Unix ASCII games

Feel free to submit pull requests to add new games and improve information about those already in the database.

How to contribute

Check games.yaml out. All information is inside, and you should more or less understand what's going on by reading it. Sorting is alphabetical.

Simplest way to contribute: edit games.yaml, and then your changes will be submitted as a pull request.

Use this template:

- name: hangman
  url: http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/man.cgi/OpenBSD-current/man6/hangman.6?query=hangman&sec=6&arch=i386
  info: computer version of the game hangman
  screencast:
  play:

name: Name of the game
url: URL of main page
info: free text with game description
screencast: link to screencast (for example on asciinema)
play: server hostname where game is available via telnet or ssh

License

To the extent possible under law, Sergey Bronnikov has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to this work.

0verkill

0verkill is bloody 2D action deathmatch-like game in ASCII-ART.

2048

This is an ncurses version of the game '2048'.

2048-cli

A cli version of the game 2048 for your Linux terminal.

n2048

n2048 is a console-based game based on the highly addictive sliding puzzle 2048. Slide the tiles together to combine them, until you reach the highest one.

abura tan

A roguelike game of Cowboy Knights and Lurking Horror.

ad astra

Ad Astra is a turn-based space strategy game written in Python that uses curses for its display.

ADOM (Ancient Domains of Mystery)

ADOM is a roguelike game.

adventure

An exploration game. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

Play: https://grack.com/demos/adventure/

alienrl

AliensRL is a tactical roguelike game, inspired by the "Aliens" movie.

alienwave

another good variant of the space invaders game.

angband

Angband is a free, single-player dungeon exploration game.

Anonymine

A curses mode minesweeper solvable without guessing, and the only with von Neumann neighbourhoods.

Play: ssh play@anonymine-demo.oskog97.com -p 2222; Password is "play"

aop

Ambassador of Pain (aop). A very nice and challenging arcade game.

arkanoid-bash

Arkanoid is an arcade game developed by Taito in 1986. Written in Bash.

See also Wikipedia.

arkanoid.py

Arkanoid is an arcade game developed by Taito in 1986. Written in Python.

See also Wikipedia.

arkanoid-sed

Arkanoid is an arcade game developed by Taito in 1986. Written in Sed.

See also Wikipedia.

asciijump

asciijump is an ASCII art game about ski jumping.

ascii portal

ASCIIpOrtal is a text based puzzle game inspired by the popular video game.

asciisector

asciisector is a free space combat/exploration/trading game.

astwar

Astwar is a ncurses based game that features two little ships on each side of the screen shooting each other.

atc

air traffic controller game. It's a BSD game.

avanor

Rogue-like game with easy ADOM-like user interface.

backgammon

A backgammon game; you can play against the computer. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

battleships

Uses character-cell graphics with a visual point-and-shoot interface.

battlestar

A tropical adventure game. It's a BSD game.

beasts

The game Beasts is a Linux version of the old DOS game called Beast.

See also Wikipedia.

beyond the tesseract

A highly conceptual game in which you interact with abstract concepts and mathematical entities as if they were tangible.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

blocks

A block-based puzzle game.

bj

a black-jack card game.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

boggle

Word search game. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

bombardier

This game is the same as the old Blitz16 game on Commodore 16/Plus 4, written by Simon Taylor.

boulder dash

A Boulder Dash game clone for your favorite terminal. You are trapped in the CAVEZ of PHEAR, your mission is to escape through all the caves and make it out alive. To escape through a cave you will have to find all the diamonds located in it. Once you've found all the diamonds, their powers combined will help you get to the next cave, one step closer to freedom.

See also Wikipedia.

bowling

Python bowling game using the Blessed terminal library.

braincurses

A nice version of the mastermind game.

brogue

Brogue is a Roguelike game.

bs

Battleships game. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

caesar

decrypt caesar cyphers

See also Wikipedia.

canfield

The solitaire card game canfield. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

Caribbean Stud

a multi-player card game, written by Hero

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

cataclysm: dark days ahead

Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead is a roguelike set in a post-apocalyptic world. Surviving is difficult: you have been thrown, ill-equipped, into a landscape now riddled with monstrosities of which flesh eating zombies are neither the strangest nor the deadliest.

cavez of phear

cavez of phear is a boulder dash / digger like game for console using ncurses.

cbattleship

A implementation of the classic Battleship game in C++. Includes a server program, and multiple different client programs. The server program wait's until two client program connected to start a game. The server dictates the rules of the game.

cblocks

a set of sliding-block puzzles.

