Family of operating systems for x86-based personal computers including IBM PC DOS and MS-DOS that were popular during the 1980s and early 1990s.
A curated list of references for development of DOS applications and learning
about the system itself. This includes list of compilers, tutorials, videos,
links to free and paid books and source code to DOS operating systems and DOS
games. The goal of this list is to collect information and act as a starting
point for someone who wants to start out retro-programming for the DOS
platform.
A 16-bit counterpart to DJGPP, a GCC-based toolchain for developing 16-bit (8086 to 80286, a.k.a. IA-16) DOS applications, currently maintained by TK Chia.
Portable self-hosting C compiler capable of producing executables for a number of platforms, including real and protected mode DOS programs, by Alexei A. Frounze.
A self-hosting Small-C Compiler Toolkit for DOS(8086) with: K&R C Compiler, Make, Linker, Assembler. First released in 1982 by Jim E. Hendrix.
Windows. The current official version is 1.9. A GitHub fork is also available. Used for Doom I-II, Warcraft I-II, Duke Nukem 3D, Full Throttle, Dark Forces and Retro City Rampage.
The documentation is very valuable in order to understand working with both version 1.9 and the V2 fork.
Memory manager for DOS PCs with 386 or higher CPUs, [released by Qualitas company in 1992](https://winworldpc.com/product/386max/6x). Source code was released in June 2022 on GitHub with GPL-3.0 license.
DOS game programming tutorial series including a primer on C, graphics, animation, input handling and collision detection. This series contains a tutorial for making [buffered input handling](https://web.archive.org/web/20200203195410/http://www3.telus.net/alexander_russell/course/chapter_4.htm). Last chapter contains full source code of a Break Out game on DOS.
Kevin Matz's almost book-length treatment of DOS system programming and VGA programming fundamentals using C/C++ and 80x86 assembly. Unfortunately it is incomplete and was abandoned since 2001.
Series from 1999 that introduces to graphics programming under DOS. The home site contains other late 90s/early 2000s game programming articles as well.
Source code and files for the following topics: MS-DOS, networking, C, C++, Pascal, Visual Basic, Delphi, 3D, PC speaker, Soundblaster, Gravis Ultrasound, MIDI and many more.
VESA article with history at the beginning and short mention of the VESA VBE standard, but unfortunately the example codes aren't even available through Wayback Machine.
A 1995 CD-ROM containing source code for Adlib, Gravis, Pro-Audio, Roland and Sound Blaster sound cards. The description for the folders on the CD-ROM is listed [on the back of the CD-ROM case.](https://archive.org/details/programming-sound-cards/Programming%20Sound%20Cards_back.jpg)
A table for setting the appropriate DOSBox cycle count according to CPU types (IBM XT 88, 286, 386, 486, Pentium I, Pentium II). Comes handy when you are developing a DOS game and want to simulate the environment where you intend to execute it.
Fabien Sanglard's walkthrough on the game engine architecture of id Software's Wolfenstein 3D on the IBM PC's hardware. Contains forewords by John Carcmack, Tom Hall and John Romero.
Fabien Sanglard's walkthrough on the game engine architecture of id Software's original Doom on Intel 486 system and game console ports. Contains forewords by John Carcmack, Dave Taylor and John Romero.
Collection of Michael Abrash's Dr. Dobb's Journal graphics programming articles and his work on the graphics subsystem of Quake ([mirror](https://web.archive.org/web/20201112020812/http://www.phatcode.net/res/224/files/html/index.html)).
Comprehensive DOS game development book about starting out. Topics include keyboard, mouse- and joystick input handling, creating 2D and 3D VGA graphics, raycaster rendering, sound and music, game algorithms, Interrupt Service Routines (ISR), timers, artificial intelligence, networked multiplayer through serial port and null-modem cable, tooling, parallax scrolling and optimization techniques.
