Game engine recreations and source ports

For list of demakes, see List of notable ports#Demakes.

For a list of game engines, see Game engines.

Game engine recreations and source ports can be better than emulation on a game-by-game basis, adding improvements to the original, better performance and ports to less powerful systems were emulation is impractical/slow. This is especially true when a developer only wants to get one game (or a number of games that use the same engine) working. In that case, re-implementing that game alone would save more time than implementing the platform it runs on. These kinds of projects are common when abandonware has large communities; when the original developer has disbanded and can no longer support or update it, an effort is then made to get it running natively on newer versions of-- and/or entirely different-- operating systems and platforms. Examples are OpenMW for Morrowind.

game engine recreations (AKA game engine re-implementations), when the developer only has a binary to work with (and not the source code), they recreate the engine rather than port it, hence the term. How the developers go about this process depends on their philosophy; they may opt to de-compile the original executable and have their own program rely on the original until all of its functions have been remade, at which point the original binary is no longer needed. Alternatively, they can be remade based on a clean-room design, in which the project implements the abstract features without having to disassemble the original, going by how components are expected to be used rather than how the game uses them. Some engines come about simply because they were inspired by the original game, and the programmer felt confident enough that no reverse engineering was necessary to make an engine that does the same thing.

source ports, in rare cases, games release the source code by the publishers themselves, allowing developers to perform a port of the source code. This skips the step of figuring out how the game works. The most common example that is often used is id Software's release of Doom in 1997. It led to so many ports being released that the community began to joke about what devices haven't gotten it running yet (see the Doom Wiki for a list). Examples are GZDoom, vkQuake, Kex Engine.

disassemblies - a type of reverse engineering that turns machine code language into Assembly code language. It's more common on pre-fifth generation consoles. A disassembler is needed.

decompilations - another type of reverse engineering that turns machine code language from an existing program (in this case, a game) into human-readable code language (like C). However, it's tricky, due to the fact that you don't get the same code extracted, and every line needs to be painstakingly translated via guesstimates and trials-by-fire. This type takes a long time to get it done 100%, just to match code with non-matched code (or linking code with data). A decompiler is needed.

(static) recompilations - even another type of reverse engineering where the existing machine code language gets instantly translated into a targeted platform/architecture code language. While it might sound like an "end-all be-all" method to make old games run on platforms without having to rely that much on emulation, it's still considered just as hard as decompilations, because in order to make the game fully run on the platform, every instruction needs to be identified, applied and executed to do so. Supposedly, this method is considered less time consuming than decompilations, however, if said completed decompilation exist, it also helps out quite a lot in the progress of a recompilation. A recompiler is needed.

collections - these collect different engine types, an example being ScummVM that contains many recreations and source ports.

Some projects are implemented in ways that the original developer did not intend; for example, for a platform other than which publishers marketed it for. And they're not just limited to game engines either; Webamp is a JavaScript application that re-implements Winamp in the web browser. These projects are almost always open-source, which also allows new programmers to fix bugs that could have been difficult to track down during development (alternatively, the bugs may be emulated to allow old mods to continue to safely exploit them). When most of the effort is on programming, the project will usually require the original game's assets (such as files in the installation directory or ROMs) until those ever get remade. This lets the developers claim they aren't infringing the game's copyrights since the player must obtain the original to use it; if the game is still being sold, this could allow the publisher to even earn revenue from the project. This aspect is debatable however, as some source code recreations did result in cease-and-desist letters and even lawsuits from companies such as in the case of re3 and reVC for the 3D-era Grand Theft Auto games, with Take-Two Interactive alleging that the source ports were made to facilitate piracy and that "the work is not licensed in any way"; some have speculated that the suit among others was to keep fan-made mods from getting in the way of their much-maligned Definitive Edition remasters.

For the sake of brevity, most of these projects often refer to themselves under some variety of fan remakes. The External links section has lists for a number of known and available projects.

On Linux downloading and using game engines is easy with Luxtorpeda - a Steam Play compatibility tool (like Proton) that allows you to run games from Steam using various different game engines and re-implementations. Alternatively some package managers/app stores, such as flatpak and snap include source ports.

For macOS, Mac Source Ports provides many of the games below but built for Apple Silicon (or as a Universal Binary where possible), with the apps signed and notarised. For the majority of the games, you will have to provide your own game data. The data for most of the games can be purchased on GOG or Steam (The game data from Windows versions usually work ok).