Checkers

a two-player board game, written by Alexi

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

chess

Chess implemented in sed utility.

gnuchess

GNU Chess is a chess-playing program.

Play: telnet freechess.org 5000 (login guest)

chimaera

A highly unusual "infinite" adventure game written by Chris Newall.

chroma

A challenging puzzle game.

ckhet

Curses implementation of the laser board game Khet.

Play: ssh ckhet@sshgames.thegonz.net; password: ckhet

clines

Clines is a standard "Lines" game, implemented as a curses application.

clines

Color Lines clone in console.

cmines

minesweeper.

cnibbles

Another Nibbles game with good and smooth animations.

Open Adventure

Colossal Cave Adventure (also known as ADVENT, Colossal Cave, or Adventure) is one of the earliest computer adventure games and a precursor form of role playing video game. The original version was designed by Will Crowther, a programmer and caving enthusiast who based the layout on part of the Mammoth Cave system in Kentucky.

Connect Four

a two-player slot game, written by Sarac

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

connect4

The Connect4 game using ncurses C library.

Conquest

Port of the old Amiga Conquest text-based game

conquest

a real-time, multi-player space warfare game.

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

gnu-conquest

A multiplayer galactic game.

corewar

Core War is a programming game created by D. G. Jones and A. K. Dewdney in which two or more battle programs (called “warriors”) compete for control of a virtual computer.

cpat

CPat is probably the best card game for the Linux console; it is a collection of many solitaire/patience games from the most famous to less known games.

crawl

One of the best games for the Linux console.

cribbage

The card game cribbage. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

cryptrover

Escape From The Crypt.

ctris

Another version of the tetris game.

cursedmate

A game with a hacking atmosphere.

curse-of-war

Curse of War is a fast-paced action strategy game for Linux originally implemented using ncurses user interface.

dab

Dots and Boxes game.

diablorl

DiabloRL is a roguelike "unmake" of the popular Blizzard game Diablo.

doomrl

DoomRL (Doom, the Roguelike) is a fast and furious coffee-break Roguelike game, that is heavily inspired by the popular FPS game Doom by ID Software.

dopewars

A funny game about trading drugs. Dopewars is a free rewrite of a game originally based on Drug Wars by John E. Dell.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

dsol

dSol is a command line solitaire card game.

duel commander

Duel Commander is a turn based command line fighting game for Windows and Unix-like systems.

dungeon crawl

Dungeon Crawl, a text-based roguelike game.

dwarf fortress

Dwarf Fortress is a single-player fantasy game.

emacs

Actually it is not a game, but text editor. It includes a bunch of text games like chess, sokoban, pong etc.

encircled

Encircled is a roguelike game.

enigma

A puzzle game where items have to be collected in the right order.

eyangband

Another variant of Angband.

factor

factor a number, generate primes

See also Wikipedia.

fbird Screencast

F-Bird, a text bootsector game

fish

Play ``Go Fish''. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

fortune

print a random, hopefully interesting, adage

See also Wikipedia.

freecell

This is a console (ncurses) version of the popular and addictive solitaire game.

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

freesweep

minesweeper game using curses.

freesweep

Freesweep is a console minesweeper-style game written in C for Unix-like systems.

fkmines

Another minesweeper-style game.

frozen depths

A very nice roguelike game with an entertaining atmosphere.

frotz

Frotz is an interpreter for Infocom games and other Z-machine games.

galaxis

Find the lost lifeboats from an interstellar liner.

gearhead

GearHead is the first roguelike to explore the world of “mechas” (giant robots).

gnake

Another variant of the snake game with a smooth movement.

gnugo

GNU Go is a free program that plays the game of Go.

gnuski

GNUSki is an open source clone of Skifree, the old Windows game.

goblinhack

Goblin Hack is a roguelike opengl-based smooth-scrolling ASCII graphics game.

gomoku

Gomoku is a two player game where the object is to get 5 in a row horizontally, vertically or diagonally on a 19 by 19 grid. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

gpcslots2

An free/opensource casino text-console game with 5 slot machines, 3 roulette tables including russian roulette, 2 dice games, a bank and stock market.

grdc

grand digital clock (curses)

greed

A puzzle game with numbers. You must remove as many numbers as you can according to the rules.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

hack

Exploring The Dungeons of Doom. It's a BSD game.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

hack of life

The Hack of Life is a roguelike game based on Conway’s Game of Life.

halls of mist

A nice roguelike game (variant of angband).

hamurabi

Hamurabi is a 1969 text-based game of land and resource management and is one of the earliest computer games. Its name is a shortening of Hammurabi, reduced to fit an eight-character limit.