Companion book to _Tricks of the Game Programming Gurus_, continuing where the original left off. Topics include SVGA, Binary Space Partition (BSP), UI, voxel graphics, memory management in real and protected mode, advanced sound programming, debugging and optimization techniques.
Comparison of playing the intro theme of Secret of Monkey Island through PC speaker, IBM PCjr/Tandy, AdLib, Game Blaster, Roland LAPC-1/MT-32, Gravis Ultrasound, Roland SCC-1 MIDI, SB16 Waveblaster/AWE32 and CD quality digital audio.
GDC talk. Brian Provinciano's presentation on porting Retro City Rampage from PlayStation 4 to DOS. Topics include optimization, using interrupts, timing, PC speaker sound, joystick, memory management and fixed-point math.
Video about how PC memory looks like, conventional memory, extender memory and reasons for the need of DOS Protected Mode Interface (DPMI) and extenders like DOS/4GW.
Former Microsoft employee David Plummer tells stories about development of MS-DOS and compiles MS-DOS 4.00 source code which has been open-sourced by Microsoft.
FreeDOS is an open source DOS-compatible operating system that you can use to play classic DOS games, run legacy business software, or develop embedded systems. Any program that works on MS-DOS should also run on FreeDOS.
First-person 2.5D dungeon-crawler on protected mode. Written in C++, includes software rendering, fixed point math, test coverage and sound (PC speaker, Adlib, OPL2LPT).
Flappy Bird clone written in 16 bit assembly. Not a DOS program, but a PC-Booter application instead (although it's also possible to build a COM executable for DOS).
Turbo Pascal with few games in C and C++. Games include Nibbles, Connect Four, Ms Pacman clone and two arcade/platform games. One of them (ra2) was written using Allegro. Utilities are all written in Turbo Pascal, these include game system routines, file and disk utilities and terminate-and-stay-resident programs (TSR).
Overhead puzzle game written in C. Web version uses [DOSBox ported to Emscripten](https://github.com/dreamlayers/em-dosbox) to embed DOSBox into HTML5. However, the original executable is also downloadable and buildable with Open Watcom.
Sci-fi side-scrolling platform game. Regarded as an innovative cult classic by most people. Supports SVGA mode up to 1280x1024 resolution. Written in C, the architecture includes a Lisp-scripting engine.
First-person shooter in fantasy setting developed by Softdisk (later becoming id Software). Features pseudo-3D graphics with raycasting technique. Supports EGA graphics. Written in C and assembly. Compiled with Borland C++ 3.1.
Side-scrolling platform game developed by id Software. Keen Dreams is the Commander Keen game created between Keen 3 and Keen 4 (often considered "Keen 3.5"), but was not widely released. Written in C and assembly.
Sci-fi FPS developed by id Software where you fight demons from hell on Mars. The DOS-specific code for Doom could not be published because of a dependency to the licensed DMX sound library, hence why it's cleaned up and only the Linux source is there. However, the Heretic and Hexen projects contain the original DOS code in a way where DMX-related code is removed.
FPS developed by id Software. Features pseudo-3D graphics with raycasting technique, before Catacomb 3D and Wolfeinstein 3D. Written in C and assembly.
FPS developed by Apogee. It was developed as a follow-up to Wolfenstein 3D, but was altered and became a standalone game instead. Uses a heavily modified Wolfenstein 3D engine. Written in C.
Side-scrolling shoot 'em up created by David L. Clark in 1984. The game involves piloting a Sopwith biplane, attempting to bomb enemy buildings while avoiding fire from enemy planes and various other obstacles.
FPS developed by id Software set in the Nazi German prison Castle Wolfenstein. Features pseudo-3D graphics with raycasting technique. Written in C and assembly.
C-Dogs - Sequel to the original Cyberdogs. Ronny Wester, the original creator no longer maintains the website for the original C-Dogs, but multiple ports exists, including cdogs-sdl.
A TSR that emulates Sound Blaster and OPL3 in pure DOS using modern PCI-based (onboard and add-in card) sound cards. Supports both real mode and protected mode games!
