''Railway Empire'' is a railroad

construction and management simulation game Construction and management simulation (CMS), sometimes also called management sim or building sim, is a subgenre of simulation game in which players build, expand or manage fictional communities or projects with limited resources. Strategy video ...

developed by Gaming Minds Studio and published by

Kalypso Media Kalypso Media Group is a German video game developer and publisher. Founded in 2006 in Worms, the group comprises four companies in Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States and has studios, including Realmforge Studios, Gaming Minds St ...

. It was announced in early 2017 and released on 26 January 2018 for

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

and

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, 30 January 2018 for

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and

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, and 14 February 2020 for Nintendo Switch. In Japan, the physical copy of the game was distributed by

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in May 2018. A sequel, ''Railway Empire 2'', was released in 2023.

Gameplay

''Railway Empire''s base game takes place in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

from 1830 to 1930. The player can build a large network of railway lines and buy various

locomotives A locomotive is a rail vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. Traditionally, locomotives pulled trains from the front. However, push–pull operation has become common, and in the pursuit for longer and heavier freight train ...

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. The Campaign mode mainly takes the player through the building of the

First transcontinental railroad America's first transcontinental railroad (known originally as the "Pacific Railroad" and later as the "Overland Route (Union Pacific Railroad), Overland Route") was a continuous railroad line built between 1863 and 1869 that connected the exis ...

, the exception being mission four which is based around the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861May 26, 1865; also known by Names of the American Civil War, other names) was a civil war in the United States between the Union (American Civil War), Union ("the North") and the Confederate States of A ...

. 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.

Release

Expansions

, the game has ten

downloadable content content (DLC) is additional content created for an already released video game, distributed through the Internet by the game's publisher. It can be added for no extra cost or as a form of video game monetization, enabling the publisher to gain ad ...

(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.

Editions

On 7 August 2020, Kalypso released the 'complete collection', allowing for the purchase of all DLCs available at that time (except the music DLC) together with the base game.

Reception

The game has a score of 74 on

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

. 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."

Awards and nominations

''Railway Empire'' was nominated for four awards by the

Deutscher Entwicklerpreis The Deutscher Entwicklerpreis () is a prize for video game development studios from German speaking countries, organized by Aruba Events GmbH. Description The Deutscher Entwicklerpreis was first awarded on 12 November 2004 in Essen. Between 20 ...

2018; it won two: Best German PC/Console Game, and Best German Technical Performance Game.

Notes

References

{{Reflist

External links

''Railway Empire''
at Gaming Minds Studios 2018 video games Business simulation games Gaming Minds Studios games Independent Arts Software games Kalypso Media games Linux games Nintendo Switch games PlayStation 4 games Railroad business simulation video games Single-player video games Video games developed in Germany Windows games Xbox One games