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It is very similar to this question: Famous games written in Java

Does anyone know of any popular or famous games only written in C?

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You probably already know this, but since it's related, I'll just mention that the vast majority of modern games are written in C++. It's not the same thing, of course; the languages are more different than a lot of people give them credit for. But I wanted to share that in case anyone is unaware. – Mitch Lindgren Jul 30 '11 at 5:43
@Mitch I understand that C++ is used more, just wanted to see if anyone knew any popular C games – LizardGamer Jul 30 '11 at 7:56
@Mitch and yes, some game forges produce C like code using large god 'classes', few OOP and so on. Of course they use a C++ compiler, but does it really count? – mbx Jul 30 '11 at 8:48
-1 since, unlike the Java question, this doesn't show a lot of research. It's almost like asking "what games use normal maps". – Tetrad♦ Jul 30 '11 at 18:58
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There's a period of time (mid-80s to mid-90s) where C and C/asm were the "only" option for writing games, so I'm not sure answers like "Doom" or anything for the PSX are particularly useful (although id did hang onto C longer than most other studios). More interesting would be studios today still using pure C, or Atari 2600 / early NES games written in C. – Joe Wreschnig Jul 31 '11 at 9:15
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closed as not constructive by Tetrad♦ Oct 21 '11 at 19:33

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4 Answers

up vote 13 down vote accepted

Doom, Quake, pretty much all id games up until id Tech 4.

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up vote 8 down vote

Cryptic Studios's games - City of Heroes / Villians, Star Trek Online, and Champions Online (and presumably Neverwinter Nights, but I can't vouch for that 100% since I don't work there anymore) - were written in C.

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Neverwinter is definitely in C too. – Alex Ames Aug 4 '11 at 22:53
Wait were all these written in Pure C? – Aditya P Mar 29 '12 at 13:29
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@Aditya: Well, and a custom interpreted language, which we wrote the interpreter for in C, and a data description language which we wrote the parser for in C, etc. Some (small) amounts of the asset pipeline were written in C++, Perl, Python, Excel macros, etc. I believe we also used a C++ shim to FMOD. But yes, for all intents and purposes the games were written in pure C. – Joe Wreschnig Mar 29 '12 at 14:15
@Joe Could you add your comments to your answer. there might be others like me who have failed to see this implied process and might imagine the entire pipleline used only c with no interpreted languages. The asset pipeline meaning the 3d? assets with bindings in pearl/python , text parsers and c++ for external libraries? I gather that you worked on these could you elaborate a bit on the asset pipeline – Aditya P Mar 30 '12 at 6:14
@Aditya: The question is closed. We don't want questions like this on the site. – Joe Wreschnig Mar 30 '12 at 8:02
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Lots of Jap/PS1/DC games. Also Soul Reaver 1, parts of Soul Reaver 2 and there was quite some plain C code in Tomb Raider: Legend.

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up vote -13 down vote

Every single Xbox and Xbox 360 game.

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Let me revise that I meant C/C++. – Matt Jensen Jul 30 '11 at 12:36
The answer is still wrong, because people use XNA which is C# for some games- not to mention that the answer specifies C. – DeadMG Jul 30 '11 at 12:45
The games made in XNA arent Xbox titles. To specify, C/C++/PPC ASM are the only languages for titles. – Matt Jensen Jul 30 '11 at 12:48
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The answer did not restrict itself to only AAA titles. It says, "Every Xbox and 360 game". That is not accurate. The games made in XNA are games that run on the Xbox. Your answer is untrue. – DeadMG Jul 30 '11 at 13:37
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@Matt your last statement about the possibility to write a full game in C on the 360 shows that you don't have access to the 360 SDK, Otherwise you couldn't make that statement, because it would be a breach of the NDA. This kind of guessed information and half-knowledge is rather useless and misleading. – Maik Semder Jul 30 '11 at 13:43
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