Game: Train Station Simulator
Genre: Board Game, Simulation, Arcade, Strategy
System: Nintendo Switch (also on Steam)
Developers | Publishers: Appliks Apps Studio
Age Rating: US E10+ | EU 3+
Price: US $21.99 | UK £19.99 | EU € 19,99
Release Date: April 1st, 2021
Review code used, with many thanks to Appliks Apps Studio!
In Train Station Simulator, as the name would suggest, you are tasked with managing a train station. In other words, Train Station Simulator focuses more on the management side and logistics of railway stations rather than setting up tracks between points A to B.
Station Manager
Upon starting the game you have the choice of starting with a tutorial or playing through the 25 different scenarios with different skill levels and time frame on offer.
They range in both complexity and length. Some of the campaigns focus on restoring prebuilt train stations back to their former glory. Others are along the lines of remodelling an existing station while on a tight in-game budget.
Short Tutorial
This is a game without a story, it is also a game with a very short tutorial. I say tutorial but it is more of a “do this” and “do that” style tutorial that is hardly a substitute for a comprehensive explanation of the games features or even the basic economy. It is certainly a tutorial that leaves you with more questions than answers once you have finished it. I’d like to see a far more extensive tutorial than the one in the game at the moment.
Place Objects and Hire Staff
In order to manage a successful train station, you’ll need to cater to the many needs of any customers and the station employees who enter the station. This means you will be laying down flooring tiles, building walls, corridors, and placing exit doors and emergency routes.
Placing ticketing machines, information boards, food stalls, benches and dozens of other public space-related objects. As well as setting up and implementing a timetable for a transport system of buses, trams and trains. Train timetables need to be set every night at midnight for the next day, that got quite irritating as you must stop whatever else you are doing in the game to attend to that. If you miss it there won’t be any trains arriving the next day.
Limited Track Building
You will be limited to building train tracks in a straight line from your station to a predefined spot in the game so you don’t really have much of a free hand in that respect.
You will have to hire staff, ranging from hygiene technicians, security personnel, engineers and last but not least, medical staff for any potential emergencies. Also managing both the staff’s pay and the hours they work. Of course, the staff management side is an important feature of running a station but sadly none of this is explained in any detail in the tutorial. This might be fine for experienced players as it was for me. However, it will put a novice player off playing the game if they haven’t a clue what they are meant to do.
Teeny-Tiny Font
My biggest problem with Train Station Simulator is the size of the games font used in its writing, it is very tiny, at times virtually impossible to read. Especially if the writing font is white on a coloured background. Even using the zoom feature on the Switch didn’t help at all. I spent my time squinting to try to read some of the descriptions, granted each decorative item has a little picture icon so you kind of make out it’s a chair but even those are tiny. Not being able to read things properly marred my enjoyment of the game.
The game offers quite a bit of challenge, though at the start it is a little slow going at times, especially while you wait for commuters to come and go through your station. And it is quite enjoyable to watch them all scurry about like busy bees with places to go!
Visuals and Controls
Train Station Simulator has somewhat flat graphics I think. They’re alright but the look of the game is hardly going to blow your socks off. Let’s just say it gets the job done and the same can be said for the soundtrack to accompany your playtime. It is a nice enough tune, but it gets repetitive quickly which is where the volume button comes into use.
The game is played using the joy-cons or the touchscreen, and all works as it should. Though you can’t use a pro controller with the game which is a little disappointing for those of us that want to.
Conclusion
I found that Train Station Simulator is too limiting on what you can do in the game. If you are looking for a game that allows creative freedom, this is not it. All you are doing is placing prebuilt objects into a station. Having to set the timetable every night regardless of whatever else you are doing in the game wears thin quickly.
I did enjoy my playtime with Train Station Simulator (in between squinting). It does need a far better tutorial than the one in the game at the moment. I have been told that the developer is planning to keep updating the game so we can hope the tutorial is one aspect that will be improved.
If I was to buy the game I would buy it on Steam, for two reasons. It is less expensive on Steam and you might be able to read the text on a bigger screen without having to squint!
Final Verdict: I Like It 