Maybe there is no economic simulators admirer that never heard the name of Sid Meier. All the virtual strategists remember tiny railway engines that moved on black-white monitors in 1990 when amazing and original Sid Meier's Railroad Tycoon appeared. It was many long ago but railways theme have not gone out yet. The game Sid Meier's Railroads develops idea that was implemented the first time more than 16 years ago.


 From the point «А» to point «B»


The main principle of the game (like it is with all the games of this genre) is extremely simple. The main thing you will have to do is to make money from nothing. And the faster you start to do it the better. In the beginning of the game you see an awful situation. Cities are deserted, their inhabitants are unhappy and want to quit them as soon as possible – no matter where they desire to go exactly. Besides, there are lots of undelivered letters, stagnant plants and factories (due to lack or even absence of resources) and so on… And to crown it all you have wild nature around yourself. In a few words, this is an ideal place to start career of railway businessman.

Connect the nearest cities, make tracks between the places where something is produced and those ones where this “something” is consumed, take incomes for carriage, spend some amount of money for locomotives maintenance… And put the rest into our pocket. Spend money and earn it more, spend and earn. That’s all. This is elementary, isn’t it?

But this deceptive simplicity dazzles you from the first moments of the game. First you like most nice interface and convenient menu, amiable bumper and animated funny grimaces of your virtual rivals. And then you start to notice that all those moving objects and endless divarications dazzles you more and more so you spend all you free time for playing. You think over maximum efficacy of an itinerary chosen and optimality of amount of carriages in waggonage. Lack of money makes you choose original and risky decisions. And trains unhastingly go towards places of destinations and make closing plug in the most problematic places.

 Twists and turns of engineering


But unfortunately, sometimes the first impression may be quite deceptive. In a couple of hours you begin to ask yourself: “What is it? This is a revision lesson? We have already passed everything we see here…” That’s right. In comparison with previous game of the series -Railroad Tycoon 3 – that appeared three years ago, we may see only a set of unnecessary simplifications of everything: interface, economics, railway control process and so on.

Railways are the main source of incomes in the game. So it is very important to locate them carefully. Trains should reach destination points as fast as possible and building expenses should be minimal. Anyway the situation was like that in the previous versions of Sid Meier. Rail-laying work was optimized very much in SM’s Railroad. We are just to choose start and finish points. Everything else will be made by computer. It looks like very nice but not always economically. Computer suggests building bridges and tunnels instead of slight correction of route. Of course, it influences prices because complicated constructions cost much more than ordinary railways. On the other hand, the shorter is railway the faster your trains reach their destination points as they do not have to decrease speed passing turns. So in the beginning of the game you will have to seek compromise between price and efficiency. And artificial intellect does not always cope with this task.

As for other peculiarities, I may notice the fact you may make new railways only continuing existing ones. And that is at least strange. To connect objects that are not included in our rail net we have build absolutely unnecessary railway near one of them first. And only after that you may build the railway you really needed.

There is a pleasant innovation in the game. I mean Double Track button. It is very useful when you build parallel railways. In general, rail-laying work is rather pleasant and convenient occupation fastening the process of playing.

 About pleasant difficulties


One of the most serious troubles you may run across playing this kind of game is lack of free space for building. And it is critical in SM’s Railroad. In the middle of the game this problem becomes a priority one. The main reason of that is limit of amount of railways outcoming from each object on the map. You may build only three. And big cities require, at least, twice as many. So you have to make numerous divarications with semaphore signals that provide a set of new problems. As railway station cannot receive more than three waggonages at one moment of time other ones will have to wait. And this is quite dangerous as you can get closing plugs that slow down your economic development.

Actually, the problem of closing plugs is the most interesting and, at the same time, the most dingy moment of the game. Your main task is avoiding such situation. To fulfill it you will have to make an indirect route or to close one of unprofitable routes. The longer the game lasts the more difficult is to orientate in your own railways. And the higher is probability of mistake. Especially if you play with other players who can suddenly prevent you from taking new useful objects under control. And it is very dingy that computer provides navigation of trains. It works properly in simple situations but may make not the best decisions in complicated ones. And you cannot “explain” trains that they may make other turn on this crossing. Artificial intellect is an excellent thing - but not always. Sometimes situation happens when you feel annoyed with computer’s decisions. But you will not get any problems if do not make too complicated routes.

And, of course, many things depend on the level of difficulty. There are two levels here. The first one is responsible for your virtual rivals, the second one – for reality of trains’ “behavior”. If the latter is low, waggonates go through each other if it is high - then they require completely free rails.

It is awful but while playing I have not noticed any broken trains. Such feature as maintenance is absent and our locomotives are eternal now. But sometimes attendance fee is taken. And, by the way, we may upgrade our old models making them newer. The older is train the higher is attendance fee. But fees are not too high so you may not worry about condition of railways. And this is serious disadvantage. Any rails and locomotives help you to earn money that can be used for improvement of economic situation. But if you play against strong rivals it may be quite dangerous as they can steal you a mar on development or just buy the majority of your shares.

By the way, shares are the only thing you’d better to worry about because if someone buys all your shares you are eliminated from the game. And vice versa you may eliminate your rivalries by buying all the shares of their companies. Their prices always change and depend on some casual factors so you should keep your eyes on the news very attentively. Actually this element of the game has no other influence on the process of playing. Just be careful not to be bought by somebody one fine day.

But this is very expensive way of rivalry I should say. So you’d better just to invade his territory using your railways and capturing as many important object as possible. Let him build indirect routes, use bridges and sustain losses. 

Buy-sell

Economic part of the game is not sophisticated at all. Everything that is produced or mined somewhere is somewhere required as well. All the objects on the map are divided into three types: 1) single enterprises, farms, mines and other constructions carrying out production or mining of raw materials, cropping and cattle breeding; 2) small inhabited localities like big single plant or factory carrying out conversion of raw materials into products (for examples ores into metals, metals into care etc.). Each object of this type represents some exact branch of industry (there are a lot of them in the game). If you want you may buy any plant during auction. In this case you will get some fixed revenue from its work; 3) cities of different size and population. They carry out the same functions as inhabited localities but may have more than one enterprise. Besides, trains may go between cities. Usually they deliver passengers and mail.

Incomes depend on speed of deliveries and distance between objects and on product demands. If you supply too much of it your incomes decrease and vice versa. Periodically players are suggested to take part in occasional auctions where new technologies licenses are sold. Winner gets a right of exclusive usage of his purchase. After that it becomes known to other players.

First this rather simple economic system is sufficient for interesting playing. But then it becomes more and more boring.

 View from the windows


It is sad to say it but the better element of the new game is its graphic. Views are beautiful and picturesque, trains and buildings are properly animated, water looks like natural. In different plots you may see its special constructions and products that are characteristic for this location and this time only. So if your impression from the game is positive to some extent this is merit of its graphic. And if its soundtrack was less poor it would be even better.

 Terminal stop?

Unfortunately, developers have evidently failed to make a hit. SM’s Railroad does not contain anything revolutionary. Besides, a successive campaign is absent too. We have only set of plots with set of standard and boring conditions of victory. There are a lot of bugs here. And to crown it all system requirements are unreasonably high. And the worst thing is boredom you start to feel soon after you begin to play. And it is eliminable with no patches.

Advantages:
Nice graphic
Simple and convenient interface
Pleasant atmosphere

Disadvantages:
Numerous unnecessary simplifications in comparison with its predecessors
Weak economy
Absence of successive campaign

The game is quite picturesque but not genial. So admirers of Sid Meier’s railway series will hardly appreciate such a continuation of it.