Railway Empire

The looks okay and it has interesting mechanics but it has two major problems: 1. The tutorial is kindof confusing, my first hour in the game was pretty uncomfortable. 2. The controls, the building - very clunky.. Also the interface is not so great, they need a UI expert to show them how to build a decent one.. Sometimes you can see weird bugs in stations when you are riding the train, like graphical glitches with people drowning.. Not worth more than 10 euros in my opinion.

This game is interesting in a way, but what you notice as you play for awhile is that the AI cheats. If you start to do better in the game, the AI will up the ante and artificially suddenly makes the game harder, and it makes it harder by refusing to do what it's supposed to do. I swear it's true. I played "The South" scenario six times and failed every time because that gangster idiot in the game kept buying my company. Finally, I took out bonds and built quickly, and took over the game very fast, but now, suddenly, the game wouldn't let me achieve a population of 60,000 in Kansas City by the end of 1892, which is your first requirement in order to continue playing. All six times previously, I easily got Kansas City to 60,000. Suddenly, now, when I'm whipping ass, the approval rate in Kansas City stays at 45%, no matter what I did, and the population shrank. I didn't do anything differently, but all of sudden my trains are breaking down, they ignore stop signals and just stop for no reason, and they all act like they're clueless. Also, tell me why a train going into a station with FOUR TRACKS has to wait forever until the single train parked in the station leaves. It's just so stupid. If things had actually worked this way in early America, we never would have grown past a third world country.

The game looks good graphically at first sight and does not overwhelm the player with too many options. After some playing time, however, irreparable errors occur. Correctly connected, upgraded stations are no longer found by the trains. All signals removed and reinstalled, but connections are not possible. First one station is affected, then two, three and so on. That's annoying and the fun of playing doesn't come anymore. Even after a new start, you don't know when the error will come back.

Artificial intelligence (AI) does not build detours and crosses, it does everything in an easy way. You could also connect the rails with competitors and charge for their use. Thank you

I have found Railway Empire to be a great but not excellent computer game. I enjoy it a lot. On some days for 5 hours. I found it confusing when I started playing. A tutorial would have been helpful. It was quite easy to learn how to play it but there is a fair bit to learn. The level of difficulty settings allows you to play an easy or near impossible game. Using the advanced settings, you can fine tune it. If you are a beginner do not make it too difficult for yourself. The layout of the American map is fully accurate, with all towns, mountains, rivers, etc. The vast majority of America is included with only about 8 states missing. There is a wide range of resources that you can farm or mine. And a great range of factories that allow you to make consumer goods. The main way you earn money is by creating railway lines. Creating one is easy at the start. But as the game progresses it can become tedious as you spend a lot of time creating and deciding where they should go. It has affected my enjoyment of game. There should be reports that say which is the most needed or profitable. One main downside is the lack of staff you get. Sometimes I only get 20% of the employees I need which affects how much money rail lines can make. The technology tree is great and easily allows you to easily see what technologies you can research, the benefits, cost in innovation points and the prerequisites. Later in the game you can add extra rail cars such as mail and dinning. Although these are tedious to add especially when you have a lot rail lines. The yearly report summaries the main income and expenses allowing you to see how much money you have from year to year. You can play against a couple of competitors that build rival networks. It is fun to sabotage one of your competitors’ stations or business. You can even merge with a competitor by buying shares in their company and eventually take over all their railway lines slowly over many years.