Penn & Teller's Desert Bus

The world's worst videogame provides the lowest initial bar to scale in simulating Ulysses.



"The objective of the game is to drive a bus from Tucson, Arizona to Las Vegas, Nevada in real time at a maximum speed of 45 MPH. The feat requires eight hours of continuous play to complete, since the game cannot be paused... The bus contains no passengers, there is little scenery aside from an occasional rock or bus stop sign, and there is no traffic. The road between Tucson and Las Vegas is completely straight." [wiki] [Java port]



Let the viewer be a pedestrian and the view be an unchanging street scene. Let them choose any startingpoint-and-destination among the book's many paths, and decide when to move and when to stop. Keep track of progress and end the game when they've 'walked' as far as their chosen path demands.

Variants: Ride in a carriage, a train, or a tram. Include paths deduced for characters between episodes. Add destinations like Mullingar or Clongowes.

Complications: Add a graphic for cross street intersections that appears at appropriate times, and require the character to 'turn'. Represent different street widths and building heights.

(If someone wants to do this, it would be nice if the data files are in a format that can be repurposed for more advanced sims.)


gameplay starts at 3:53