Maria Rowe’s Reviews > A History of Video Games in 64 Objects > Status Update

When little Joey died of dysentery, it meant something. When the cart overturned while fording the river, it was devastating. Like no other game before it, The Oregon Trail transported players to an entirely new world, if only for third-period history class.

In 1942, New York City mayor Fiorello La Guardia outlawed pinball machines and denigrated pinball pushers as “slimy crews of tinhorns, well dressed and living in luxury on penny thievery.” Pinball was seen as the gateway to gambling, one that corrupted children and set them along the path to drinking and prostitution.