Rail Estate

Play the demo to see if this is something you enjoy. There isn't much difference between the full game and the demo otherwise, a few QoL improvements here and there, but overall the situation is the same. Personally, I think the game is a little too basic and also too chaotic at the same time. Mechanics-wise it's pretty straight forward, but I just don't think I enjoy the auction part. You only get one chance. Supposedly devs tested having an auction to be more than a "set and done" thing, and reported pacing issues, which I can absolutely imagine to be the case. However as is, this game just turns into "whoever has the largest pockets", you want the route - bet all the money and pray you get it, or your opponents have more and take it. I've only played against AI as there are were no people joining or creating public matches that I could see. Devs kept saying "bet the amount that makes sense for the line. Don't overpay" Then you get into a game, trying to join 2 towns with only 10k population, and AI buys it for 56k. Like, it just doesn't make sense... I have wrongly expected this to have a somewhat similar gameplay to the old Sid Mayers Railroads and its multiplayer, which used to be very fun. The demo, obviously, didn't give that vibe or mechanics, and considering the game launched soon after discovering the demo - I gave the game a little try too, but what you see is what you get. This is not a game for me, but maybe somebody out there will enjoy it. Don't exactly want to be the first player giving a negative review here as, I think, the right person will have fun with this game, so I'll leave the thumbs up. Hopefully it finds the right audience and atleast the multiplayer part can be enjoyed by others.

Tried the demo, enjoyed the game. Got the game, enjoyed it more! Price is very fair for the content so far I feel.

Game is awesome. Must buy for train fans and tycoon players more broadly. Auction system is unique and super compelling. Campaign looks decent so far as well. Tons of emergent gameplay with hubs and connecting tracks massively increasing (or decreasing) profits for both yourself and opponents. Looking forward to playing this multiplayer with my family as well.

This one's a really fun game to play with friends, and I've also had some fun in the single player campaign so far. The train network system is a lot deeper and more complex than I expected, and competing against other rail tycoons makes it a lot more interesting than traditional sim games, but I never felt like the game was unfair as the balance seems really good. There are a few campaign levels that are harder to perfect clear, but you can replay those and they are more like puzzle levels, and you can usually get them in a few attempts. I'm about... idk, maybe halfway through the game so far, but this thing was just so much fun I wanted to get some good feedback for it. For the price, I think you're getting a really good game here. I think I'm going to be sinking a lot of hours into this game x3 The tutorial explains things pretty well, and playing through the early campaign can also help you get a grasp of the rest of the game. Some things to keep in mind I've learned so far: The auctions are blind. This means you don't know what other people(Or AIs) are bidding and that can add a layer of strategy and guesswork to the game. This means the group you play with materially changes how a game can play out as different people have different strategies. There is another interesting competitive aspect of purchasing land rights defensively and not building a track that can add another element of strategy. As tracks can note pass over one another in this game, this mechanic can add further strategy as you try to monopolize a region by buying up real estate in the area to keep your tracks operating at a higher price, and hinder your opponents ability to bypass your train routes and hurt your business. Building rail that connects to bigger cities cost more both to buy the rights and to install. This works well both to simulate zoning rights, and to add a good amount of gameplay balance allowing for early game play to be making bids on shorter connections between smaller towns to earn starting capital, while late game largely revolves around building shortcuts and optimizing the network to undercut opposing tycoon's profits by stealing their customer. It's actually a pretty fair and balanced game loop from what I've seen so far. Like, the balance feels really nice. And if you build with these things in mind and use defensive strats, you can defend against shortcuts too! Also, this game has upgrades for your trains that run on certain tracks. You can use upgrade points to increase the speed and size(number of passengers) of your trains to outcompete other players and NPCs. The paths people take along the rails do seem to take into account the speed. And even if you don't have the capacity for it on a train, you can increase the speed of your train to hurt your competitor's routes, even if they are higher capacity. If you just play the campaign you will figure out a lot of this naturally as it gradually introduces everything, but if you are hopping into multiplayer right away you may want to jump in with friends, or accept that it may take a few matches for you to figure out all the common tricks this game has for battling over real estate. There's a surprising amount of depth to the economics and optimization of your train networks, and competing against other rail tycoons. All in all, a SUPER FUN game to play with friends, and not a bad campaign either. I hope they add more story content to it at some point though, as right now it seems to be mostly based on teaching the player the game, and the challenges. But there area LOT of challenges, with a handful of bonus objectives for each scenario too!. My one complaint is I wish that the sim time could be adjusted to go longer? Or have that be an option? It seems the scenarios all end in around 1900, but I think allowing players to have some longer running games(especially with huge maps) could be really fun, maybe even having a game mode where the map expands to give you more regions to build in over time? The base game is so solid it has me imagining lots of cool things I think could be added to this game to make it even cooler. I'm curious what the later scenarios will have in them. (will update my review once I clear the campaign!)