See also Wikipedia.

hangman

Computer version of the game hangman. It's a BSD game.

hellband

Hellband is a Rogue-like game in which you descend through the nine circles of Hell and find an even more dangerous Hell beyond the city of Dis.

hinversi

Hinversi is a implementation of Reversi (a.k.a. Othello), a board game.

hrd

the puzzle game of HuaRongDao

hunt

The object of the game hunt is to kill off the other players. There are no rooms, no treasures, and no monsters. Instead, you wander around a maze, find grenades, trip mines, and shoot down walls and players. It's a BSD game.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

hunt-ng

A fork of BSD hunt with colour and realtime processing

Play: ssh hunt@sshgames.thegonz.net; password: kalte

hydra slayer

A nice and easy roguelike game.

imperium

Imperium is a game of intergalactic exploration, warfare, and economics. Imperium has no set goal, and fairly flexible rules about what you can do, thus, while a single player could run their own game just for the fun of exploration, they would be missing out on most of the aspects of the game with no one to compete against.

intricacy

A game of competitive puzzle-design. At its core, this is an abstract turn-based puzzle game in which you pick a lock by co-ordinating a pair of tools to manipulate its mechanism. The locks you pick are designed by other players; once you have figured out the secret of how to pick a lock, you must secure that secret behind a lock of your own devising.

Play: ssh intricacy@sshgames.thegonz.net; password: intricacy

Invaders Screencast

Invaders game in 512 bytes (boot sector)

ascii-invaders

An ASCII-art game like Space Invaders

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

ninvaders

nInvaders is a Space Invaders clone based on ncurses for ASCII output.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

lagrogue

Roguelike in which your commands are enacted after a few turns' delay.

Play: ssh lagrogue@sshgames.thegonz.net; password: lag

larn

Exploring the caverns of Larn. It's a BSD game.

Legend of the Red Dragon

Legend of the Red Dragon (LORD) is a text-based online role-playing game.

See also Wikipedia.

Play: telnet darkrealms.ca

keeperrl

Ambitious dungeon simulator with roguelike elements.

Let it Ride

a multi-player card game, written by Hero

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

lexter

Lexter is a real-time word puzzle for text terminals. Arrange the falling letters into words to score points.

liberal crime squad

This is a very elaborated game where you have to fight with your friends against conservative laws.

mancala

Implementation of the simple board game called Mancala.

mangband

This is a multiplayer variant of angband.

manhunt

Play: telnet on twenex.org

Dr. Mario

Dr. Mario or BUGS is a clone of Nentendo’s Dr. Mario, well sort of.

See also Wikipedia.

mastermind-nc

A simple version of the Mastermind game.

matanza

Space ascii war game.

mgt

Go is an ancient oriental strategy game based on the capturing of territory.

mille

A racing card game in BSD games based on the Parker Brothers game Mille Bornes. It's a BSD game.

miscom

A curses-based game where you must defend cities from missile attack. It’s essentially a clone of Atari’s “Missile Command” (with some minor enhancements) for terminals, and has colour and sound.

monop

Monopoly game. It's a BSD game.

monousa

A sort of monopoly game. At least two players are needed.

moo

Moo (a.k.a. Mastermind) supervisor and a very powerful Moo player.

moon-buggy

Moon-buggy is a simple character graphics game where you drive some kind of car across the moon's surface.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

moria

The game is set in Moria and the goal is to kill off the balrog.

msnake

A simple snake game written in C using the ncurses library.

microsnake

Micro Snake is based on a simple snake game by Simon Huggins.

mutant aliens

Mutant Aliens! sees a spaceship 'dock safely' into the forest of a hostile alien world.

myman

MyMan is a video game for color and monochrome text terminals in the genre of Namco's Pac-Man.

nclife

Conway's Game of Life in C++ using ncurses.

nethack

NetHack is a single player dungeon exploration game that runs on a wide variety of computer systems, with a variety of graphical and text interfaces all using the same game engine.

