--- description: The Internet Archive, Oregon Trail, the game that traumatized countless children of the '80s and '90s online for free. title: You Can Now Play 'Oregon Trail' Online for Free image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d71c75157c9cf0e/698778753c1639e427451003/oregon_trail.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Newsfeed](/tag/time-section-newsfeed/) ## Newsfeed Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # You Can Now Play _Oregon Trail_ Online for Free by [Melissa Locker](/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jan 6, 2015 11:41 PM CUT  Oregon Trail Oregon TrailInternet Archive by [Melissa Locker](/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jan 6, 2015 11:41 PM CUT Hitch up your oxen, find some water barrels and get ready for some westward expansion because _Oregon Trail_ is now available to play online — for free. The [Internet Archive](https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary%5Fmsdos%5Fgames/v2 "undefined"), which is best known for running the world wide web’s time capsule, [The Wayback Machine](http://archive.org/web/ "undefined"), has put the game that traumatized countless children of the ’80s and ’90s online. That means future generations can feel the oppressive horror of attempting to fight their way across the Oregon Trail on a steady diet of squirrel meat with only an axe, some rope and frequent bouts of dysentery, pausing in their manifest destiny only long enough to etch grandma’s epitaph on a makeshift tombstone on the side of the trail. Fun, right? **MORE** [Sony Is Bringing Back the Walkman With One Huge Surprise](http://time.com/3655492/sony-walkman-zx2-sound-clarity/ "undefined") Of course, _Oregon Trail_ isn’t the only game available. There’s also _Duke Nukem, Street Fighter, Burger Blaster, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, The Lion King_ and _Chuck Yeager’s Advanced Flight Trainer_ and more than 2,393 other MS-DOS based game titles ready to play in an immersive and engaging lesson in interactive internet preservation. The online arcade is a “software crate-digger’s dream: Tens of thousands of playable software titles from multiple computer platforms, allowing instant access to decades of computer history in your browser,” the [archive wrote](https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary "undefined"). And they definitely want people to play the games, but be prepared to offer feedback. According to a [post](http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/4487 "undefined") announcing the new resource, the site’s software curator Jason Scott wants people to reach out and report bugs as they play. “Some of \[the games\] 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. But on the whole, you will experience some analogue of the MS-DOS program, in your browser, instantly,” Scott wrote. So start playing, but prepare for dysentery. \[Via [The Washington Post](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2015/01/05/you-can-now-play-nearly-2400-ms-dos-video-games-in-your-browser/?Post+generic=%3Ftid%3Dsm%5Ftwitter%5Fwashingtonpost "undefined")\] _Read next:_ [_These Are the Most Ingenious Gadgets From CES 2015_](http://www.time.com/3653602/ces-gadgets/?xid=time%5Freadnext "undefined") [_Listen to the most important stories of the day._](http://time.com/newsletter/the-brief/?sl%5Fautoplay=true&xid=spl-fullbrief-article "undefined") ### These Vintage Computer Ads Show We've Come a Long, Long Way  1974  1976  1976  1977 Picasa 3.0  1977  1978  1978  1980  1980  1981  1983  1983  1983  1984 ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3656635/play-oregon-trail-ms-dos-games-free/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3656635/play-oregon-trail-ms-dos-games-free/"},"headline":"You Can Now Play Oregon Trail Online for Free","datePublished":"2015-01-06T23:41:00.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:48:12.132Z","description":"And many, many other MS-DOs games","url":"https://time.com/3656635/play-oregon-trail-ms-dos-games-free/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Games"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d71c75157c9cf0e/698778753c1639e427451003/oregon_trail.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Melissa Locker","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d71c75157c9cf0e/698778753c1639e427451003/oregon_trail.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"oregon_trail","caption":"Oregon Trail","creditText":"Internet Archive","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3656635/play-oregon-trail-ms-dos-games-free/","name":"You Can Now Play Oregon Trail Online for Free"}}]}] ```