Oregon Trail 5

I was very happy with this game- it took the bets parts of the previous Oregon Trail incarnations and wove them together for a good overall product. I can appreciate a company which recognizes both the weaknesses and the strengths of their products and uses this information to get better. In this Oregon Trail you can once again chose how many you will travel with and name them (for some crazy reason this feature was eliminated in the 4th Oregon Trail edition), but you can also CHOOSE the times you stop to collect wild fruit or fish, instead of these circumstances just happening randomly (which does not make as much sense). To me, these were the biggest changes to previous games, but they were improvements.

Aside from the above changes, the basics of the game remain the same, and it will look familiar to those who have played other editions. A few things have been updated, particularly some aspects concerning Native Americans and some geography, but the good times still keep rolling.

Both my son & I started playing Version 1 (which is great for kids), but the graphics aren't great. Version 2 gives you more options, and I get to shop and keep a budget. Shooting food & steering down the rapids is more fun also. Versions 3 & 4 were more complicated because of more choices (who will you chose to be in your wagon, fishing, trading & plant gaithering). There's 3 disks with 3 & 4 and NO LEGEND (highscore list), but you do get to chose what you want to trade. VERSION 5 IS 1 DISK, but you can FISH,HUNT,GAITHER PLANTS,SHOP,TRADE(their choice)& log your high scores. Start out as a green horn; continue as an expert trailguide. If you're a farmer you don't have much money & must budget your supplies & money, but your score is times 4.5. While a banker has money, but really has to avoid the temptation of over loading his wagon. You can have 1 to 5 people ride in the wagon with you and you can name them or the computer will. When my son was under 11, he had me start the game by buying the supplies, then he'd take over. He loved the hunting and fishing. When I played the game I'd call him over to finish it by "riding the rapids" (with his fast reflexes, better than me). If you like making choices in a game this may be the game for you. Remember when gaithering plants the bright red berries are poisonous. If you have them for supper you die, game over. It helps to save your game before that happens, so if a mistake happens, you can exit and return.

Version 4 was full of bugs and agonizingly slow but it clearly reflected an effort to expand the game and make it more interesting.

This version reverses direction. It is quite stable and should run on just about any recently purchased Windows computer.

The trade off is the game play is diminished. The other members of your party no longer have occupations or much personality. The screen no longer scrolls as you hunt. There are less choices to make and overall the game is more likely to bore the adult who tries to play it with children. The only thing not simpler is the the purchasing that still confused my 9 year old brother (who is good at math) so badly I had to make his purchases for him to keep him from quitting.

The lack of feedback at the end of the game is quite irritating. No longer can you tell what items that you were carrying were worth something once you got to to Oregon. So you can't tell what to bring next time. Was the Grandfather clock worth more in Oregon? How about the extra supplies your carried? You will never know.

Overall it is a big step down from version 4 except for being more stable.