Developer:
The Men Who Wear Many Hats LLC

Compatible with:
iPhone
iPad
iPod Touch

Android Systems

Requires:
iOS 3.1.3 or later

Android 2.1

Price:
$2.99

Available here (for iOS) and here (for Android)

“You have Died of Dysentery”

Nothing was worse than seeing this message pop up on the Apple screen at the library we used to play “The Oregon Trail” at in grade school. Maybe the first couple of people to fall to it got away without too much ridicule, but as soon as one of us discovered what dysentery was, we became unstoppable forces of mocking nature. There were many ways to die on the “Oregon Trail”, but the only one you truly feared was the dreaded dysentery. It’s not like it was ever your fault either. If there was a “wash your hands after using the bathroom” button, we would have used it.

If you can’t relate to what I’m talking about then I truly pity you, because you missed out on one of the greatest gaming experiences of all time. What made “The Oregon Trail” so great was the many gameplay options and features, and how even playing the game right wasn’t a guarantee for survival. Even better, the vaguely historical setting meant that it was a game you could play at school, and at the aforementioned libraries. It’s one of those games where you can tell right away if someone grew up with it or not, because if they did, all it takes is a mere screenshot to bring a grin to their face, and set them off on a bombastic recollection of nostalgic memories.

Well if you did, in fact, never get to share that experience, then developer The Men Who Wear Many Hats has your back, thanks to some funding by Kickstarter. Because they are bringing back the old school gameplay of “The Oregon Trail” but infusing it with the harsh reality of the zombie apocalypse. Now truthfully, I’m getting a little tired of the zombie genre, but every now and then something will pop up that resurrects the style much in the same manner as the decaying dead that populate those titles.

“The Organ Trail” (huh…clever) is one of those instances. From the menus, to the basic gameplay, to the perfectly recreated graphics and sounds, “The Organ Trail” shamelessly apes “The Oregon Trail” with admirable accuracy. The basic goal is the same. You and yours traverse the country in search of a better home, while battling the dangers of the untamed world. But rather than just throw a couple of undead sprites your way and port “The Oregon Trail,” the developers have completely re-imagined the experience of that classic as it stands in this new world, and along the way have managed to perfectly recreate the experience of the original, while still making sure that anyone who grew up on the original game enjoys the near flawless ratio of nostalgia to the joy of a fresh game experience.

It’s the original title’s survival aspect that makes this re-imagining work. You are forced to hunt for food, and the barest supplies you can muster against not only zombie hordes, but raiding humans and mutated wildlife as well. The best you can hope for is to take on the occasional odd job, and gather enough resources to trade where and when it’s available for supplies and the necessary equipment to beef up your station wagon.

Understand this. No other zombie game, and few other apocalypse titles have quite the same level of desperation as this one. It may be light hearted in its concept and style, but the desperate fight for survival that this app requires will force you to make stupid decisions like going out in overrun zombie areas for whatever you can grab, and watching your party die around you. Some of them will even become mutated forcing you to do the job yourself.

You will constantly find yourself surprised by the different gameplay available in “The Organ Trail.” You may start a session as a laugh, or out of curiosity, but you will soon find yourself impossibly engrossed in everything occurring around you. At first I thought the most impressive part of the game was its brilliant re-telling of one of the most classic video games ever made. Then I was sure that it was all of the imaginative callbacks to the horror titles that influenced the zombie aspect. Only after finishing my first play-through though, did I truly know that the most impressive part is how every single aspect of this game is done with 10x the effort that was necessary. “Organ Trail” is a combination of several loves, and there isn’t a moment or feature in it that doesn’t remind the player of all of them.

Last week, I had the privilege of declaring “Turf Geography Club” my first unanimous must have app. Now, I get the honor to do that again. I frankly don’t want to know the person that couldn’t enjoy “Organ Trail”, even if it’s in short bursts of playtime. Even better, with the new undead enemy force my old grade school nemesis, the disease dysentery, doesn’t have to be the biggest threat looming anymore. Yes, finally I can enjoy “The Oregon Trail” experience without worrying about the embarrassment of dying from dys…

Dammit. Well, it’s still my app of the week.

I went into season two of AMC’s “The Walking Dead” thinking it would be a slam dunk. How could it be anything but? The first season, at just six episodes, was one of the most intriguing pieces of television I’ve seen in years. Most of its allure was the pacing. Every episode had moments of pure calm that were invariably interrupted by drooling hordes of zombies. But the zombies didn’t carry the show. The characters did most of the work, which is exactly what a good zombie show needs. We need to care about the characters so that the inevitable losses have some consequence, a task the writers of the show met head-on. All of this is to say that my expectations, high as they were, were based on the merit of the first season.

Season two started well. The survivors from last season had decided to leave Atlanta and head for Fort Benning. They hit a roadblock on the way out of town, which included a brush with a shuffling horde of zombies. We saw a pair of walkers dispatched, the first with a screwdriver through the eye, the second with a quick stab to the brainstem. It was a perfect re-introduction to the gruesome, post-apocalyptic world I loved in season one.