Play: telnet on nethack.alt.org

netris

This is netris, a networked version of t*tris. It allows head to head two player games via a network.

nettoe

netToe is a Tic Tac Toe-like game for the Unix consoles written in C using UNIX sockets.

nibbles

Nibbles is a remake of the classic Snake/Nibbles game in ncurses.

nlarn

NLarn is an enhanced and improved rewrite of the historic roguelike game Larn. It tries to maintain the atmosphere and story of the last version of Larn (12.3) while improving gameplay and the user experience.

npush

nPush is a logic game similar to Sokoban and Boulder Dash.

nsnake

Classic snake game on the terminal.

nsudoku

A Sudoku game for the console.

nsuds

A very elaborated sudoku game.

nudoku

ncurses based sudoku game

okiworld

okiworld is a host-to-host console-based strategy game.

oldrunner

Oldrunner is a remake of Broderbund’s Loderunner which contains the 150 original game levels. It is written in C and has a text-based interface.

omega

omega is a complex rogue-style game of dungeon exploration.

othello

a two-player board game, written by Unk

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

ox3d

An aggressive 3D Noughts & Crosses player, developed in 1976. The player incorporates the knowledge of the three-in-a-plane forcing patterns and quite spontaneously discovered that plane-forks are deadlier than one would have thought. It can offer suggestions and can be made to play against itself.

pacman

It's a simple and ASCII version, so no fun (and IA is very stupid)...

Play: https://www.google.com/doodles/30th-anniversary-of-pac-man

pacman

ASCII Pacman is a simple clone of the Pacman game. It features color and animation using only the curses library.

pacman

Pacman for Console.

pacman

A simple version of the famous pacman game written in Python.

Play: ssh pacman:pacman@antimirov.net

petris

Another tetris clone.

phantasia

An interterminal fantasy game. It's a BSD game.

pillman Screencast

Pillman (aka pacman) game in 512 bytes (boot sector or COM file)

pinochle

a three-player card game, written by Sarac.

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

piu-piu-SH

Old School horizontal scroller 'Shoot Them All' game in bash

plonx

Small ASCII puzzle game.

Poker

a multi-player five-card draw, written by Lucifer

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

pong

An old and very poor version of the old pong game.

portile

Portile is a 2D, tile-based take on narbacular drop.

Scrabble

a two-to-four-player board game, written by Unk

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

Sgt. Major

a four-player card game, written by Lucifer

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

shogi

Japanese chess.

sshtron

SSHTron is a multiplayer lightcycle game that runs through SSH.

Play: ssh sshtron.zachlatta.com

pyro

A roguelike written in Python; the display is smooth.

pythrees

Python curses homage to Threes!

pytris

pytris is a two-player networked console Tetris clone written in Python/Pyncurses.

reversi

A good version of the othello/reversi game written in the Lisp langugage.

rhex

Simple ASCII terminal hexagonal map roguelike written in Rust.

Play: ssh rhex:rhex123@rhex.dpc.pw

robots

Fight off villainous robots. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

gnu-robots

GNU Robots is a game/diversion where you construct a program for a little robot, then watch him explore a world. The world is filled with baddies that can hurt you, objects that you can bump into, and food that you can eat. The goal of the game is to collect as many prizes as possible before are killed by a baddie or you run out of energy.

robotfindskitten

Yet another zen simulation.

rogue

Exploring The Dungeons of Doom. It's a BSD game.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

the rougelike!

The Rougelike! is a roguelike game.

rr

Russian roulette

sail

Multi-user wooden ships and iron men. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

scrap

Scrap is an easy to play roguelike game.

scroll

You're a bookworm that's stuck on a scroll. You have to dodge between words and use spells to make your way down the page as the scroll is read. Go too slow and you'll get wound up in the scroll and crushed.

seabattle

A version of the classical battleships game.

seatris

Another clone of the tetris game.

the sewer massacre

A roguelike game written in Lisp.

shogi

GNU Shogi is a computer program that plays the game of Shogi, also known as Japanese Chess.

sil

A good roguelike game.

simulchess

Simultaneous-move chess.

Play: ssh simulchess@sshgames.thegonz.net; password: simulchess

ski

A hotdogging game, evade the deadly Yeti on your jet-powered skis.

slashem

Another variant of the roguelike nethack game.

slider

A slider game.

snake

A quick and easy turn-based survival game; you have to move without being caught by a snake. It's a BSD game.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

snake

snake game

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

snake

snake game

soccer

ASCII Soccer is a tool for investigating how groups of simple agents interact while playing a soccer-like game.

sokoban

Sokoban is a logical game, where U must solve problems with pushing packets in labirints. The problem is to push packets to saving positions by moving around and pushing only one packet at a time if possible.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

sokoban

A fully playable version of the sokoban game, but a little hacking has to be done.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

spacezero

SpaceZero is a Real Time Strategy 2D space combat game for two players over a network.

sporkhack

SporkHack is a variant of Nethack.

sst2k

Super Star Trek — a classic computer game

stardork

Stardork is a Linux terminal based maze game.

