Railway Empire

[SAR704]

Has anyone played this game yet? According to steam, it was apparently released yesterday. It looks like a more modern version of Railroad Tycoon in a way, but I want to know if it's worth clogging up space on my PC for a game I may play twice a year or something.

I've barely played Trainfever, so would this be worth it? Despite having a few dozens games, I still tend to play the same ones like TS, Sims 4 (obviously not on Steam sadly...), Euro/American Truck Simulator, Carmageddon (2 or Max Damage, occasionally), and OTTD (which is by far the most addictive one).

[XDriver]

I have it and I'm going to tell you that it is very addicting. I went on PC and started playing and my ole lady didn't see me till I get off the puter after 8 hours straight! lol I think it's done very well. two

[gwgardner]

$49. Wow, out of my price range for now. I'll put it on my wishlist for a sale.

From reading the forum on Steam and watching videos, it apparently has some unfortunate features, such as toylike speeds which are not controllable by the player.
[amendment: after watching some videos, the speed seems acceptible to me.]

Signalling is available, but players are complaining about 'one track, one train.' Haven't figured out what that means, unless the signalling just doesn't work.

There is a sand-box mode. The graphics look very good.

Progression through all eras is not possible. One must select an era, and play within that. I read about a mod where someone tried to allow progression through all eras, and given the high train speed even in 1830, by the modern era the speeds were ridiculously high.

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

The graphics look very good.

Is the game built on the EU4 engine?

[XDriver]

It's NOT a simulator. It's a game to test your ability to build a railroad and beat the competitor RR's in a certain allowed time. Connect certain city's and so on. Loosely based on real history. Signaling works good if you use your knowledge from Railworks and follow the in game tutorial. I like it and think it's a lot of fun for what it is.

[Paragon]

Anyone who liked Railroad Tycoon will probably get a kick out of this. It's somewhat more limited, but so was RRT when it first came out, eventually evolving into a complete DLC-extensible rail bidness sim, with user-specified maps and scenarios.

Well, then. Something do to until TSW tools get here...

[gwgardner]

After watching some videos, I guess the speed is ok. Yeah, it's not a simulator.

Is there time pressure? Does one have to finish each era in a certain time, and it quits? Or can one take all the time wanted?

[Griphos]

Despite having a few dozens games, I still tend to play the same ones like TS, Sims 4 (obviously not on Steam sadly...), Euro/American Truck Simulator, Carmageddon (2 or Max Damage, occasionally), and OTTD (which is by far the most addictive one).

OTTD? I have about 200 games, mostly on Steam. I've only played about a dozen of them, almost always some kind of sim (but, then I count Skyrim as a horse-riding simulator!). I'm a sucker for sales! :-)

I saw this. Didn't seem that interesting to me (and that's saying something, given my proclivities just mentioned).

[JOHNtheREDNECK]

Transport fever has to be the best "successor" to these type of games in my opinion. Especially for those of you that remember the old Chris Sawyer's Locomotion. With that said the modding community for that game is rather lacking but it is slowly catching on for the North American players.

[SAR704]

OTTD? I have about 200 games, mostly on Steam. I've only played about a dozen of them, almost always some kind of sim (but, then I count Skyrim as a horse-riding simulator!). I'm a sucker for sales! :-)

I saw this. Didn't seem that interesting to me (and that's saying something, given my proclivities just mentioned).

I didn't say that OTTD was on Steam. It's an open source remake of Transport Tycoon Deluxe which I used to play ages ago. In the current scenario, I have over 900 trains on one 4096 x 4096 network, mostly running quite efficiently.

[TheOldDessauer]

Some observations about Railway Empire:

1) Has pretty graphics. Can ride the trains in first-person. Thunderstorms look nice. No day/night cycle like RRT3 (disappointing). No seasons/no weather changes (disappointing).
2)Has some interesting mechanics: A) Tech Trees. Player can invest research points in unlocking new locomotives and business practices. B)Employees. Player can hire train crew and office staff that have various attributes that can buff train and company performance, and nerf competitors trains and companies, can scalp employees from other competitors.
3) Signaling. Player can signal tracks to create passing sidings and secondary main lines, etc. Doesn't exactly work like signaling in the real world; it is more a visual representation of programming logic for your trains to follow, but it gives the game flavor.

Some negatives: Railway Empire has fewer features than RRT3 overall.
1) Player cannot buy or sell stock in their own company, no dividend mechanic. The only way to protect your company from hostile takeover is to buy out the other companies first.
2) Only up to 2 A.I. opponents; you could have up to 7 in RRT3.
3) Cannot connect to A.I. Track: Player cannot connect to and use competitors stations and track like in RRT3, no trackage rights. Cannot cross competitors tracks at grade; can only build over or under them, i.e. no diamond crossings, no junctions.
The corollary to this; the A.I. cheats...competitors trains don't have to use signaling, they can just ghost through each other, so the computer can put as many trains on the tracks as it wants (many players have complained about this). Not only is this an unfair advantage, if you do buy out that company it will have to be completely dismantled and rebuilt/signaled to work.
4) Fewer commodities/raw materials than RRT3. Instead of building a station in a major city and having materials flow to the station, you have to build stations at every commodity, this results in a "spaghetti bowl" effect as you and competitors race to lay as much track as possible. Results can be messy.
5) Game is separated into discrete 20-30 year sections with an associated section of the tech trees. Tech tree stops around 1940. Player cannot start at 1830 and play all the way to 1940.
6) Game stops around 1940, cannot play into modern times (yet). Might be DLC or patches.
7) Two big missing pieces to tech tree; No 4-8-4 Northern-type (the apogee of North American steam) and no EMD F-Unit (strange because the E-unit is in there).
8) Game is about the rise of railroads in America during the steam age so America maps only(fine with me), no Canada or Mexico (maybe DLC on the way). No international maps. And no fantasy maps like RRT3 (post-apocalyptic, ice age, underwater, etc.) fine by me.
9) No multi-player (fine by me).

[TheOldDessauer]

From: The developer of Railway Empire
Steam forums:

Greetings tycoons!

It’s been a whole week since the hugely successful launch of Railway Empire, and while the game has received very positive reviews from the media and consumers alike, we want to further improve on this foundation with all the great feedback we have received so far, along with some things that we were already working on.

With that in mind, we are happy to announce that we are currently working on the following:
Available in ‘free mode’, we will introduce one huge North American map covering West to East coast, including a tech-tree covering all the tech innovations from almost 100 years of the steam revolution.
A roadmap of further free updates, which will include new content, enhanced AI, bug fixes and other general improvements inspired directly by player feedback.

Players will see these new updates begin to roll out over the next couple of months, and in the meantime we will continue to collect your feedback and reports, working to implement them wherever possible.
Stay tuned for more details coming soon!

[gwgardner]

on sale 70% off on STEAM now

[buzz456]

Dead thread.

[gwgardner]

Why is it dead? I just bought it. Tried out the 1st campaign, ie tutorial. Determined that it ought to be fun in sandbox mode, on 50% speed. Some of the scenarios made by players promise a 'more realistic' experience. Graphics are very good.