While creative zombie-killing is great, it isn’t enough to carry the show. There has to be some sort of plot. For season one, it was getting into Atlanta and the CDC with the hope of finding more survivors. In season two we have Fort Benning, again with the hope of finding survivors. It’s a fine plot, though it does get quickly derailed when Sophia, one of the children in the group, is chased into the woods and later disappears. Sophia’s disappearance would have been fine had it been contained to just an episode or two, but it has utterly consumed the show.

I think Shane said it best in episode 5 when he said, “…you got 72 hours and then you’re looking for a body, and that was before.” Even if Sophia was a primary character, spending this kind of time looking for her without any indication she may be alive would be maddening. I’m sorry, but no amount of Rick grimacing or Carol staring into the distance will make me care about Sophia’s whereabouts. She just isn’t an interesting character. Leaving the group to stagnate on the farm has made several of them less interesting as well.

Consider Andrea. She was one of the least consistent characters in the first season, but she also lost the most, so her wild character swings at least had some basis. In season two she’s flat-out crazy. She’s become obsessed with carrying a gun, despite the fact that she doesn’t know how to handle one. It’s not even clear why she wants one, other than just to have it, which should raise some questions for the rest of the group.

How have I not yet mentioned that she shot Daryl in the head? In case I haven’t made it clear, she’s untrained with a gun. Regardless, she thinks it’s perfectly acceptable to take a shot at a target that is mere feet from three other human beings and obscured by the sun. Would you want her anywhere near a firearm? I wouldn’t, but apparently the two state sheriffs felt otherwise. In the very next episode she has a gun back in her hand. She even makes jokes with Daryl about shooting him in the head. I’m sorry, AMC, but what the hell are you thinking?

The one good thing to come of Andrea’s utter insanity is that she’s pushing Shane further along his own descent into madness. Shane is the one interesting thing about this season, but his volatility has been wasted on the benign location and the scarcity of drooling undead so far.

I think the general lack of zombies remains my biggest issue with season two. In season one, zombies were everywhere, all the time. The world felt dangerous and unmanageable, and yet, the characters were surviving. At its core, this is what a zombie story is about. It’s about a world we all know and love becoming foreign and dangerous and the efforts we take to make the world knowable and lovable again. Once that world is knowable and lovable, the story ends. The Georgia of “The Walking Dead” is much too comfortable, much too familiar. It’s a feeling I would be fine with for an early episode but not six. It’s time to shake things up. It’s time to leave the farm and try to make the rest of the world a livable place.

ALSO: Check out our interviews with actors Jon Bernthal and Norman Reedus and executive producer Robert Kirkman.

It’s no secret that AMC has endured a difficult year filled with one PR nightmare after the next – including public contract disputes that suspended production on Season Five of “Mad Men” and threatened the future of “Breaking Bad,” as well as audience backlash over the season finale of “The Killing” – but it suddenly felt very personal when Frank Darabont, creator and executive producer of “The Walking Dead,” was unexpectedly relieved of his duties only a few days after promoting the show at San Diego Comic-Con. Though the network never gave a clear reason for his dismissal, it’s believed to have something to do with forced budget cuts for the second season, which came as a surprise to Darabont after the show set a new cable ratings record in its debut season.

But despite all the backroom drama and concerns that Darabont’s absence would spell trouble for the hit zombie series, AMC was insistent that “The Walking Dead” was in the capable hands of his replacement, Glen Mazzara. Then again, Darabont was already hard at work on the show for months before getting the axe, and mapped out the entire season prior to his departure, so audiences may not notice many differences (if any at all) until the show’s third season. It should be noted, however, that Mazzara is no slouch when it comes to making great TV (having previously spent five years behind the scenes on “The Shield”), and he’s still working with the same team that Darabont put together, including zombie experts Robert Kirkman and Greg Nicotero. In fact, based on the first two episodes alone, it’s pretty clear that fans have nothing to worry about.

When we last left Rick Grimes and the rest of the survivors, they had just escaped the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta by the skin of their teeth and hit the road once again in search of a new refuge. Though they don’t actually arrive at Hershel’s Farm – the provisional sanctuary featured in Kirkman’s comics – until the second episode, the season premiere has more than enough going on to keep them busy, including a tension-packed opening sequence where the survivors must hide from a herd of zombies after Dale’s RV breaks down on the highway. There’s plenty of action and gore as well, with one survivor wounded pretty badly in the aforementioned attack, another one shot in what is likely the first of many “holy shit” moments of the season, and a truly disgusting zombie moment that some people might not be able to stomach. Oh yeah, and fan favorite Daryl kicks a lot of zombie ass, but I’m guessing you already knew that.

Of course, the series is first and foremost about the relationships between its large cast of characters, and although some viewers might bemoan the slower pace of these early episodes, it allows for a lot of great interactions – particularly involving the Rick, Lori and Shane love triangle – that will only make you even more invested in their survival. And if there’s one thing that AMC can never take away from Darabont, it’s the amazing job he did with laying down a strong foundation on which those characters could grow. Because while he may no longer be around to captain the ship, Darabont’s fingerprints are all over “The Walking Dead,” and it’s the main reason why the show will continue to operate at such a high level of excellence. It may not have gone down exactly the way we would have liked, but the audience still comes out the winner in the end.

“The Walking Dead” returns to AMC on October 16th at 9/8c with a special 90-minute premiere. Can’t wait that long? Check out a sneak peek of the new season below.