Originally this page bore the title Games with ASCII Graphics,
but that was not quite correct. ASCII graphics is a very specific term for
an art form popular especially in the Unix world and denotes graphics that
actually use only the ASCII character set, less than hundred signs. On the
PC, this is a rare thing. ADOM is one game that
uses ASCII graphics on all platforms.
But most PC games make full use of the extended IBM character set, which has lots of special characters for tables and statistic that can be used very well in games. Compare a screenshot of Rogue for DOS with ADOM, and you will see the difference.
The popularity of games with character graphics on the IBM PC peaked around 1990, probably because they would run—and look more or less the same—on all the graphics cards available for PCs at the time, even the monochrome ones, unless color was essential for gameplay. With the general adoption of VGA in the following years, character graphics became a niche genre among the fans of roguelike games and ZZT.
| Pac-Gal | Pac-Man | 82 | Al J. Jiménez | |
| The Queen of Hearts Maze Game | Pac-Man | |
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| Ario Bros | Arcade | 83 | |
David Tretter |
| Beast | Puzzle | 84 | |
|
| Computer Dots | Dots | John E. Thayer | ||
| Othello | Othello | Details unknown | ||
| Relentless Logic | Puzzle | |
Conway, Hong, and Smith | |
| Rogue | Roguelike | |
||
| 8088 Othello | Othello | 85 | |
Michael W. Bayley |
| Hack | Roguelike | |
Don Kneller | |
| Turbo-Gomoku | Gomoku | |
||
| Yatzy | Yahtzee | |
Ivar Gundersen | |
| Pente | Gomoku | 86 | |
Michael A. Leach |
| Tetris | Tetris | |
||
| Bones | RPG | 87 | |
Bruce N. Baker |
| Pentis | Tetris | M.T.M. | ||
| Yatzee | Yahtzee | |
Bjoern Kroghore | |
| Accordion Solitaire | Cards | 88 | |
Raymond M. Buti |
| Castles & Kings | strat | |
Steve Hanson | |
| Nyet | Tetris | |
David Howorth | |
| Pentix | Tetris | Marta & Adrian Soncodi | ||
| NEW Tetris | Tetris | |
||
| A-Maze | Arcade | 89 | |
Wizard Games |
| Block Five | Gomoku | |
Scott Miller | |
| MaxIt | MaxIt | |
Owen Gwilliams | |
| The Battle of Kursk | Strategy | |
Matthew Kowalski |
In 1990, there is a sudden boost in popularity for ASCII games. I have almost as many of them from 1990/91 as I have of the whole previous decade. What caused this, I do not know, but it may simply have been a rising popularity of the IBM PC as a hardware platform. 1990 was also the year that game development for Windows 3.1 started in earnest.
| Blox | Tetris | 90 |  |
Graham Cluley |
| Da | Tetris | |
Michael Heyda | |
| Diamaze | Puzzle | |
Steve Herring | |
| Fusion | Columns | |
William Chin | |
| Majik | |
Chris Bush | ||
| Popgames | |
Geoffrey Silverton | ||
| Kroz | Adventure | |
Scott Miller | |
| Shogatsu | Ishido | |
Alan Meiss | |
| TetraFix | Tetris | |
||
| Crux | Puzzle | 91 | |
Bob Lancaster |
| Dr. Rudy | Tetris | |
Kevin Jay North | |
| Taktix | Ataxx | |
Alan Meiss | |
| ZZT | Adventure | |
Tim Sweeney | |
| Sqrtris | Tetris | Au Software | ||
| Tiny Tetris | Tetris | |
Alex Lochm | |
| Wallgame | Breakout |  |
Jari Karjala |
Up to and including 1991, ASCII games were mostly a US thing. Beyond this year, the majority of the games is from Europe. This is not an uncommon pattern. You will find it, though less pronounced, with 16-bit Windows games as well.
| Small Tetris | Tetris | 92 | |
Tore Bastiansen |
| Tiles | Puzzle | |
Daniel G. Rigal | |
| Wari | Mancala |  |
Eric Roosendaal | |
| DOSMine | Puzzle | 93 | |
David Vancina |
| ADOM | Roguelike | 94 |  |
Thomas Biskup |
| MegaZeux | GCS | |
Gregory Janson | |
| Alphaman | Roguelike | 95 | |
Jeffrey R. Olson |
| 4Tris | Tetris | 96 | |
Boris Sachsenberg |
| Gnasher3 | Pac-Man | |
Jørgen Fog | |
| Yahtzee | Yahtzee | |
John Martin | |
| Hungry? | Ataxx | 97 | |
MAD Software |
| Lentris | Tetris | 98 |  |
Lennart Johannesson |
| ASCII Invaders | Space Invaders | 01 | |
Corey Mercer |
| WormWars 3 | Arcade | 06 | |
Christian Knudsen |
| Tetris | Tetris | 08 |  |
Sergey Smolyachenko |
A special case is Edward Henigin's Minefind (1993) that uses ASCII graphics, yet runs in (hi-res) VGA mode. The graphics are used only for a border around the screen. ADOM and WormWars 3 are the only games I know that uses character graphics and have Windows versions.
It is possible to create action games using character graphics, but it has not been done very often. Apart from the roguelike games, character graphics were most popular for board game implementations like Othello and the various Monopoly clones. It should be noted that the original Tetris featured character graphics, as did some early clones.
These games are probably the most unproblematic ones ever released for the PC. Most will look better on some sort of color adapter, a few may even require it, very few are truly monochrome. None of the games listed here uses custom characters, which would require VGA and was common for applications. Very few run in 40-column mode, which looks awkward in a monochrome setup.
I think ADOM is the only game to have a minimum requirement as far as processor speed or type is concerned, it needs a 386. Beast on the other hand is the only one that has problems with fast computers. The others will run on any PC at all. Since they can run in a DOS window, they are usually easier to play on new computers than other DOS games. Most of my screenshots were made under Windows 98 or even Windows XP.
Few of these games have any sound at all, and if they do, it is played over the PC speaker. None of them has any sound card support.
