2112: A Field Trip (2001)

Starting from the tarmac at the Chicago Central Spaceport, this text adventure game follows the protagonist through nocturnal adventures during what seems initially to be an ordinary, everyday McCracken Middle School class field trip to Mars on February 4th, 2112 (singing, all together now, "the turbines on the di-molecular ion drive go 'round and 'round!") -- but turns out to be the last 24 hours of the UNASA colony's existence! Unable to sleep after resting through the flight, the player sneaks out of the hotel and prowls around the colony's spaceport, F.A.K.E. bio-dome, and mini-mall facilities at Conformity Corner... outsmarting an entomophobic security cyborg, befriending a sassy holographic AI designed to be the figurehead goddess deity ("Oona") of the UN's one-world government, and stumbling upon and unraveling codes and ciphers of sacred geometry and mystical numerology left by missing research scientist Lt. Cecil Kraven II, father of a classmate and diagnosed schizophrenic, pointing to the outpost's pending eradication at the hands of a cosmic threat. This all culminates in a moon buggy trip across the Martian surface with a genetically-modified cockroach, racing against time to save the lives of the colony's innocent denizens. Good thing you got your permission slip signed!

• Release Date: October 1, 2001