starlanes

Starlanes is a game of interstellar commerce for 1 to 4 players.

startrek

steamband

Steamband is a roguelike ASCII dungeon exploration simulation game.

sumeria

This is the good old “Govern Ancient Sumeria”, with a 1983 ecology re-write.

taipan

Modern version of Art Canfil's classic, Taipan.

tetris

The game of tetris. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

ascii-tetris

ASCII Tetris game written in C

tetrix

A UNIX-hosted, curses-based clone of Tetris.

tint

Tint Is Not Tetris, a ncurses based clone of the original Tetris(tm) game.

threes

Threes!

tictactoe

Tic Tac Toe game

tictac4

A tic-tac-toe variant where you have to align four symbols (instead of three).

Toledo-Atomchess

Toledo Atomchess is the world's smallest chess program in x86 assembly code

tom bombem

An arcade game where you have to shoot on inanimate objects.

tornado

Tornado is the clone of a C64 game.

torus

A variant of the robots game.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

tower of mediocrity

A tower defense game. Unfortunately, the game is quite easy to win.

trek

Trekkie game. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

trek73

An old but rather elaborated game inspired by the Star Trek series.

trog

a roguelike game with simple commands.

tsl

The Slimy Lichmummy is a difficult roguelike in a traditional style.

tt

Tetris for Terminals is another, very old, clone of tetris.

tty-solitaire

ncurses-based klondike solitaire game.

Play: telnet mud.darkerrealms.org 2000

tzar

A roguelike game.

ularn

An easy to play roguelike game.

ultrarogue

Another variant of Rogue.

umoria

An old and easy to play roguelike game.

unnethack

The first game in this roundup is UnNetHack, a fork of NetHack, originally based on the hugely popular roguelike game NetHack.

urban warfare

A roguelike game written in Lisp.

vadorz

Another space invaders game with simple graphics.

vagabondo

vapors of insanity

Vapors of Insanity is a roguelike game set on a paradise island of Fortarica.

vitetris

vitetris is a terminal-based Tetris clone by Victor Nilsson. Gameplay is much like the early Tetris games by Nintendo.

vms-empire

Empire is a simulation of a full-scale war between two emperors, the computer and you.

wallyplus

A game for playing go.

Wander

Wander was probably the first computer game that is recognisable as what came to be known as a “text adventure”.

Play: https://s3.amazonaws.com/wander1974/wander.html

wanderer

Wanderer is a game similar to Boulderdash, Repton, XOR and others.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

wargames

Would you like to play a game?

See also Wikipedia.

worm

A version of the arcade game worm (sometimes called snake or nibbles). It's a BSD game.

Play: telnet on twenex.org

wump

Hunt the wumpus in an underground cave. It's a BSD game.

See also Wikipedia.

wumpus & superhack

A version of the very old game called Hunt the Wumpus by Eric Raymond. A joke version called “superhack” is included in the archive.

xorcurses

XorCurses is a puzzle game set inside a series of mazes.

yahtzee

A very nice yahtzee game where you can play against humans or against the computer (including several different opponents).

yahtzee-color

A very nice yahtzee game where you can play against humans or against the computer (including several different opponents).

yetris

yetris is a customizable Tetris(tm) clone for the console.

yuxtapa

is a multiplayer real-time CLI game.

zangband

One of the best roguelike games for the console.

zapm

Zapm is a science fiction roguelike game by Cyrus Dolph.

Z-Code games

z-code games

See also Wikipedia.

Play: telnet telehack.com (or http://telehack.com/)

z-day

Z-Day is an easy to play roguelike game. You have to kill zombies in a supermarket.

zis

Zionist In Space, a text-mode (curses) multiplayer game like Konquest (a turn based strategy; you send ships from planet to planet to conquer them).

znake

Just a simple colorful clone of the famous game Snake but with an extraordinary feature. Do you know the Soviet Russia meme by Smirnoff? Try to imagine if you don't eat the food but the food eats you.

zombies

Zombies is a simple curses-based game in the same style as robots.

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

zombies!

Zombies! is a roguelike written entirely from scratch, in one day, in Common Lisp.

zork I, II, III

An old game by Infocom. (DOS/Windows only)

Play: telnet or ssh on sdf.org

zracer

ZRacer is a console car racing game. It has a curses based semi-graphical interface, a random track generator, editable settings, and supports hotseat multiplayer. The rules are simple: the higher on the screen, the faster you ride. Don't crash into rocks, curbs, or your opponent, and be the first across the finish line.

ztrack

Ztrack is a (very) simple curses-based pseudo-3D driving game.