Desert Bus Video Game

THE WORST VIDEO GAME EVER MADE?

Andrej Dethlefsen
2 min readJan 20, 2021

The drive from Tucson, Arizona, to Las Vegas, Nevada, takes around eight hours when travelling in a vehicle whose top speed is forty-five miles per hour. Fancy driving this? Well now you can!

By Greg Dorais — Own work

In this PIG of a game, Desert Bus, conceived by the American entertainers Penn and Teller in 1995, players have to complete that journey in real time…eight hours, driving along a straight road, with only the occasional rock or sign to change the scenery.

All with NO passengers.

Think you can just let go of the wheel and take a ‘comfort break’? WRONG! The bus veers to the left and right forcing you to make micro adjustment constantly. If that happens, you get towed back to the beginning in REAL TIME!

Want to pause to get a beverage? NO CHANCE!!! There is no pause function.

You drive, real time for over 8 hours. That’s it. Your reward?

1 POINT. Enjoy!

“The route between Las Vegas and Phoenix is long,” said Teller. “It’s a boring job that just goes on and on repetitiously, and your task is simply to remain conscious. That was one of the big keys — we would make no cheats about time, so people like the Attorney General could get a good idea of how valuable and worthwhile a game that just reflects reality would be.”

TAKE A SPIN

Want to give it a spin? Well, you will have to get your mits on the short-lived and ill-fated Sega CD add-on for the Megadrive console.

Don’t have one? Good news! You can watch the FULL drive through in the below video, with the benefit of a pause button and option to abandon!

Incredibly this turd has gained somewhat of a cult classic and has been re-released in VR so you can have a fully immersive experience should you be so inclined.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/638110/Desert_Bus_VR/

YOU ARE WELCOME!

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Andrej Dethlefsen
Andrej Dethlefsen

Written by Andrej Dethlefsen

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I am a professional content marketer who loves using video, words and empathy to create compelling stories.

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