Is there a resource to get Keys for old PC games?

[LexDiamonds81]

Found some old games from the 90's/ early 2000 while digging thru parent's house. Almost none are in original case and such so do not have the Keys. Am I out of luck if I want to load them up on my old school gaming PC?

 

[March's Ghost]

You might try searching through abandonware sites, but you'd be better off buying them through GOG or Steam if they're available.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Found some old games from the 90's/ early 2000 while digging thru parent's house. Almost none are in original case and such so do not have the Keys. Am I out of luck if I want to load them up on my old school gaming PC?

I'm not a lawyer but I think in that case you are legally out of luck and so any discussion of ways to obtain keys without buying them from the IP owners is not allowed here.

 

[Slasken]

Most games in the early 2000s only required you to have the CD-rom in your drive while you played, so I believe most of those will work.

 

[LexDiamonds81]

I'm not a lawyer but I think in that case you are legally out of luck and so any discussion of ways to obtain keys without buying them from the IP owners is not allowed here.

I mean....I purchased them myself many moons and lost the keys ago so its not like I am doing something wrong here.

 

[LexDiamonds81]

Most games in the early 2000s only required you to have the CD-rom in your drive while you played, so I believe most of those will work.

wow that is really great to know. I can try that route. thanks!

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

I mean....I purchased them myself many moons and lost the keys ago so its not like I am doing something wrong here.

Not saying you are, but in order to get new keys that are different from the ones you purchased without buying them, unfortunately that comes under piracy and we dont do that here according to the community rules. Just making sure that no one suggests anything like that, because that will make more work for us mods to delete and warn etc.

 

[mjs warlord]

When you use an old game on a new pc you may have difficulty getting them to run and one problem you will have with some games is that todays pc's are too good and by that i mean you jump on a solid object such as mountains in some of the myst games and you go straight through them. The best way to get old games to run on todays pc's is to find out when the game was made and put the launcher in compatibility mode for the operating system that was around when that game came out.

Even if you do have the key codes you may still have difficultly using old games , i have around 20 that i cant use because you have to register the codes online and even if you use the same email address you used many years ago a box will eventually come up to say the email and key code/email related to the game is already in use.

Of course it is ....... by you many years ago........ i have yet to get a games company to give me a replacement key code so as @February's Ghost said look on steam or GOG because you can buy some old stuff at really silly prices.

 

[LexDiamonds81]

When you use an old game on a new pc you may have difficulty getting them to run and one problem you will have with some games is that todays pc's are too good and by that i mean you jump on a solid object such as mountains in some of the myst games and you go straight through them. The best way to get old games to run on todays pc's is to find out when the game was made and put the launcher in compatibility mode for the operating system that was around when that game came out.

Even if you do have the key codes you may still have difficultly using old games , i have around 20 that i cant use because you have to register the codes online and even if you use the same email address you used many years ago a box will eventually come up to say the email and key code/email related to the game is already in use.

Of course it is ....... by you many years ago........ i have yet to get a games company to give me a replacement key code so as @February's Ghost said look on steam or GOG because you can buy some old stuff at really silly prices.

thanks for all of that. Yeah I guess at end of day Steam is the way to go. Just sort of like using the old games for the nostalgia, etc

 

[Zloth]

Just sort of like using the old games for the nostalgia, etc

Yeah, that's what I've found. Going through all the hassle to get one of those old games going on a modern PC can be done, but why bother when you can just spend $5 at GOG or Steam? (Unless you really want to get into it and refurbish and old PC to run them on! Ah, to use an old CRT monitor and dial up any resolution you like again.... <sigh>)

 

[Rolfil]

If it's on GOG then please buy it there. They have a game preservation program and their games will work on modern PC's. I think it's pretty cool that CD Projekt set this up as there are quite a lot of older games that you either cannot buy or when you have the original disks/cds will not work.