Seven Cities of Gold

From the Database of Home of the Underdogs

GAME DESIGNER:Dani Bunten
GAME DEVELOPER:Ozark Softscape
GAME PUBLISHER:Electronic Arts
Copyright 1985, Ozark Softscape

From Brian Moriarty’s tribute to Dani Bunten: “Seven Cities of Gold was a solid commercial triumph. It brought together real-time action, strategy and exploration in a historical adventure with a genuine smudge of educational value. In fact, the much-despised term “edutainment” was originally coined to describe this game. With sales of 150,000 copies across several platforms and numerous design awards, Seven Cities catapulted Ozark into the ranks of the elite developers; and nobody complained about the fact that it was designed for only a single player.”

Note: the 1993 remake called “commemorative edition” upgrades the game with VGA graphics. I still like the original much more, though, because the 1993 version simplifies the gameplay and make it much more tedious. If you are interested, this version is included in the EA Compilation Pack.