BushBuck Charms, Viking Ships & Dodo Eggs
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Video games |
| Founded | 1991 |
| Headquarters | Australia |
| Products | Bushbuck Charms, Viking Ships & Dodo Eggs |
Bushbuck Charms, Viking Ships & Dodo Eggs, alternatively titled Bush Buck: Global Treasure Hunter, is an educational video game launched in 1991. Created by the Australian developer Reckon and distributed by the American company PC Globe—known for its focus on edutainment software throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s—the game adopts a worldwide scavenger hunt style reminiscent of Broderbund's Carmen Sandiego series. Its primary educational goal is to teach geography by guiding players to locate fifteen specific treasures chosen from a vast collection, including items like a hemlock leaf, lava-lava, and an alpaca poncho. The title was released for both Amiga and MS-DOS systems.
Gameplay
Participants travel between various cities to discover treasures assigned at the beginning of each session. The game provides three distinct modes: solo play without an AI opponent (not available at the advanced level), solo play against a computer adversary, and a two-player option.
Each session commences in a randomly selected home city, where players must return to exchange found treasures for points and additional tickets. Successfully gathering all fifteen treasures grants a one-way ticket back to the home city. At any moment during gameplay, only five items are accessible.
Weather
While journeying between locations, players encounter weather challenges such as blizzards, typhoons, hailstorms, rainstorms, or hurricanes. Opting to fly through these adverse conditions carries the risk of being rerouted back or having collected treasures damaged, which decreases their point value upon redemption.
Tickets
At the start of each round, players receive a predetermined number of tickets (60 for beginners, 50 for intermediate players, and 40 for advanced). Each flight consumes one ticket; if a player attempts to fly through storms and fails to reach the destination, they must surrender between one and three tickets to cover aircraft damage. Returning items to the home city rewards an additional ten tickets per treasure.
Infoboxes
Upon arriving at or selecting a city, an "infobox" appears presenting information pertinent to business interests such as founders, prominent individuals, and significant landmarks or attractions.
Clues
Certain cities display clues indicated by black boxes on the map. Each treasure has five clues that progressively become more informative, drawing from local landmarks, historical context, popular culture references, and data found in infoboxes to assist players in locating items.
Skill Levels
The game includes three difficulty tiers: Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced.
In Beginner mode, players face off against a caricatured French opponent named Pierre (renamed Texan John in the European edition). A proximity meter helps players gauge their distance from treasures for strategic movement.
Intermediate mode removes this proximity meter and introduces an eye symbol that illuminates when the player is in the correct city; pressing it allows collection of the treasure. The rival character here is Natasha, portrayed as a Russian stereotype.
Advanced mode features Otto, depicted as a German aristocrat rival. The eye icon remains but no longer lights up; players must identify the exact city independently. Otto occasionally takes longer routes inaccessible to the player, misleads by sending players to incorrect countries, and can claim treasures if encountered simultaneously. Visiting locations Otto has already explored triggers his portrait above the infobox with a speech bubble declaring "Otto vaz ere!"
Reception
Computer Gaming World characterized the visuals and sound quality as average, yet suggested the title as suitable for both youngsters and adults with an interest in geography and cartography.