Railway Empire 2 is the newest train simulation game from Kalypso Media and Gaming Minds, offering a tycoon experience as you build up a railway empire across the United States and Europe. The game starts in the 1830s, deemed to be the golden age of locomotives, featuring large maps populated by cities and smaller locations such as farms and lumber yards, and you can connect them all via railway, sending supplies across the state.

Thankfully, the main menu has a very helpful and in-depth tutorial system, so if you are new to the series, or the genre in general, I would highly suggest taking the time to learn all the aspects. It will teach you how to build train stations, connect them, and even how to manage the tracks by picking the direction of travel or adding junctions to tracks that you have already placed. Players will need to keep on top of managing supplies and transporting goods, so keeping an eye on the distance travelled and how long trains are running for will be a good focal point at the start, at least until you get used to it all and have everything running on time.

While also placing the player in a management position overlooking the tracks and trails across the land, you will also have to deal with outside forces such as the media. If you are performing well, the media will reward you with great headlines. Or they can blackmail you, which can hit your bank account pretty hard when attempting to keep a good public eye.

You don’t have to pay the blackmail cost – sometimes it can be a bluff, and other times the image you already have will not change as a result of a bad story, so it comes down to how you have been going and your personal choice. As players progress, they can unlock new locomotives and economic advantages via the skill tree, and some of these are locked behind time periods. You can’t expect to see a modern-day diesel engine in the 1870s, so you will have to advance the timeline to unlock certain trains.

Railway Empire 2 supports a number of game modes, with the main campaign introducing six different characters to pick from, each with pros and cons for their management style. Challenge mode is for those that want unique challenges while testing their skills, and the sandbox mode lets you pick where to play, takes the stress of money management out of the game, and you can build your empire the way you want. Railway Empire 2 also supports multiplayer that supports cross-platform so players can team up with friends and run the railway empire together.

Railway Empire 2 can be played from two perspectives; an overhead view, similar to city builder games which have you looking over the land, allowing you to see cities and locations that can be connected with track lines, or, if you zoom in and focus on the trains, you can see the amazing details put into the designs, complete with moving parts, such as wheels, and steam from the engine cabin. It also features a nice backing soundtrack, which can get a little repetitive, but it has a very pleasant vibe to it, helping you get lost in thought, especially when you’re on a roll with the trains and have a steady income.

The difficulty is a little hard to gauge because it comes down to each player’s memory and focus. Given I am fairly good at puzzle-solving games, I often found myself having to return to the main menu so that I could redo training for certain segments. I had forgotten small options to have things working properly, and with an accidental misclick, I managed to close down a whole track, and I didn’t notice until a few hours later when I didn’t have a resource income.

Railway Empire 2 is an amazing train simulator game for those that have a fascination with trains and are great at management resources. It offers a relaxing experience and comes with a very well-presented training segment in the main menu.

I can see the appeal for players wanting to just kick back and relax while making their own railway empire, but I can also see the other side of things. It can be a bit of a grind, and perhaps a bit of a repetitive experience, but it’s well-suited to its targeted audience.
So prepare for departure, as Railway Empire 2 is releasing on the 25th of May on all current platforms, and you’ll even be able to try it out if you’re signed up for Xbox or PC Game Pass.

Written by: Shane Walsh