Railroad Empire
As in Sid Meier’s best-selling Railroad Tycoon, Railroad Empire lets you start your own railroad empire from scratch in either the U.S. or Europe, although the it is much more simplified as there are only two cargo types: passengers and freight.
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In 1992, Maxis published A-Train, a railroad management simulation by Artdink, a developer of some renown in Japan but virtually unknown anywhere else. A-Train was the third episode in Artdink’s Take the A-Train series, which dates back to 1986. Railroad Empire is an older version of ArtDink’s underrated A-Train railroad simulation that was published by Maxis in the U.S. Play Railroad Empire online!
In a goal-oriented approach, your task as a railroad tycoon is to build a trans-continental track that connects New York with California in the US scenario, England with Turkey on the (considerably more challenging) Europe map. With transportation service limited to passengers only and scheduling options minimized, creating smoothly running train lines is comparatively easy – just make sure that trains don’t collide on the single-track lines. The main focus is on efficient track building using the A-Train, which you control directly. A limited supply of rails and geographical barriers such as rivers with few pre-constructed bridges make careful planning essential. Optional cargo trains help distributing building materials to the station closest to your A-Train. In a unique feature, days pass in an accelerated real-time day/night cycle, with track-building only possible during daylight and changes to train schedules and switches only allowed at night.
