The Oregon Trail Lives Again In Browsers As The Internet Archive Adds 2,400 MS-DOS Games

Hello, it’s me.

You’ve been missing it for so long, you didn’t even know it until now, when the sweet feelings of relief are about to wash over you: You can play The Oregon Trail again in most Internet browsers, no MS-DOS needed, thanks to its addition along with around 2,400 titles to The Internet Archive this week.

“Considering the Internet Arcade has dragged in over 5 million people, this new collection will probably bring in a flood of its own. Welcome,” Internet Archive curator Jason Scott wrote this week in announcing the new additions on his blog (full list of games here).

Along with The Oregon Trail there are plenty of favorite titles to be had, from The Lion King to Donkey Kong, Street Fighter II to 4D Prince of Perisa. Though there are some caveats — as Ars Technica points out, some software might not be available for long depending on specific copyright rules.

And the experience isn’t foolpoof, warns Scott of the software:

“Some of them will still fall over and die, and many of them might be weird to play in a browser window, and of course you can’t really save things off for later, and that will limit things too,” he writes. “But on the whole, you will experience some analogue of the MS-DOS program, in your browser, instantly.”

Now, back to getting Poopypants McQuirk on the road to dysentery. Err, to Oregon. Successfully, at last.

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist