Empire Railway 2
Cora Auch
Overall, I very much enjoyed Railway Empire, as can be told by my shoulders being sore from being hunched over my Switch while my wife watched the 10th hour of Millionaire Matchmaker. This definitely scratched an itch for me and will be my go to Railroad Tycoon-ish game from now on. I love that it is now on the Switch since I can now bring it on long flights. I would 100% recommend this to all trains fans and anyone who likes this breed of intense economic sim. A few hiccups minorly hinder it at times, but once you learn your way around the tracks, Railway Empire is a very sound game.
Thanks for coming over for this review. :)
It's a bit worrying to read this crashes every few hours with seeming regularity, as the game has been out on Switch in Japan since February. Gives the impression they won't be patching that out, and to be honest it doesn't instill great confidence in future Kalypso Switch releases like Port Royale 4.
Will gladly eat crow here if they fix it. I'm not much of a rail buff, and it's a minor bummer this is mostly pre-WW2 railways instead of stretching into the modern MagLev era, but I am partial to this type of tycoon game. Might give it a go if they patch it or if it goes on sale.
Seems quite interesting. The crash issue, while frustrating, is one I am familiar with from Sid Meyer's Railroads on PC. That game crashes periodically as well but the auto saves are so frequent I rarely loose more than one or two actions to it.
I'll still hold out for a bug patch or a good sale, but will give it a shot for sure thanks to this review.
Since I wrote the review, I've been playing it a bit more this week and over the weekend, and it hasn't crashed once since the official launch, not sure if its because I haven't been pushing it as much (needed to get in some Animal Crossing time) or there was an update I didn't notice. But I'll keep everyone updated if it happens more.
Railway Empire is a railroad construction and management simulation game developed by Gaming Minds Studio and published by Kalypso Media. It was released on 26 January 2018 for Linux and Microsoft Windows, 30 January 2018 for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One,[3][4] and 14 February 2020 for Nintendo Switch. In Japan, the physical copy of the game was distributed by Ubisoft in May 2018.[5] A sequel, Railway Empire 2, was released in 2023.[6]
Railway Empire's base game takes place in the United States from 1830 to 1930. The player can build a large network of railway lines and buy various locomotives to serve cities and industries - growing cities in the process, and hire railway personnel for both train operations and office positions, all with individual bonuses and personality types. The player can also unlock innovations such as new locomotives or bonuses to revenue. The game has five main game modes: campaign mode, scenario mode, free mode, sandbox mode and challenge mode.[7][8][9]
The Campaign mode mainly takes the player through the building of the First transcontinental railroad, the exception being mission four which is based around the American Civil War. In this mode, the player must fulfil tasks as well as competing with AI controlled competitors. In the Scenario mode, these competitors are selectable and playable characters with specific gameplay bonuses. The tasks are also considerably harder in scenario mode. In Free mode, the task list is randomly generated upon start-up, and the tasks given are not compulsory. Players can also choose to toggle different settings, such as how many competitors they face (between 0 and 3), the competitors' difficulty level, or whether snowfall is enabled (thereby slowing down locomotives in winter months). Sandbox mode has no tasks and all locomotives are automatically researched. There are also no competitors and money is infinite. Challenge mode is similar to scenarios and free mode but players compete with other players on an online leaderboard.[8][10]
As of 7 May 2021[update], the game has ten downloadable content (DLC) available. Most DLCs add new Scenarios to the game, new maps for Free Game and Sandbox mode, new engines and tradeable goods. One DLC, Railway Empire - Official Soundtrack, does not add to the base game and instead is the release of the soundtracks of the base game and the DLCs released at that time.[11]
In a review of Railway Empire in Black Gate, Bob Byrne said "I've rediscovered my love of railroad simulations with this game. It's just as fun to play as Railroad Tycoon was. I highly recommend this if it's your type of game."[26]
All aboard the express train to riches and fame in Railway Empire 2! Don the coat of a clever entrepreneur, take over a small railway company in the early 1800s and turn your steam engines into the workhorses of the economy. Grow your company into the largest railway company of the continent and outsmart your competitors as you connect cities and companies with an ever-expanding network of rail lines, bridges, and tunnels
Laying Tracks is easier than ever with automatically placed signals, bridges that can hold up to 4 tracks, train stations with up to 8 tracks and new train station attachments to customize your stations. The land also adapts to your track layout as your tracks cross mountains, valley and plains.