For a work-in-progress list of source ports that work on macOS see the Source ports on macOS page.

If you're looking for a specific game title, use the 'Ctrl+F' shortcut to search within this page.

Multi-game engine

Action-adventure

Name	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
OpenLara^{[N 1]}	git SailfishOS	✓	~	~	PC: Tomb Raider 1–4 Handhelds: Tomb Raider 1
OpenTomb	git	✗	✗	✓	Tomb Raider 1–5
Tomb Raider Automated Fix	TR1 TR2	✗	✗	~	Tomb Raider 1 & 2 + expansions
Tomb Raider 1 & 2 Classic Collection	git VitaDB	✗	~	✓	Tomb Raider 1 & 2 Classic (Android versions)
TRX	git	✗	✓	✓	Tomb Raider 1 & 2 + expansions
CroftEngine	git	✗	~	?	Tomb Raider 1
TR2Main	git	✗	✗	?	Tomb Raider 2

Bullet Hell

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
ReC98: The Touhou PC-98 Restoration Project	Multi-platform	git	✗	✓	✗ (WIP)	Touhou 1–5 (PC-98)

FPS

See also Game engine recreations and source ports/FPS for more in-depth description sorted by engine

Name	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
BuildGDX	Website	✗	✓	✓	Blood, Duke Nukem 3D, Powerslave/Exhumed, Redneck Rampage, Redneck Rampage Rides Again, Rock 'n' Shaolin/Legend of the Seven Paladins 3D, Shadow Warrior, TekWar, Witchaven, Witchaven II
EDuke32 VoidSW ^{[N 2]}	Website	✗	✓	✓	EDuke32: Duke Nukem 3D, Ion Fury, NAM, World War II GI VoidSW: Shadow Warrior
Metaforce	Dev builds git	✗	✓	✗ (WIP)	Retro Games (Metroid Prime 1–3 & Donkey Kong Country Returns)
Nuclide	Website git	✗	✓	✗ (WIP)	GoldSrc Games (Half-Life, Counter-Strike 1.5, Team Fortress etc..)
openDarkEngine	git	✗	✗	✗	Thief 1-2, System Shock 2
Raze	git	✗	✓	✓	Duke Nukem 3D, Blood, Redneck Rampage, Shadow Warrior and Exhumed/Powerslave, Nam, WW2 GI
RedNukem	git NotBlood fork	✗	✓	✓	Duke Nukem 3D, Duke Nukem 64, Redneck Rampage, Redneck Rampage Rides Again, NAM, World War II GI
Serious Sam Classic VK	git	✗	✓	✓	Serious Sam: The First Encounter, Serious Sam: The Second Encounter
Surreal Engine	git	✗	✓	?	Unreal Gold, Unreal Tournament 99
XLEngine	git	✗	✗	✗^{[N 3]}	Star Wars: Dark Forces, Daggerfall Later: Outlaws, Blood, Shadow Warrior

Horror

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
Free In The Dark		git	✗	~	✗	Alone in the Dark 1-3
OpenAWE		git	✗	✓	✗	Alan Wake, Alan Wake's American Nightmare

Platform

Name	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
Commander Genius	3.6.1	✗	✓	✓	Commander Keen 1-6, Cosmos Cosmic Adventure 1-3, Keen Dreams
MBHaxe	git	✗	✓	✓	Marble Blast Gold, Platinum & Ultra
OpenGOAL	0.2.31	✗	✓	✓	Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, Jak II, Jak 3^{[N 4]}
RSDKv5	Sonic 1 & 2 Sonic CD Sonic Mania Sonic Origins fork	✗	✓	✓	Sonic the Hedgehog 1–2, Sonic CD and Sonic Mania. (Retro Engine v5)

Point & Click Adventure

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
ScummVM		2026.3.0	✓	✓	✓	Adventure games and RPGs (LucasArts, Sierra, Activision, Humongous & more. Over 250 games.)

