The Oregon Trail

Description of The Oregon Trail

There are few video games more fondly remembered than the Oregon Trail. It has inspired countless gamers and spawned countless memes. Still, it is hard to say how much of the fondness gamers feel towards this storied title is due to the fact that Oregon Trail was literally the first (and in some cases, the only) video game many children played. Much of its exposure came in classrooms, due to its educational nature. By the standards of the time in which the 1990 “Classic Edition” was released, much less those of today, there’s very little actual substance to Oregon Trail, and many will find it either tiresomely repetitive or only good for a brief jaunt down nostalgia lane. Gameplay in the older versions of Oregon Trail consists mostly of hunting every day to make the most of your food supply (a minigame where you shoot at a variety of game) and waiting for your party to reach the next landmark. Later versions, including the 1992 Oregon Trail Deluxe and the 1995 Oregon Trail II offer vast improvements on both graphics and gameplay. In fact, many adults in their 30s today are far more likely to have grown up on either of those than the variants of the Ur Oregon Trail. Still, this remains an artifact for the curious. While this is a step up from the days of having to type “Bang” and “Pow” to shoot game in the earliest versions, a quick play of Oregon Trail: Classic Edition will show kids (and many adults) how lucky they’ve had it compared to Generation X, who had to walk to school through snow, uphill both ways, to get to their vidya.

Review By P. Alexander