If he typed the word incorrectly, he earned no food for his efforts. The user would comply on the keyboard as quickly as possible. When use of the rifle was called for in Oregon Trail, say for hunting, the computer sent the instruction, “Type BANG,” or some other randomly selected gunshot word. He took advantage of two of the teletype’s capabilities: It recognized whether the user’s typed input matched what was specified in a program, and it could measure the elapsed time between the end of a computer instruction sent to the user and the typed input of the user’s response. How, then, to include rifle use in the game?īill ingeniously solved this problem. It could only print text on a scroll of paper. But the teletype in 1971 did not have color, graphics, animation, or sound effects. The pioneers depended on their guns for hunting and protection. However, with this historical era, shooting was a part of the story. So many computer games today involve shooting. On Building The Game's Iconic 'Hunting' Mechanic Using different curve formulas, this technique was used for several of the game’s variables to produce different event probabilities as a function of trail location. If the number fell above the curve, as it often did during the mileage between the ranges, snow was less likely. If the random number fell under the curve, as it often did at the curve’s beginning and end, snow occurred, representing the two mountain ranges. During each turn through that segment of the trip, the computer generated a random number that was compared to the curve. Bill and Paul developed a parabolic formula that, when graphed, produced an upright U-shaped curve covering miles 950 to 2000, with mileage along the X-axis. The snow probability in the game was defaulted to zero during miles 0 to 950 of the trip. This was followed by more flat land with little snow, and then came the Cascade Mountains in fall with a higher likelihood of snow. Once the Trail entered the Rocky Mountains, snow was more likely. During these warm months, it almost never snowed on the prairie traversed during the trip’s first half. It would have been easy to decide that for the game: “the probability of snow will be seven percent.” However, the pioneers typically made the six-month journey during the April to September period. For example, if the diaries averaged reports of rain in 27 days of the 180-day trip, the computer probability for rain was set for 15 percent. I kept a record of what happened each day of the trip for several of these diaries, and then set the probabilities based on this information. The Oregon Trail would probably have been successful if the probabilities chosen for events along the Trail had been educated guesses: 'It probably rained 25 percent of the time, so let’s have the computer report rain in one of every four turns.” Not content with this approach, I found books in the library that published the actual diaries of pioneers traveling the Trail. On Using History And Math To Create Realistic 'Probabilities' For Random Events westward migration, the three of us decided to try making a computer game. When I found myself faced with teaching a unit on U.S. Other than these few examples, there were no antecedents to examine no commercial games, no books written about creating computer games, and no collegiate classes taught on the subject.īill, Paul, and I did have an understanding of how an event could be simulated mathematically by setting up algebraic relationships between variables that represented the impact of user decisions, the financial value of supplies, and random events. Thus, our team had experience with simple simulations, such as running your own lemonade stand, taking into account local tastes, cost of goods, pricing, and weather to maximize the stand’s profit. The mainframe computers usually had a library in which users could store and share programs they created.

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