Railway Empire 2 2023 Kalypso Media Group GmbH. Railway Empire is a registered trademark of Kalypso Media Group GmbH.
Published by Kalypso Media Group GmbH. Developed by Gaming Minds Studios GmbH.
Recently Patrick and I went to the Orange Empire Railway Museum in Perris (about an hour and a half east of Los Angeles) with a couple of friends for a day filled with not just train history, but a glimpse into the history of Los Angeles transit, as well as added bits of Disney history!
At first glance, it may appear that I am just wearing another western inspired outfit with turquoise jewelry, but I specifically chose to wear turquoise to pay homage to Fred Harvey, a man closely tied with the restaurant industry, railways, and turquoise jewelry.
Fred Harvey was a restaurateur who transitioned into the railroad business. He became fascinated with the southwest and built trading posts at rail stops, filling them with Native American goods, such as blankets, baskets, and jewelry. Harvey went so far as a to make pre-cut (and hallmarked) pieces of jewelry, to then be embellished (traditionally by stamping, like my bracelet) by Native Americans and then sold at his trading posts. The Orange Empire Railway Museum even has a building dedicated to Harvey and his influence on train travel.
Another interesting piece in the Orange Empire Railway Museum collection is the Descanso, the believed last remaining funeral car. Built in 1909 in Los Angeles, the Descanso features stained glass details, a compartment for the casket and originally had wicker chairs to accommodate 24 mourners. Later it was redone with green plush seats to accommodate 40 mourners. It was retired in the 1920s as automotive hearses became more common.
These deficiencies in shipment pertained not only to industrial products important to combat troops on the front line, but, even worse, to the supply goods sector serving civilians in the hinterland. On the other hand, as the figures for the mining sector indicated, until 1916 the total of all shipments increased by approximately 10 percent per year, thus proving the public grievance against the transport disorganisation partly wrong. The prewar traffic peak in 1913 grew considerably in wartime almost without expanding the rail network. The absolute numbers of carriage thus tended to increase.
In wartime the total number of passengers was constantly rising. In 1913 the railroads carried about 235 million passengers; in the first year of the war this figure jumped to 265 million, in 1915 it went up to 294 million, and in 1916 almost 348 million passengers rode the railways. Freight traffic increased as well, but fell slightly at the outbreak of war. As in 1913 the railroads dispatched more than 13.820 billion pood goods of all kinds, while the first year of the war saw a slight lowering of circulation to almost 13.740 billion pood. The year 1915 then saw a considerable growth in the carriage of goods, amounting to more than 14.610 billion pood, finally peaking one year later at nearly 17.230 billion pood. These increases happened in spite of the indisputable problems in transportation and delivery; the Russian railway system actually operated much more intensely during the war, carrying more freight and passengers per route.
Gradually accounting for about 40 percent of the total rolling stock, the war and the military use of the railroads had a decisive impact on Russian railway traffic in general. From an economic point of view, this heavy use of the rails for war turned out catastrophic: in the second half of 1914, non-military shipments decreased on average by 16 percent compared to the previous years; timber shipments decreased by 44 percent, raw oil by 22 percent, and cattle by 21 percent. But the heavy burden placed on the railroads could particularly be felt in the number of civilian passengers as indicated by the above numbers.
To cope with these challenges, in 1915 about 115,000 wagons, i.e. 20 percent of the total rolling stock, were assigned to the evacuation of war refugees in just two months. But despite the greatest efforts undertaken by the officials to improve the Russian railroad system, it remained deficient in the end. The number of locomotives, for example, decreased constantly: by the end of 1914 the total number of engines amounted to nearly 20,000 units, whereas three years later it stood at 9,200. This general downward trend was decried by the Association of Industry and Trade already in spring of 1915; their representatives complained that the shortage of wagons caused considerable delays in the deliveries of fuel to iron and steel producers, threatening some with closure.
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