Today bought and download Railway Empire which is a game like OpenTTD. This game wasn’t in my focus but is available on GeForce Now and in the last days was in Humble sales. So I want to discover and show you some information about this game.
For me first look was “oh this game looks good” after some hours I could say that this game is perfect for old players of OpenTTD. Yes, this game isn’t the same but there are some improvements. And after all, I could recommend this game to everyone who loves OpenTTD and search for another new game.
Who created the Railway Empire?
Railway Empire came to market 26. January 2018 and this game came from Germany Kalypso Media. The company is also behind Tropico 6, Port Royale 4, Project Highrise, Rise of Industry, and Airline Tycoon.
What difference between Railway Empire and OpenTTD?
Railway Empire isn’t OpenTTD, but I think it’s supercharged up to appeal to players who love OpenTTD. There are a lot of new tweaks that make the game special and I don’t find it so repetitive. For example:
- Campaign and goals
- Research tree
- Reality
- Different economy
- Staff
There are many different things. But main features like factories, trains, railway, and efficiency remains. In the following paragraphs I will show you the most important changes:
Campaign and goals of Railway Empire
One big feature which OpenTTD doesn’t have is a campaign and you must set your own goals. In RE you have solved this question because when you play a campaign you have set which goals you must finish winning scenarios.
In a free game, you have a lot of tasks to do. These tasks may help you with what to do. But the goal of RE is simple you must build a company with the best value. When I play with AI I have another goal which is to buy by stock other competitors.
Research tree
What is a good feature is the research tree. So you must focus on this feature to get better trains or to gain bonuses. It works that you get points every month and these points you could spend on upgrades.
Also, you could hire staff that could boost your research or you could hire staff to steal from other competitors (AI/players). Also, others could steal from your research tree.
Reality
The thing which I like is reality maps which are in games. In starting a campaign you deliver cargo in the USA. But when you buy DLC you could play in Central Europe or Japan. On every continent are different things you can transport. So the game tries not to be monotonous and I think it succeeds.
Different economy
Yes, the economy is different from OpenTTD. You don’t travel tons from factory to factory. There are factories in cities. And every city has its demands which you could satisfy or not. So you build mixed tracks where must be placed for people trains and freight trains.
Your city grows when you have enough cargo in town (60%) and when your city grows you could build a new factory (your own) or in the towns will be building new factories.
More info about Towns in Railway Empire >>
In the time I’ve been playing, I haven’t found the industry to be unbalanced. At least in the campaigns where I spent most of my time, I found it very good. What may annoy me a bit is that tracked planning is more complicated than in the old OpenTTD. You have many options of what to do, but it’s still something different and you have to get used to it.
Staff
The last feature I haven’t explored much and, to be honest, doesn’t appeal to me at first glance and that is the staff. The interesting thing is that they can bring you special features that improve your trains or unlock some advantage, but on the other hand you have to watch whether the employees will be compatible or not, otherwise you will be in trouble.
Is Railway Empire free?
No, this is a big game which in full price costs like 104 Euro (when you live in Europe). This game you could buy on Steam or Nexus.gg. Now (since 3.8.2022) is this game in Humble Bumble price where you could buy this game with sale ~80% for 11,80 Euro.
What are the minimum requirements of Railway Empire?
- 4 GB RAM and 7 GB of disk space.
- processor is Intel Core i5 750 @ 2.6 GHz or AMD Phenom II X4 @ 3.2 GHz
- graphics are nVidia GeForce GTX460 or AMD Radeon HD5870
But be aware, that this game isn’t available on macOS. You could play this game just on Windows or Linux.
Can you play Railway Empire on a laptop?
I think that yes you could. The minimum requirements (above) don’t look too strict for middle laptops. You could try it and if you have problems you could play on nVidia GeForce Now.
