Chisholm Trail

Chisholm Trail
Chisholm Trail (Front Cover)
Publisher(s)	Texas Instruments (TI)
Original Retail Price	$39.95
Programmer(s)	John Plaster
Part#	PHM 3110
Format(s)	Solid State SoftwareTM Command Module
Release	July 1982
Genre(s)	Action, Shooter

Chisholm Trail is an Action-Shooter video game created for the TI-99/4A home computer system. It was released during July of 1982 and was distributed as part#: PHM 3110 by Texas Instruments (TI). Chisholm Trail was programmed by John Plaster who also created Tombstone City: 21st Century. It was distributed by Solid State Software^TM Command Module and originally retailed for $39.95.

Gameplay

1982 Chisholm Trail Manual Front Cover (Old-Style)

In Chisholm Trail, the player takes on the role of a cattle driver on the trail, trying to push their cattle to specific destinations. The player must defend the heard from the cattle rustlers and wranglers along the way. The wranglers in the game, take on the appearance of brands and will mark your steers as their own. The player gains mileage as points. Rustlers are worth 250 miles each, and wranglers value 150 miles.

Advertising Blurbs

Front Cover of Manual

Chisholm Trail challenged you to drive your cattle to market on the Chisholm Trail. Perils along the way include cattle rustlers and wranglers.

Back Cover of Manual

Relive the excitement of the era before the railroad came to Texas. With Chisholm Trail Command Module, you become the foreman on a cattle drive attempting to get your herd to market. As you travel the Chisholm Trail, you are besieged by perils, including rustlers trying to steal your cattle and wranglers trying to put their brands on your steers.

Chisholm Trail provides the thrill of frontier days as you:

• Eliminate cattle rustlers who are after your herd.
• Avoid, and possibly destroy, the wranglers trying to put their brands on your cattle.

Each time you successfully survive a day on the drive, you complete another segment of the trail and add another steer to your herd.

Cheat

By pressing "*#*" in that set sequence when the game prompts the player to input the desired starting level the player enters a cheat mode where he/she can select the specific day (there are 7 days per level) and the number of shops to begin the game with. The catch, when the player does this, the word "TEST" displays on the top left-hand side of the screen making it very difficult to fool others that the player is a Chisholm Trail master. Friends and family would know the player cheated.

Manual

Introduction

Imagine yourself as a cattle rancher before the railroad came to Texas. To get your cattle to market in Kansas City and Chicago, you would have to drive your herd along a cattle trail, such as the Chisholm Trail. This trail extended from San Antonio, Texas, to Abilene, Kansas. From Abilene, the cattle were sent by rail to market in the East.

Although this sounds fairly simple, the cowboys on a cattle drive didn't have an easy time. Daily, they were besieged by perils, including rustlers trying to steal the cattle and steers straying from the rest of the herd. Often, these stray steers would join another herd, where they were branded by the wranglers driving that herd.

Now, with the Chisholm Trail Solid State Software™ Command Module, you can relive the excitement of this era. Become the foreman on a cattle drive attempting to get your herd to market along the Chisholm Trail. The module lets you experience, day-by-day, the thrill of accomplishment as you earn points by:

• Eliminating cattle rustlers who are after your herd.
• Avoiding, and possibly destroying, the wranglers who want to put their brands on your cattle.

In addition, each time you successfully survive a day on the drive, you complete another segment of the trail and add another steer to your herd.

Movement on the screen can be controlled by the Wired Remote Controllers or from the keyboard.

Beginning the Drive

After you choose the game from the master selection list, the Chisholm Trail title screen appears. Press any key within two seconds to go on to the level-of-play display, or wait for the title sequence to end and the next display to appear automatically.

To see a demonstration of the game, do not select a level of play. After a moment, a sample game begins. When you are ready to start your own game, press any key and the game's title screen reappears. Press any key to proceed to the level-of-play display.

You can choose any level of play from 1 through 9. The level you select determines the number of days you have been on the trail, the number of steers you have, the number of shots a steer can fire, and the number of rustlers you must eliminate. These values are listed here.

Level	Day	Number of Steers	Shots per Steer	Number of Rustlers
style="width: 20%;" 1	1	4	50	12
2	8	6	50	16
3	15	8	100	16
4	22	10	100	16
5	29	12	100	16
6	36	14	100	16
7	43	16	100	16
8	50	18	100	16
9	57	20	100	16

External Links

• Giant Bomb: Chisholm Trail
• Moby Games: Chisolm Trail
• TI-99/4A Video Game House: Chisholm Trail
• WikiPedia: Chisholm Trail (video game)