Basic Facts:
- Title: The Oregon Trail
- Release Date(s): Created - 1971, Released for schools - 1974, Released commercially - 1978
- Publisher: Minnesota Educational Computing Corporation (MECC)
- Developer(s): Don Rawitsch, Bill Heinemann, and Paul Dillenberger
- Genre: Edutainment, Economics, Sim
- Version Reviewed: Apple II (1985 release)
The Good
- Engaging strategy gameplay that holds up.
- Game changes based on each decision you make, so every time you play it's a different experience.
- Both fun and educational for all ages.
- Shows the true life hardships of early pioneers.
The Bad:
- Often problems on your journey occur for no apparent reason, like a lost or sick party member.
- Some issues come up with no options to fix them, such as a lost party member.
- No save game option.
History:
In 1971 when Carleton College student teacher Don Rawitsch became inspired to create a computer game as a teaching aid for his history students, he teamed up with fellow student teachers Bill Heinemann and Paul Dillenberger. The three programmed their game, The Oregon Trail, coding it into a large mainframe computer via a teletype machine.
The text-based game recreated the experience of pioneer immigrants crossing The Oregon Trail in 19th century United States. Students and faculty alike were impressed with the outcome which combined strategy gameplay while giving players an understanding of what those early pioneers had to survive during the long journey.
While the first publicly available video arcade games, Computer Space and Galaxy Game had released earlier that year and the first home console, The Magnavox Odyssey. wouldn't make its debut until 1972, computer games were mostly used as a tech demo for computer labs. As schools and universities had the most accessible computer labs for students, it was the ideal opportunity to create a teaching tool that helped give a lesson in history as well as give students an interactive computer experience.
Three years later Rawitsch joined educational software developer Minnesota Educational Computing Corporation (MECC) and added The Oregon Trail to their library. Soon the game was exclusively available to schools throughout Minnesota.
By the late '70s hobbyists were starting to buy and build their own home computers, one of the more popular models being the Apple II. Software was hard to come by for the small user base making techies hungry for anything they could get. To fill the demand for more software and games MECC released the first home version of The Oregon Trail for the Apple II via third party distributor Apple Pugetsound Program Library Exchange (or A.P.P.L.E.). The game was part of A.P.P.L.E.'s PDS Disk Series sold via mail order through the back of Creative Computing Magazine, one of the first computer periodicals.
As the popularity of computers continued to grow MECC started releasing their edutainment titles in bundles for the home market as the MECC's Elementary Series, and in 1980 they released Volume 6, which included the first graphics based version of The Oregon Trail. Reception to this primitively illustrated game was so great that they added much more extensive graphics and released The Oregon Trail as a packaged stand alone game in 1985.
In subsequent years numerous versions of The Oregon Trail have been released for various platforms. While the style, graphics and animation quality have adapted and improved, the concepts behind the game have remained the same, with its popularity continuing today, most recently with an adaption for mobile phones.
