The idea for the Desert Bus mini-game came after Janet Reno, the then Attorney General of the United States, made comments about how gamers shouldn't be playing violent video games and instead games that were more peaceful and more like reality. Eddie Gorodetsky, television writer and an associate of Penn & Teller, had suggested to do a game where the player drives from Phoenix to Arizona, on a bus at 50 miles per hour, in an eight hour shift, as a response to Janet Reno's comments.

Originally, there was going to be an official contest for anyone to submit their highest score in Desert Bus. The grand prize was to be a bus trip from Tucson to Las Vegas where they'd see a Penn & Teller live show, and a four night stay at Bally's Las Vegas.

The highest score possible in Desert Bus that could be achieved is 99, which meant that players would have to play 792 hours (33 days) to reach it.

Desert Bus for Hope is a Charity Streaming Marathon where anyone can donate money to Child's Play to add more extra Hours to keep the drivers drive the bus more and they can only stop if the timer expire.

The creators of Desert Bus "Penn & Teller" found out about Desert Bus for Hope and have chosen to support the charity.