Donald Duck's Playground

Donald Duck's Playground
Donald Duck's Playground
Donald Duck's Playground Coverart.png
Developer(s) Sierra On-Line
Publisher(s) U.S. Gold (C64)
Sierra On-Line (others)
Designer(s) Al Lowe
Engine Adventure Game Interpreter
Platform(s) Amiga, Atari ST, Apple II, Commodore 64, IBM PCjr
Release date(s) Commodore 64'
1984
Atari ST, Amiga, Apple II
1986
IBM PCjrPC'
1988
Genre(s) Educational
Mode(s) Single player

Donald Duck's Playground is a computer game for the Commodore 64, based on the Walt Disney cartoon and comic book character Donald Duck. It was also ported to the IBM PCjr, Apple II, Atari ST and Amiga. It was designed by Al Lowe, who went on to create the Leisure Suit Larry series.

The player takes the role of Donald Duck, whose job is to earn money so that he can buy playground items for his nephews. To do this, Donald can get himself a job in any of four different places: a greengrocer's, a railroad, a toy shop or an airport. Each job shift lasts from one to eight minutes, as the player wants, in which time Donald has to earn as much as he can.

Contents

The jobs

Donald has a different task at each job. He earns a set amount for each part of his job; on the Intermediate level, these wages are doubled; on the Advanced level, these wages are tripled.

The greengrocer's 
Donald is responsible for sorting vegetables thrown to him from the back of a pick-up truck in three different boxes. One of the boxes is for watermelons, one is for pumpkins, and one is for cantaloupes. Each vegetable gets thrown at a randomly chosen distance. Donald has to catch it and put it in the correct box. Failing to catch the vegetable or putting it in the wrong box results in it being squashed and no money earned. Donald earns 1 cent for each vegetable correctly sorted.
The toy shop 
Donald is responsible for putting toys given to him from a conveyor belt in the correct place on a shelf. Every 80 seconds or so, a train will pass on a nearby railroad. If the shelf is open at the time, the train will cause toys to drop from the shelf, losing money. Donald has to close the shelf for the time the train is coming. Donald earns 5 cents for each toy placed on the shelf.
The railroad 
Donald is at a switch console, responsible for putting switches on the tracks in the correct order, so that cargo trains can pick their cargo up from the correct city and deliver it to the correct city. Donald earns 15 cents for each delivery routed.
The airport 
Donald is responsible for sorting cargo given to him on a conveyor belt into the cargo vans for flights going to different airports across the United States. Each item of cargo bears the three-letter abbreviation of some U.S. airport. Donald has to throw it into a passing cargo van with the matching code. Near the end, the aeroplane leaves, and Donald has to stop sorting cargo. Donald earns 3 cents for each item sorted.

The playground

Donald can spend his hard-earned wages by buying various items such as ladders and swings for a playground for his nephews Huey, Dewey and Louie to enjoy. They can be bought from three different stores where the player must be able to count the amount of coins needed (25, 10, 5 and 1 cent) for an item and, if the total is not even, the change.

Each item bought can be placed at a specific place on the playground. By going across the railroad, Donald can call up one of his nephews (in practice, the player character switches from Donald to his nephew), and he can then play on the playground.

SCUMM VM

The popular emulator for old adventure games recently added AGI engine games, and despite this game being slightly older than officially supported games, this too works with SCUMM VM and the Nintendo DS port of SCUMM VM.

See also

External links

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