I honestly can’t think of any educational game that has been more successful. Thanks to green-screen IBMs, an entire generation of people grew up knowing what the Oregon Trail is. …well, assuming the Oregon Trail has to do with dysentery, hunting, writing witty sayings on tombstones, and deciding whether to caulk the wagon or ford the river.

For the few among you that are uninitiated, this was a game about, well, pioneers and the Oregon Trail. It was one of those subjects that you were guaranteed to spend at least a few months on every year in elementary school, and it was one of my favorite subjects, partially because it meant I got to wear cool period clothes that my mom made me and play with wooden propeller toys.

Anyways, this was a strategy/simulation game that involved, well… trying to get to Oregon from Missouri or wherever the heck you started. (You states east of the Continental Divide are all the same and I can’t keep track, pffft.) Along the way you had to deal with whatever nature and various diseases decided to hurl at you. Not to be taken lightly as a kids game, people in your wagon party could– and would– die at a moments’ notice, which promptly led to the infamous playground trick where you would name your party after all of your least favorite classmates and then try to induce rattlesnake bites. (Come on, we all remember kids who did that. Maybe you were that kid.)

Looking back on it I think what the Oregon Trail game was most successful at, in terms of educational value, was teaching me place names. For example, apparently there is a rock somewhere that looks like a chimney. I would not have known this if not for the Oregon Trail. I mean, you never know when you’ll be in a life-and-death situation requiring you to point out various historical landmarks, right?

Now most people probably quit playing Oregon Trail right about the time they graduated into middle school, but if you were me, you decided to be hardcore and play the later editions, which had super shiny graphics.

This edition included the exciting hunting-for-plants minigame, where ten minutes worth of sorting plant pictures turned into about five seconds’ worth of food in the actual game. It’s much more economical to just shoot a bear. (Sorry, vegetarians!)

It also came with a super easymode option at the beginning of a new game where a guy would sell you basically all of the supplies you needed for your entire journey in one neat bundled package. Of course, we all know that only casuals pick that option, and us hardcore gamers start with only a gun, a box of bullets, and a grandfather clock.*

Speaking of your items, a word of warning: the people in this game that you can trade with love to rip you off. I mean, I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure an ox isn’t worth a jar of pickles. As enticing as that jar of pickles might be. (And for the love of all that is holy don’t try to haggle with them, or they’ll start wanting TWO oxen for a jar of pickles.)

Ultimately, though, for all that we love to poke fun, this game and its derivatives are truly among the all-time greats. Long before the disaster that was “Mario is Missing”, there were truly fun and memorable educational games like Number Munchers, Odell Lake, Murphy’s Minerals, and of course, The Oregon Trail.

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* Is it terribly wrong of me to want to point out the historical inaccuracies in calling a longcase clock a “grandfather clock” prior to the year 1876? >_> SHUT UP, I KNOW THESE THINGS OKAY?