Reviews

Review by amarillion all reviews by amarillion

The basic idea of this game is that you are a "Train Master" controlling a whole network of railways and all the trains on it. You have to switch tracks at junctions at the right moment so that all trains follow the right route and arrive at their destination stations in time. You have a view over the entire railroad in a single screen, so you get a good overview, although that also means some of the graphics are tiny and sometimes hard to make out.

There are four different levels, varying in difficulty. The easy level is indeed easy enough, because there is only one train to control. The train schedule is not very tight so you can make the train go very slow and you have plenty of time to make the necessary adjustions to the junctions before the train arrives there.

In the normal level it gets quite a bit more complicated. You have to control three trains at the same time, and there are many more junctions and stations. You have keep an eye on so many things at the same time that this becomes quite a challenge.

I must say I haven't really played the "quite difficult" and "no fair" modes. One look at the levels shows they are quite interesting, but due to some interface problems detailed below I didn't play them thoroughly.

The main issue I have with this game is the poor user interface. It has several glitches in it that make the game hard to play. For example, I often run into a problem where the speed dial gets stuck at 100 or -100. This is especially a problem when I want to stop a train, but it won't go slower than 100. At other times the speed dial seems to loose all bounds and you can go way past 1000, so the train zooms accross the rails in no time.

Another big usability problem is that the game doesn't tell you when you're doing something wrong. Sometimes you're playing and suddenly, quite unexpectedly the "You're Fired!" screen shows up. Perhaps one of your trains crashed somewhere, or perhaps you missed a target station or perhaps there is a bug in the game. Who knows? It would have been much nicer if the game would have pointed out problems e.g. by showing a big explosion when your train crashes somewhere, or a big red mark when you are late at a station. But as it is right now, you can't learn from your mistakes as you don't know what you're doing wrong.

The graphics are nice and colourful, the (voice) sound effects are nice too. The music is ok, but moreover it seems to have been made during the time of the competition which is a big plus. The ascii art is a mixture of automatically converted images and hand-generated, and is quite fitting. The help function is there, although it is rather basic.

All in all this is a decent entry with a fun concept, and it would have been really great were it not for a few annoying user-interface glitches.

Scores: Overall 3 Artistical 3 Technical 4 Genre 3

Review by Onewing all reviews by Onewing

Good: I can?t believe it?s not butter! It feels like the real thing!
Bad: Gets very difficult.
The New York Times call it, ?Simply Amazing!? Well, at least I do.
Comments:
Wow! Quite possibly the best entry for this year?s TINS. It?s a well polished, challenging game that feels like a ROM for a Nintendo emulator. This game better place in the top position in some category, at least in my opinion. It?s like what I imagined everybody to be making during the competition, only done right. Oddly, I want to play SimCity all of a sudden?

Overall: Challenging game play that?s relatively easy to pick up and difficult to master. With music that fits perfectly and gameplay that actually appears to maneuver as intended, I have to give a shout to out to my friend, five!

Artistic: Is it breath-taking? No, not really, but it doesn?t look indie. It?s very retro and gets the point across. Four score (and sever years ago?)!

Technical: I think the ASCII art in this game is fitting and impressive, even if it is generated. A+! The help screen is a little lacking and jarring from the rest of the game (although I like how a little detail is given on each level). I had no problems with the engine. Four stars!

Genre: It?s obviously focused on time. Another 4!

Scores: Overall 5 Artistical 4 Technical 4 Genre 4

Review by miran all reviews by miran

Good use of ASCII art, good gfx (for its size), good menus and help screen. Pretty much everything about this game is good. But there's just one little thing: what are you supposed to do? I only played on the "for dummies" level and no matter what I did, I got fired after some time. I moved the train from station to station but nothing happened.

Scores: Overall 3 Artistical 4 Technical 4 Genre 3

Review by guilt all reviews by guilt

Nice looking title screen, and a retro "Train master" voice totally got me! :) The game is a nice puzzle type game (I'm not very good at playing these ones apparently :( ) The author has managed to get the entire 8x8 ASCII character set (accented characters included .. which i don't think Allegro provides) ... and deserves the credit for it! :)

Scores: Overall 3 Artistical 5 Technical 5 Genre 5

Review by Darksoll all reviews by Darksoll

The menu of this game is something cool, a good quality ASCII art, and a voice that says "Train Master!", it's cool to hear a voice at the start of a game, it adds a special flavour. The music is OK.
The game idea is really excellent and original. i will say my experience with this game: first i choose new game and then i chose not fair mode(I love that incoherent things) but i didn't understand absolutely anything, so i tried mode for dummies(don't laugh ;-)). I understood how to play the game, but i discovered that for dummies mode was as unfair as the unfair mode itself, the game ask you to reach stations that doesn't exist, not at all....
So then i tried normal mode, and it worked ok.
when you lose you se an ASCII guy pointing at you and it says "YOU'RE FIRED!".
I liked this game so much, it's something different and fun for a while, one of my favourites.

I think this game would be better if: mmmm, there's a bug with the speed, some times speed get stuck at 100 or -100, and that's really frustrating. And the dummy mode could ask for REAL stations ;-)....

Scores: Overall 3 Artistical 4 Technical 4 Genre 4