🔒 EXCLUSIVE: Id/anshackles/recommended/ - Collection

For an Early Access game this is pretty impressive. 12 hours in at this point.
Content is a tad light as yet but there's quite an engaging campaign to play already and overall there's much to like about it. Look and feel is about the same as its competitors like Railway Empire.

Track laying is easy and effective although so far it lacks good control of track height, hopefully that will come later. That aside if you accept that it does some quite heavy civil engineering (which can make routes cost more) it works well. Double track is easy, stations can have up to 5 tracks each although so far I've not found the need for more than 2. The height issue aside it's easily as good as its competition in the sector. Junctions and signalling work nicely.

Trains are not artificially limited to length which is a bugbear of many other similar titles. Each engine has a maximum tonnage it can haul, and you can have as many cars as you like. You can even overload them if you wish although that's not efficient.

There's a research department you can install in your head office, which allows a variety of upgrades which increase performance, plus of course researching bigger and better engines. Top of the tree so far appears to be the GG1 electric. It'd be nice if they filled out the tree a little, the number of engines currently is a bit low.

In addition to these things, you also have other departments you can install:
* lobbying: Lets you influence cities to charge lower taxes or allow you to build buildings etc.
* geology: Lets you hire people to search for additional resources on the map
* finance: Lets you hire financial people for loans, bonds and the like but I don't know if that's working yet.

All in all it's well worth a look especially if you catch it on discount; even so it's cheaper than some of the rest at normal price. Only slight concern I have, based on their older version 1 game, is they might go over the top on DLCs. I've nothing against expanding with DLCs but the price must not get excessive. Some titles are fond of launching a bare-bones game and making a raft of expensive DLCs. I don't like buying DLC which costs as much or more than the base game. Time will tell on that one.

For an Early Access game this is pretty impressive. 12 hours in at this point. Content is a tad light as yet but there's quite an engaging campaign to play already and overall there's much to like about it. Look and feel is about the same as its competitors like Railway Empire. Track laying is easy and effective although so far it lacks good control of track height, hopefully that will come later. That aside if you accept that it does some quite heavy civil engineering (which can make routes cost more) it works well. Double track is easy, stations can have up to 5 tracks each although so far I've not found the need for more than 2. The height issue aside it's easily as good as its competition in the sector. Junctions and signalling work nicely. Trains are not artificially limited to length which is a bugbear of many other similar titles. Each engine has a maximum tonnage it can haul, and you can have as many cars as you like. You can even overload them if you wish although that's not efficient. There's a research department you can install in your head office, which allows a variety of upgrades which increase performance, plus of course researching bigger and better engines. Top of the tree so far appears to be the GG1 electric. It'd be nice if they filled out the tree a little, the number of engines currently is a bit low. In addition to these things, you also have other departments you can install: * lobbying: Lets you influence cities to charge lower taxes or allow you to build buildings etc. * geology: Lets you hire people to search for additional resources on the map * finance: Lets you hire financial people for loans, bonds and the like but I don't know if that's working yet. All in all it's well worth a look especially if you catch it on discount; even so it's cheaper than some of the rest at normal price. Only slight concern I have, based on their older version 1 game, is they might go over the top on DLCs. I've nothing against expanding with DLCs but the price must not get excessive. Some titles are fond of launching a bare-bones game and making a raft of expensive DLCs. I don't like buying DLC which costs as much or more than the base game. Time will tell on that one.