I’m an early beta tester for Rail Estate. It is been so fun having my suggestions so quickly and so well incorporated into the game from concept to execution. The developers are wonderful people. The developers have fixed all the early issues I noticed and added all sorts of new features, but more than that they improved the core components of the game to make the gameplay smooth. I can beat level 4 AI difficulty but it is debatable if I can defeat level 5 AI difficulty. The single player mode versus the AI is fun. But what is more fun is playing against and with friends online. This is definitely the sort of game you want to play with your friends. Down to the gameplay mechanics: The maps are randomly procedurally generated but you can choose the terrains like lakes, mountains, and rivers combinations. Rivers were the first new landscape patch which significantly improved the opportunity of commerce by linking two population centers across the river creating opportunity for a player or team to make big profit. However, other players can also build bridges so you want to have the best rival bridge. While one might expect that bridges are profitable the tracks directly connected to the bridge can likewise by profitable and also extremely profitable if they are only rails to the bridge because you constructed tracks to block other approaches to the bridge because rails can’t bisect each other. Therefore, I was really excited when the developers added rivers and bridges to cross the rivers. Now the game has lakes and mountains which are aesthetically pleasing but also intricate gameplay obstacles. While rivers essentially divide the map, mountains block the shortest path between any two cities forcing the player to construct rails that go around the mountain. Therefore mountains redirect the course of the game. Lakes also have a similar impact, and I really like how the lakes aren’t usually circular but have distorted shapes as seen in nature. One would normally expect that you should construct rails between big cities because they are profitable. This is true indeed. However, tracks between big cities cost a lot of money. If you buy a lot of tracks connecting small towns you can accrue income in the early game. You can also use those little rails to create epicenters to make all the traffic go through one small town. Once all trains are going through that small town your most profitable track can be a cheap long track between small towns because the only way to travel to the big cities is between small towns. I’m sort of chaotic player so I create blocking tracks between two small towns far apart. That track is essentially a mountain range that bisects the map. This strategy doesn’t work as well as you think it would but it also is quite jarring to players have never seen such a chaotic play style. I also buy critical tracks that connect my rivals epicenters and then I don’t build the tracks. This essentially creates huge losses in profits for my rivals making them have to redefine their strategy to make money by connecting rails to cities. Although the tracks are randomly generated based on user predefined settings one can play any random map by saving the seed. I played the same random maps with my group expecting our network of tracks would look the same. There are slight differences with each replay but each new group of players has a different concept of the same map for how the rail systems are constructed. Winning is fun and also losing is fun but the true reward is testing out new mechanics and strategies with your friends. The in-game audio is essentially flawless to play with your friends but I also like chatting on Discord with my friends while playing this game. Every country has a rail systems although i presume some countries have a more fluid rail system, other countries may also have chaotic rail systems. I presume one would understand why the rails look as they do if one were to watch the cities grow over time. In the game Rail Estate you and your friends use rails to connect cities creating localized economies and linkages to those economies. At the end of a match, the rail systems probably looks a little crazy but that is because you, your friends, and the AI have a different vision of where the economy hubs should be and those hubs can change over time as the rails redirect the flow of passengers and cargo. I envision the rail systems one creates as star constellations, a cardiovascular system, or circuit boards, or a water maze. My undergraduate anatomy instructor once told me, “what is normal?” regarding the connection of blood vessel, nerves, muscles, and the other networks in the human body. Everything must be connected, but we are a little different in how thick, flexible, and strong those connections are. Physicians know exactly what they are looking for when they do a surgery on anyone but they know the fine details are important to take note of because there is no normal person. Likewise there is no normal track network in this game. Every friend group has a different vision of how all the cities should be connected. I don’t understand how profit is calculated in this game but from a relative standpoint the profits make sense to me as the matches progress, and I like how the game score keeps. I don’t know how to build a game but I’m so glad the developers care about BessieBestie’s input even though I’m of intermediate skill. It is cool to see all my suggestions be so throughly incorporated way better than I could do. There are more critical gameplay mechanics and settings, but to understand what I mean about those niche strategies I mentioned and to create your own strategies you need to try the game out for yourself with your friends.

The game is fun, but takes a second to get the hang of. You're bidding blind on train routes, which introduces a lot of strategy. Tracks can't cross each other and you have to keep track of impassable regions on the map. The strategy is chaotic and requires a lot of fast thinking on your feet if you haven't planned ahead properly or allowed competitors to make plays you didn't expect. It's interesting to see the little plays snowball into big plays towards the end. Cool game and not very expensive. Definitely check out the demo first if you're curious.

Fantastic game, glad i managed to get together with master hellish to play a few rounds. love the simple artstyle and sounds. Everything just works when it comes to setting up and playing. Mechanics are a little strange to get used to but work really well once it clicks My *only* gripe is there is no birds, but thats a me thing :P

Good game!

One moment I am peacefully expanding my rail network to ensure all the cities in my claimed region have adequate train routes. Then longtime friend I will refer to as "bb" calls for an auction, a new line between two big cities, deep in my network. My heart jolts, I try to outbid them for the rights to the road but they happen to outbid me, by only $10. "Bb" quickly starts and finishes construction on the new rail, now many of my surrounding tracks lose precious income as passengers flock to the new direct route. Rage shooting across my mind, a long 10 minute ballad of undercutting, bidding wars, upgrade fights, and decoy tracks ensues. Adequate infrastructure? Screw that. All that matters is getting ahead income-wise by the start of 1900, and by any means. This is but one of the many sagas born from a 15 min Rail Estate match. When you play the game without competitors, it feels more akin to a pleasant, casual railroad tycoon sim. When playing with opponents (human, cpus, teams) it can still be pretty chill, if each player stick to their own region of the map. If players decide to start building into each other (like "bb"), the gloves come off and the session devolves into cold, cutthroat, capitalist chaos not seen since my first proper game of Monopoly. Overall... If you enjoy train network management games, you'll like this. If you want an easy-to-learn train game to play with friends/family, you all will LOVE this. If you desire to use trains to screw people out of tons of money (like "bb"), then you MUST have this.

It's a fun train-tycoon game. The blind auction system is an interesting new mechanic. I played the demo to get to grips with the game, then bought the full version to play with friends. Quick 15-30 mins matches, turning on the voice chat makes it a dynamic bidding game. Great fun!