How to play classic DOS games on Android and Chromebooks

There are many great emulators for Android that allow you to play games from various platforms. But what about if you want to turn the clock back even further and play classic DOS titles like Sim City or Doom?

While emulating DOS games is a little more complex than recent games, it’s straightforward with the proper walkthrough. We’ll guide you through the entire process so you can relive the gaming days of the 90s. Best of all, these games will run smoothly on even budget Chromebooks.

How to set up and use a DOS emulator on Android and Chromebooks

Unlike GBA emulators, DOS emulators are few and far between on Android. Your best option is Magic Dosbox which offers quality-of-life features that help circumvent some of the frustrating elements of other DOS emulators (e.g., you don’t have to run games from the command line with Magic Dosbox). There are also plenty of customizable settings.

The free version is a great way to start with Magic Box, but if you like it, you should probably spring for the paid version. The paid version allows you to add more than one game to the main shelf, and the additional in-game widgets are necessary if you want to use virtual controls.

When you start up DOSBox, you must create two folders in your device’s internal storage to hold game files and settings. You can set these up on Android phones and tablets anywhere, but on Chromebooks, you’ll have to create the folder inside your Downloads folder because that’s the only directory that both Chrome and Android apps get full access to.

Follow the on-screen instructions to set up your folders. You’re ready to install and play some DOS games when you’re done!

How to install DOS games on Android and Chromebooks

Once you’ve opened Magic Dosbox and finished the initial setup, it’s time to install a game. We’ve used a Chromebook for this guide, but the steps will be identical for Android phones and tablets.

Copying the files

For this first example, we’ll use the original shareware version of Doom. While there are much better ways to play Doom on Android, like the official port released last year by Bethesda, it’s a perfect example of how to download and install DOS games.

Download the installer package to your device, then unzip it into the Games folder within the Magic Box folder you created when setting up the app.

How to add a DOS game into Magic Dosbox

Once you’ve unzipped your game, you’re ready to add it to Magic Dosbox. First, we’ll need to specify the setup program.

1. Open Magic Dosbox.
2. Select the plus button on the left side of your screen.
3. Select New Game from the pop-up window.

This will create a window with various settings and options but don’t worry if this seems overwhelming, as you won’t need to touch most of these options. Some DOS games require specific hardware, but Doom’s requirements are close to the default settings. However, you must perform some essential steps regardless of the game.

How to prepare the setup program in Magic DosBox

1. Enter the name of the game in the Title heading.
2. Scroll down to the Hardware heading.
3. Click the Choose button and find the game folder you just extracted.

4. Scroll down to the Software heading.
5. Click Choose under the Setup subheading.
6. Select INSTALL.BAT.

When you’re done, confirm your changes by clicking the checkmark at the bottom of the window. It will create an icon with your title on Magic DosBox’s home screen if done correctly. Now you can set up the main program.

How to set up a DOS game in Magic Dosbox

We can’t open Doom from the Magic Dosbox main screen yet, because we’ve only specified a setup program, not the main program.

1. Tap/Click and hold on to the game’s icon.
2. Select Edit.

3. Select Setup.

This will boot up the installation program. If the steps were performed correctly, you should see this screen:

Tap C on your keyboard to install Doom to the virtual C: drive, then press Enter to confirm the installation. It may ask you to create a directory; tap Y in this scenario

Once it’s done copying files, the installer will ask you what control method you’d like to use. Select Keyboard+Joystick, so your game will work with physical keyboards and virtual/mapped joystick controls.

Press Enter on the rest of the installer steps to accept the default settings, and when everything is complete, press Enter on the Save parameters and launch DOOM option. The game should start, but before you rip and tear as Doomguy, we need to make one final change to the game’s settings.

How to skip the setup steps for installed DOS games:

1. Return to Magic DosBox’s home screen.
2. Tap/Click and hold on to the game’s icon.
3. Select Edit.
4. Scroll down to the Software heading.
5. Click Choose under the Main program subheading.
6. Select DOOM.EXE.
7. Click Choose under the Setup subheading.
8. Select SETUP.EXE.

Now, opening a game from Magic DosBox will instantly launch the game rather than rerunning the setup process.

You can now play Doom or your DOS game of choice! However, depending on your controls, you may need to tweak settings further.

How to set up controls in Magic Dosbox

You won’t need to tweak anything if you’re playing a DOS game with a device that uses a physical keyboard and mouse (e.g., a Chromebook). However, if you’re using an external keyboard and mouse, open the Mouse settings in the emulator and select the Absolute setting. This will cause the virtual mouse to follow your clicks exactly.

If you’re relying on a touchscreen, you’ll want to focus on games that primarily use the mouse for input. Examples include SimCity 2000, The Oregon Trail Deluxe, and the first Sid Meier’s Civilization games.

If a game requires joystick input, or only a few keys (e.g., Doom), you can use an Android-compatible controller. Magic Dosbox’s emulation settings allow you to map keyboard keys to buttons on your controller. After mapping the ‘A’ button on my controller to the left mouse button and mapping ‘X’ to the space bar, I could play Doom fine.

Finally, Magic Dosbox does allow you to create on-screen buttons mapped to joysticks and keyboard keys, but the setup process is finicky. The Add virtual buttons option in the Magic Dosbox menu will create a design mode where you can place and move around on-screen buttons.

The built-in guide goes over the details, which involves holding down on an area of the screen and selecting what kind of button you want there. Most of the options, including the all-important joystick control, are only available on the paid version of the app.

How to play DOS games from disc images

Most DOS games are archived as a collection of files, which you can usually dump in your DOS folder without problems. However, some games always expect the CD to be inserted and aren’t designed to run entirely from the hard drive. Using disc images also keeps Android from indexing the contained files, so you won’t get a pop-up from Google Photos asking if you’d like to backup random photos from the game.

How to play a DOS game from an ISO file

Let’s use the ISO image for The Ultimate Shareware Games Collection from 1995 as an example. Download the ISO file from the archive page and put it inside your DOS games folder, like in the screenshot below. If it has a .img ending, rename it to use the .iso ending, or Magic Dosbox won’t be able to detect it.

Create a game by clicking on the plus button in Magic Dosbox

1. Enter the name of the game in the Title heading.
2. Scroll down to the Hardware heading.
3. Select the Choose button and find the game folder you just extracted.
4. Scroll down to the CD-ROM heading
5. Select the Enabled checkbox
6. Press the plus button to the right of the checkbox.

7. Tap the Choose button and select the ISO file.
8. Enter a title under CD Lable.
9. Press the checkmark button to save your changes.

Once that’s done, you can select the setup program just like you did with Doom, but Magic Dosbox will now allow you to pick files from the CD image.

Relive the days of classic DOS games

Hopefully, you should now have the knowledge required to play some classic DOS games on Android devices and Chromebooks. But if you want to relax with something more recent, browse our roundup of the best games on Android.