Racing

Name	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
OpenDriver	git	✗	~	✗	Driver 1-2
OpenNFS	git	✗	✓	✗	Need for Speed I–III, Need for Speed: High Stakes, Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2
ProjectR	Website	✗	✓	✓	San Francisco Rush: The Rock, San Francisco Rush 2049

RPG

Name	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
EasyRPG	0.8.1.1	✓	✓	✓	RPG Maker 2000/2003 games
Exult	git	✗	✓	✓	Ultima VII: The Black Gate, Ultima VII Part Two: The Serpent Isle, Ultima VI: Remake
Falltergeist	git	✗	✗	✗ (WIP)	Fallout 1-2
GemRB	git	✗	✓	✓	Infinity Engine (Baldur's Gate series (1998–2001), Planescape: Torment, Icewind Dale series (2000–2002))
JoiPlay	1.20.023 RPG Maker Plugin Ren'Py Plugin Ruffle Plugin	✗	✓	✓	RPG Maker XP/VX/VA/MV/MV games/Ren'Py/TyranoBuilder/HTML based games
MKXP	2023 Builds	✗	✗	✗	RPG Maker XP/VX/VX Ace games
MKXP-Z	2.4.2	✗	✓	✓	RPG Maker XP/VX/VX Ace games
Neko RPGXP Player	2.01	✗	✗	~	RPG Maker XP/VX/VA/MV games
UnderworldGodot	git	✗	✓	✗	Ultima Underworld 1-2
xoreos	0.0.6	✗	~	✗ (WIP)	BioWare's Aurora engine & derivatives (BioWare's 7 PC/console RPGs, Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood, The Witcher)

RTS

Name	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
openage	git	✗	✓	~	Genie Engine (Age of Empires, AoE II (HD), Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds)
OpenRA	git	✗	✓	✓	Early Westwood games (Command & Conquer Tiberian Dawn, C&C: Red Alert, Dune 2000). Soon: 2nd-gen C&C (C&C: Tiberian Sun).
OpenSAGE	git	✗	~	✗ (WIP)	EA's Command & Conquer games (C&C: Generals, C&C: Generals - Zero Hour) Soon: The Battle for Middle-earth series (2004–2006), C&C 3 + expansion.
Stratagus^{[N 5]}	3.3.2	✗	✓^{[N 6]}	✓^{[N 7]}	Wargus (v3.3.2): Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness + Beyond the Dark Portal, Aleona's Tale War1gus (v3.3.2): Warcraft: Orcs & Humans Stargus (v3.3.0): StarCraft (partially playable as of v2.4.1) Games natively made on the Stratagus engine: Aleona's Tale (Wargus), Astroseries, Bos Wars, Wyrmsun
Vanilla Conquer	git	✗	✓	✓	Early Westwood games (Command & Conquer, C&C: Red Alert, Dune 2000). Based on the official source code release by EA, with the goal of serving as a portable drop-in replacement for the original executables as well as a platform for mod developers.

Visual Novel

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
Impacto		git	✗	✓	✗ (WIP)	MAGES. Engine (Science Adventure games)
Xsystem35		2.17.1	✗	✓	✓	Alicesoft. System35 Engine (RPG and strategy games)

Various

Name	Latest Version	libretro	Active	Recommended	Supported game(s)
DREAMM*	4.0.0	✗	✓	✓	LucasArts: Maniac Mansion, Zak McKracken, Indiana Jones (Last Crusade & Fate of Atlantis & Infernal Machine & Desktop Adventures), Loom, Monkey Island (1 & 2 & Curse & Escape), Day of the Tentacle, Sam & Max, Full Throttle, The Dig, Grim Fandango, Rebel Assault (1 & 2), X-Wing, Tie-Fighter, Dark Forces, Dark Forces 2 Jedi Knight, Mysteries of the Sith, Shadows of the Empire, Yoda Stories, Mortimer and the Riddles of the Medallion, Outlaws (+13 more in the 3.0 beta)
Jorio's ports of Pangea Software games	depending on game	✗	✓	✓	Billy Frontier, Bugdom, Bugdom 2, Cro-Mag Rally, Mighty Mike (Power Pete), Nanosaur, Nanosaur II: Hatchling, Otto Matic
OpenGMK	git	✗	✓	✓	GameMaker game engines
M-HT SR / SRW	depending on game	✗	✓	✓	Albion (1995), X-Com: UFO Defense (UFO: Enemy Unknown), X-Com: Terror from the Deep, Warcraft: Orcs & Humans, Septerra Core: Legacy of the Creator, Battle Isle 3: Shadow of the Emperor (Battle Isle 2220: Shadow of the Emperor)
MegaZeux	2.93d	✗	✓	✓	MegaZeux games