Station

Station is a video game in the strategy genre developed by Shareware Systems originally released in 1992. It is currently playable on DOS.

Station is a single-player shareware game that simulates the management of an Australian sheep ranch. It is the first game from Shareware Systems and is text-based.

The game consists of a single screen divided into three main areas. At the top left is a box containing a list of keyboard commands, S - Buy/Sell Sheep, L Buy/Sell Land, etc. Pressing any of these keys brings up a small window in which the player decides whether to buy or sell and for how much. To the right is a status window, here the function keys F1-F4 show the status of the farm, buildings currently owned, market prices and a capacity window showing how many sheep, dogs and employees can be fed, watered and housed. Game events are also posted in this area, these include good things like investments maturing and uranium being found in the land and sheep dying.
At the bottom left the game displays a 'Welcome to Station!' message. This is also a scrollable message area that, over time, replaces the welcome with warnings such as 'buildings need to be maintained' or 'employees are overworked'.

When the game is initially set up, the player sets the speed at which it will run, after which it starts in the current year and gives interim status reports at the end of each season with the overall report at the end of the year. The player can raise sheep to sell their wool and build up the farm as he goes along and can also invest in buying sheep, wool, buildings, etc. which he can then sell at a profit. Life is hard and it is possible to lose all your sheep to dehydration very quickly if you don't look after them.

The game is controlled entirely with the keyboard. It has a save/load function with ten save slots, but no sound.

It is possible that we have multiple downloads available when different versions exist.