Might & Magic 1 may only be played on a real XT. Any faster machine throws it off in a way or another. On the other hand, Might & Magic 2 will run on XT but is unplayable. Every time you step into a tile with something/someone in it, you are to wait 5-15 seconds until the game shows it up. I recommend a 286/386 for that game.

I had the XT for a short period at that time. It was 1986 or 1987... can't remember. But all I remember was playing Alleycats, Test Drive II, StarFlight, Digger, Zaxxon, Karateka, Lode Runner, Blockout and Pitstop II. And I played them A LOT.

I have been thinking though, for this specific year and prior, 1990, is there any games you can't load on an XT? There's stuff that's better on a 286/386 but pretty much anything will chug along. VGA might be more of a filter, if you're stuck on CGA, there's things around you can't run, if you've got VGA, I think you can run anything released... slowly in some cases, maybe with less features, smaller maps, lower level of soundcard support.

Also I was a bit late to PCs/XTs in 1992ish, and the larger problem at that time was finding stuff still on 5.25 360k floppies. If you had a 3.5" drive you had a lot more things on the shelf you could take home and run. Budget re-releases of late 80s and 90/91 stuff might have been coming on 1.44MB though, which required "steps" to get supported on an XT and probably a $100 or so upgrade spend. So I am not sure how that was in 1990, whether 360k 5.25 was becoming rarer, or was in full swing still.

F-19 Stealth Fighter is what comes to mind first, followed by Starflight.

They might not play optimally but games I played on my XT in EGA at the time:

Death Track
Wing Commander
Various Sierra games
Neuromancer
Tunnels and Trolls
Land of Ys
D&D Goldbox games
Bar Games

Well i had a 286 until 1994 and remember i was super happy, even upgrade with mitsumi 1x cdrom

i upgrade to 386 because of doom

Hi, my apologies for another visit, but I think this links could be fitting:
https://www.dosdays.co.uk/topics/1990.php
https://www.dosdays.co.uk/topics/dos_games_1990.php
XTs were still being sold as cheapest/clearance PCs at the time.

Gaming wise, an AdLib ('87, '90) or clone (PC‐Soundman etc) was already standard by the time, even if there was no money left for an VGA upgrade (requires card, but also monitor).

For 90s games, though, a Sound Blaster ('89) made more sense perhaps, since some games with FM music had accessed OPL2 via Sound Blaster ports rather than AdLib ports.

Also, sound effects via period-correct PC-Speaker were more CPU demanding than using Sound Blaster/DMA.
So an Sound Blaster (DSP 1.5 or 2 or equivalent) made sense even moreso to a PC user with a PC that has a weak CPU, like an 4,77 MHz XT.

The extra MIDI/game port saved a slot or two, as well, which was a bonus in a typical XT with a shortage on free slots.

Edit: These are just some thoughts, of course. I'm thinking out loud here.
"If I was an PC/XT owner in 1990, what would I do? What would matter to me the most?"
Personally, I would at least consider getting an AdLib compatible music card.
The card doesn't have much compatibility issues and doesn't require much drivers (except optional sound.com) or resources (just two i/o ports). Edited.

If was four(only one in that year) I woulded play Compedia early games.

Have you bumped on an early games(s) that worked only on XT and not on AT due to direct access to XT PPI keyboard I/O ports, e.g. had problems with keyboard on PC/ATs?

georgel wrote on 2025-01-06, 19:12:

Have you bumped on an early games(s) that worked only on XT and not on AT due to direct access to XT PPI keyboard I/O ports, e.g. had problems with keyboard on PC/ATs?

"California Games" by EPYX is one of them. The workaround is to insert "switches=/K" in your CONFIG.SYS

MMaximus wrote on 2025-01-06, 23:22:

georgel wrote on 2025-01-06, 19:12:

Have you bumped on an early games(s) that worked only on XT and not on AT due to direct access to XT PPI keyboard I/O ports, e.g. had problems with keyboard on PC/ATs?

"California Games" by EPYX is one of them. The workaround is to insert "switches=/K" in your CONFIG.SYS

While the behavior is similar this is not quite the same I was asking for -- obviously this game is not directly accessing keyboard i/o ports if DOS is able to replace and adjust the scancodes for it.