

Games are like movies and music, everyone has their own tastes.

What kind of games do you like?

[heroquestelf]

I'm a big fan of the original Command & Conquer series, and I LOVED the first "Red Alert", so those kinds of games appeal to me. I also like the Civilization games. I've installed and tried the FreeCiv, but it has a steep learning curve and I'm having trouble getting into it. I enjoy some of the sim economy games like SimCity. I've tried OpenTTD, Lincity, and Micropolis, but the graphics on those are a little *too* low for my tastes. I also love some of the turn based combat games like "Battle for Wesnoth", which, as I said, I really dig. For a little while, I was into MMORPGs, but I don't know of any that can run on my laptop.

[heroquestelf]

Here is what I *don't* like. I don't want something that relies on speed and reaction time. Mine is terrible, and with a low-memory laptop, it does not do well anyway on response time. I'm also not big on First Person Shooters.

[ibjsb4]

There is hope for those old windows games. Playonlinux is easy to use and I have found it works nice with old window games.

https://apps.ubuntu.com/cat/applications/saucy/playonlinux/

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/PlayOnLinux

https://apps.ubuntu.com/cat/search/saucy/?q=games (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/PlayOnLinux)

[deadflowr]

What about something like 0ad?
(Zero AD, not O as in OMG AD)

[Linuxratty]

World Of Goo is quite good, as is Minecraft. You can cut some of the features out of Minecraft,like clouds to speed it up. You can also play in creative mode and not worry about having the stuffing kicked out of you.
We have our own little server for it.

[sandyd]

I'm a big fan of the original Command & Conquer series, and I LOVED the first "Red Alert", so those kinds of games appeal to me. I also like the Civilization games. I've installed and tried the FreeCiv, but it has a steep learning curve and I'm having trouble getting into it. I enjoy some of the sim economy games like SimCity. I've tried OpenTTD, Lincity, and Micropolis, but the graphics on those are a little *too* low for my tastes. I also love some of the turn based combat games like "Battle for Wesnoth", which, as I said, I really dig. For a little while, I was into MMORPGs, but I don't know of any that can run on my laptop.

Warzone 2100 - youll have to test if your system is powerful enough

[Sonic_Hedgehog]

There are plenty of good DOS games that are free/abandoned now, like Daggerfall and Mechwarrior, they are easily run in DOSBOX.

[heroquestelf]

How about emulators? Are there any good emulators out there? (Specifically NES)

[Linuxratty]

There is a 3d version of Mahjong that used to be around and I played it quite a bit on Linux. You can move the board around to change the view. Not sure if it's still out there or not.
Ubuntu appears to only have the flat versions.

[Sonic_Hedgehog]

Also Dwarf Fortress is free, and plenty of fun, if you can get past the difficulty ​mountain.

[deadflowr]

How about emulators? Are there any good emulators out there? (Specifically NES)

I don't use nes emus, but I do use
pcsx -r (ps1)
mupen64plus (nintendo64)
desmume (nintendo ds)

These are all in the repos.
For me, at least, they all work perfect,
except one thing that can be a pain, which is desmume has a horrible mic in the linux version.

Mupen64plus is cli, but there are plenty of graphical frontends if you want one.

There is also visualboy which is a gameboy emu.
I've used it, but not so recently.
Worked fine when I did, though.

[sffvba[e0rt]

I'm a big fan of the original Command & Conquer series, and I LOVED the first "Red Alert", so those kinds of games appeal to me.

open Red Alert - http://openra.res0l.net/

//close thread ;)

[matt_symes]

open Red Alert - http://openra.res0l.net/

//close thread ;)

That's my weekend gone then !

[heroquestelf]

Thanks guys! I will look into some of these!!

If anyone else has any more suggestions, feel free to pipe up!

[kurja]

If old XCom plucks your strings, there's UFO: Alien Invasion (http://ufoai.org/wiki/Download)

You probably need to turn down the gfx but it's turn based so should be playable anyway.

[Linuxratty]

We got a really old Mahjongg game going if anyone wants to give it a go:

http://linuxinternationals.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=13162

[help_me2]

Here is what I *don't* like. I don't want something that relies on speed and reaction time. Mine is terrible, and with a low-memory laptop, it does not do well anyway on response time. I'm also not big on First Person Shooters.
Sim games like Sim City? They require almost no dexterity to play.

[PartisanEntity]

open Red Alert - http://openra.res0l.net/

//close thread ;)

Oh man, I am so tempted to try that even though I stopped gaming a long time ago. RA was one of the first games I played regularly with friends back in the days on my first computer :)

[sffvba[e0rt]

Talking about old games, I just picked up Duke Nukem 3D and Shadow Warrior as part of a Humble Bundle and they both have native Linux clients and install via Steam. Oh the memories :D

[Repro77]

We used to play Doom alot on our old OS/2 workstations at work! Loved that game.

[deadflowr]

We used to play Doom alot on our old OS/2 workstations at work! Loved that game.

The repos(software center) have freedoom and chocolate doom.
If you're interested.

[mattlach]

I highly recommend the original 2001 release of Deus Ex. Fantastic game. I replayed it a couple of years ago, and while it definitely feels dated, it is still a compelling game.

There are also some tweaks you can download to give it modern resolutions and 32bit color support, which is fantastic.

[mips]

I highly recommend the original 2001 release of Deus Ex. Fantastic game. I replayed it a couple of years ago, and while it definitely feels dated, it is still a compelling game.

There are also some tweaks you can download to give it modern resolutions and 32bit color support, which is fantastic.

+1 I played it with all the mods, widescreen, high-res textures etc etc. Still a great game!