Play Ringworld: Revenge of the Patriarch Online

Ringworld: Revenge of the Patriarch is one of those weird, ambitious MS-DOS RPGs that throws you straight into the deep end of Larry Niven’s sci-fi universe. You start as a scout—could be a human from some backwater planet, a twitchy Kzin warrior, or even one of those two-headed Puppeteers (good luck with that). Your job? Wander this absurdly massive artificial ringworld, poking at ruins, dealing with locals, and probably getting into trouble.

At first, I thought the lack of spaceships and interstellar politics would feel limiting, but the Ringworld itself is so packed with bizarre cultures—Ghouls, Vampires, floating cities—that you don’t really miss it. That said, if you were hoping for ship combat or planet-hopping, yeah, you’re stuck here. The game leans hard into exploration and weird alien encounters, which either clicks for you or doesn’t. I spent way too long just trying to figure out how to talk to a Giant without getting stepped on.

It’s janky, niche, and definitely not for everyone, but there’s something weirdly charming about its single-minded focus on this one impossible place.

Each game uses different controls, most DOS games use the keyboard arrows. Some will use the mouse , "Alt" ,"Enter" and "Space bar".