I absolutely adored this game when I was younger! The idea is to drill your "rig" deeper and deeper into the ground, collecting drops of oil, without letting your rig be destroyed by various obstacles along the way (mostly bugs). I would spend hours upon hours collecting as much oil as I could, trying to get to the next level, all while avoiding the bugs that were quickly creeping closer and closer to my rig.
I owned the version developed by Sierra Online, so at the end of each level, my hard work was rewarded with a cartoon featuring Slater, a bluish-purplish "Petrosaur" whose home was destroyed with each dig.
I loved watching the rig burst through the roof of his underground home, piercing his TV as the poor guy barely avoided disembodiment by the foreign object that had invaded his personal space. (On a side note, it baffles me to this day as to why an oil mining game would choose an underground-dwelling dinosaur as its mascot, but that was the least of my worries when I was ten years old and playing a game where tiny bugs could destroy oil rigs.)
There are other enjoyable things about this game besides the nostalgic aspect. For one, the game isn't too difficult, so children can enjoy it without getting frustrated, but it is not so easy that they will get bored
with it. The manner of playing is simple, too; the arrow keys and space bar can be used instead of a joystick. The graphics were very nice for the time in which this game was created, though certainly laughable by today's high-tech digital standards, and the cartoons in between each of the levels were creative and amusing. However, this game was not without its downfalls, though minor. For one, the levels did not differ incredibly in difficulty, so the game was easy to beat once you got the gist of it. Also, while the company did claim it could be "fun for the whole family," it is definitely more of a game for children, in particular younger children to adolescents.
All-in-all, Oils Well is a game I would recommend to others just because I know how much fun I had with it when I was younger. And the best part? Now I can relive a little piece of my care-free childhood every time I boot up my computer!
