Bounty Train - Early Impressions

Here are two early access impressions of Bounty Train.

Oprainfall:

Besides keeping your characters and train alive, since both are expensive to heal, you also often have to protect your cargo. This isn’t a problem with, say, steel, but there are a lot of flammable cargo items like oil, cotton and tobacco. Weapons are the worst because they can cause a massive explosion, but they’re also one of the most profitable items. Every city has different buy and sell prices for each cargo item, so it’s worth analyzing your prospects any time you start a journey. You pretty much have to make a profit all the time, since even if you don’t get attacked, the coal to move from city to city is a constant cost.

Christ Centered Gamer:

From a moral standpoint, the game is surprisingly solid, especially given the subject matter. People do get killed in the game, but merely fall over and lie on the ground. It is possible – and encouraged – to trade alcohol and tobacco, but the usage of such substances isn't displayed in the game. Bounty Train also is, surprisingly, vulgarity-free from what I've seen so far. Given the subject and the difficulty, I'm pleasantly surprised with how kid-friendly the game has been. It's possible that smuggling elements could be introduced in the game as well, since some of the cargo indicates that the items may not be allowed in certain cities. But I have yet to run into this as an option.

So, Bounty Train is an interesting mashup of edutainment, real-time strategy, economic simulation and role-playing game. It shows quite a bit of progress in this early access stage, but still needs more work before I feel I could whole-heartedly recommend it. I look forward to seeing how it develops, though!

Thanks Eye.