Oregon Trail - Developing A Classic

Via Press the Buttons, an interview on the site Deadly Hippos with Philip Bouchard, designer for the original "Oregon Trail". The classic game of food, hunting, and cholera was a staple for many folks around my age growing up, and the piece makes for interesting reading. From the article: "Unfortunately, in real life it was all too easy to kill a buffalo with a rifle. In later decades hunters would kill vast numbers of buffalos and take only the tongues. So I wanted kids to feel a sense of shame for killing too much and then wasting the kill. That was one of the reasons for allowing the player to carry back no more than 200 pounds of meat. I wanted the kids to develop a sense of conservation while playing the game - to say "We should not shoot more meat than we can carry". Our field testing showed that this lesson was indeed effective."

Comments

OS remake?

[Kleedrac2]

It's always amazed me with all the OSS remakes of classic games (especially ones 20 years old upon which the copyright may have expired) we've never seen a java version of Oregon Trail! Growing up in the 80's you couldn't not have played this game, and I daresay that if you played it it impacted you. If I had more time I'd be very tempted to start a team and put this dream into action. As it stands I'll simply say I'd love to add my $0.02 worth of code to this project should it pop up on sourceforge :)

Kleedrac