Sim: Railway Mogul [by Limbic Jujitsu]

Game: Railway Mogul
Release: September 25, 2003
Genre: Simulation
Developer: Limbic Jujitsu
System Requirements: Pentium 500 MHZ, Nvidia Geforce or similar video card, 50 MB HD space, 64 MB RAM
Price: $24.95


According to their web page, Limbic Jujitsu's sim title, Railway Mogul, "lets you fulfill your childhood fantasy of model railroading on a grand scale". When I was a child my "railroading fantasy" involved watching a model train go around the track a few times and then seeing how many ways I could derail it. The missing ingredient in table-top railroading for me has always been some sort of involvement beyond simply watching the trains move and Railway Mogul supplies this by creating an immersive 3D world of supply and demand and an impressive economic model.

Taking on the role of an upstart railroad manager your job is to build a line that will draw customers to either travel or ship products on. Unlike earlier games in this genre the environment for Railway Mogul is fully 3D, navigable using the mouse and keyboard, so you can zoom in close to the action or all the way out for a "God's eye view". Building stations, tracks, tunnels and bridges is extremely easy and intuitive, especially if you have a mouse wheel, which allows you to scroll quickly through your build options.

The basic idea behind building and maintaining a successful railroad is fairly simple and revolves around linking pockets of supply and demand to each other - if you have a cattle farm that needs grain then build a station and link it to the grain silo. But that simplicity is deceiving because building stations and running trains isn’t cheap and you need to have enough supply and demand constantly running along your rails in order to pay your maintenance and replacement costs. I often fell into the newbie mistake of spending too much money early in the game only to have a slump in the market turn my fortunes around. You definitely need to think long-term and be prepared for whatever circumstances the game's fully modeled economic system throws at you.

Graphics: 7
As a general rule I am easier on strategy / sim titles when I’m reviewing their graphics because I find them to be less of an issue to the genre. In fact, I find the inclusion of flashy shaders and features tends to get in the way of a good strategy game.

The interface and menu graphics for Railway mogul are spot on and you can clearly determine all of the controls based on the graphic for each button. This is a very detailed game so there is some cluttering in the menus but if you follow the tutorials you should have no problems with basic navigation.

The 3D graphics used to present the world are sufficient for this style of game although I would like to see more color and personality in the presentation. Each 3D map consists of the terrain and a variety of buildings such as factories, farms, houses, etc. and most of them have individual animations but there doesn’t appear to be any lighting or environmental effects and this makes everything seem a little bland. However the graphics really shine when you have a number of lines built and trains running, it comes very close to the look and feel of a table top railroad.

Sound: 6
The sound palette is very basic with general environmental sound effects and there is no background music. Great sound seems to be the “final frontier” when it comes to independently developed games and so often I am disappointed when it appears a developer didn’t even try to create an aural personality for their game.

Railway Mogul is actually better than a number of strategy / sim titles and so I am not going to criticize their efforts too much. Truthfully, most veteran sim players probably won’t notice (or care) about the lack of a “theme song” or the limited ambient sound.

Game play: 6
I will say it flat out - there are a few bugs. The nature of these bugs seemed to differ from computer to computer but they ranged from minor interface problems (having to click a button 3 or 4 times to see a result) to total crashes. While these occasional glitches were sufficient enough to be noted, they didn’t overwhelm the game play.

Concept: 7
Railway Mogul takes the general formula of classic games like Railroad Tycoon and brings it into a 3D world. On a depth and quality level I think Railway Mogul easily stands up to other games in the genre, even outdoing some. At the same time there is plenty of room for this game to grow and I hope the developer plans on continuing this series and makes even more of an effort to create environments that are more vibrant and involving. Make me believe that there is a living, breathing world to build my trains in and at the same time make the prospect of railway management more inviting to the casual gamer.

Fun: 7
As the score indicates, Railway Mogul is a solid “B+” title. The hardcore nature of the simulation limits the appeal of this game to a very specific audience, and if you belong to that audience I am sure you will have a good time with it.

This simulation level is complex and I wish the tutorials had gone a little deeper into the management of a rail system. The game is able to get you up and running using the interface and tools but leaves you mostly on your own in playing the scenarios. To this day I’m still not sure I understand it fully, but then again you’re reading a review by a guy who could never get a city in “Sim City” to succeed long term.

Options: 8
Railway Mogul gives the user control over the graphics resolution, sound mixing and offers full-screen or windowed mode although full screen may require you to change your desktop settings if you aren't in 32bit mode. There is a powerful WYSIWYG scenario creator included with the game that allows you to create your own environments and scenarios to play. The HTML tutorial is sufficient to get users started with the editing tools.

What I really liked was the fact that the game data is read from editable files, allowing enterprising players to edit the values for just about everything. Unfortunately, I was unable to find any tutorials or help for this feature in the game or on the developer's website so it's strictly "do at your own risk".

Overall: 7
The transition from railway management in traditional 2D to a 3D world has been achieved smoothly but I’m left wondering why they did it. You can pan and zoom around the world smoothly but the graphics are not detailed enough to warrant getting in close to the action and generally the entire game will be played from a top down, zoomed out perspective. While the environment objects (communities, factories, etc.) are all animated and evolve with time I still think the developers could have gone further in bringing the 3D world to life. The addition of weather effects and seasonal variations would have put this game at a much higher level of presentation quality, in my opinion.

I can recommend Railway Mogul to veteran players of this genre without any hesitation but as I said the casual game player might be put off. My girlfriend flat out refused to even try the game, basing her opinion solely on the graphics and presentation and right or wrong that’s the kind of uphill battle these simulation games face in expanding their audience.

At the very least I can assure you that the demo is worth the download and to get through the tutorials before passing judgment. In the future I hope the developer is able to implement some sort of scalability in the simulation level. Some people want to play as a micro-managing, hardcore “robber baron” while others would just like to be a kid in the sandbox. Hopefully there is a way for Railway Mogul to appeal to both audiences because there is still something unique and fascinating about the railroad industry that’s rewarding to tap into as a player.

Added: January 20th 2004
Reviewer: Kyle Nau
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