1830: Railroads & Robber Barons

1830: Railroads & Robber Barons is a turn-based computer game developed by SimTex and published by Avalon Hill in 1995 for MS-DOS. Play 1830: Railroads & Robber Barons online!

1830: Railroads & Robber Barons game description

Based on Avalon Hill’s board game of the same name, 1830: Railroads & Robber Barons is a railroad empire building game that is along the same lines (although a different style of gameplay) as the much more famous Railroad Tycoon.

Capturing the very look and feel of the board game, all the way to the hexagonal playing field and track tokens, 1830 is a turn based game that emphasizes the successful running of a company and manipulating the stock market rather than managing a railroad. Tracks can be laid, cities connected, trains purchased, and schedules set, but the ultimate goal in the end is making money, even at the cost of your company; you’ll wind up buying and selling a number of them during the course of the game anyway.

Starting with a relatively small amount of seed capital, players purchase shares in eight different railroad companies; ownership of a majority of a company’s shares makes a player its president, letting them dictate how the company lays track on a map of the northeastern US, builds stations, buys trains, and runs them on routes to generate revenue. The game ends when the players have collectively earned a certain amount of money (“breaking the bank”) or when a player or computer opponent goes bankrupt, at which point a player wins by having the highest total of stock valuation plus cash on hand. As in the board game, tactics such as looting companies of their assets, using buy/sell patterns to manipulate the stock market, and dumping unprofitable companies on other shareholders are prominent aspects of play.

Play 1830: Railroads & Robber Barons online

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