This is my problem, I'd be willing to pay much more if I could try it out and kick the tires. Abandonware is a problem in the gaming engine community... even a success story is only going to be around a few years.

A big problem is that by the time you fully understand any game engine (I've looked into) it might just be obsolete. The cost of learning the engine dwarfs the cost of licensing... Assuming your time is worth anything.