Railroad Ink

Review: All 28 Railroad Ink Expansions

The person who actually received the review copy for Railroad Ink: Deluxe Edition (Railroad Ink Challenge: Lush Green, Railroad Ink Challenge: Shining Yellow and all the dice expansions) was Quinns. I (Tom) had to persuade Mr Quintin to relinquish his grasp on the box because, of course, I was the bigger, better fan of Railroad Ink – I play it on my own, for goodness sake.

Little did I know that the box was a Monkey’s Paw. Little did I know that within a few short months, I would be rattling on about ‘The Rainbow Die’, ‘The Eldritch Expansion’ and drawing up the tier list from (and starring) hell. The words and behaviour of the utterly deranged. Enjoy!

Railroad Ink Challenge is a quick-playing roll-and-write game for 1 to 4 players. Grab a board and a dry-erase marker, and get ready to reach networking nirvana! Roll the dice and draw the routes to connect the exits around your board. Expand your network with railways, highways and stations to collect points, but you will … Read more

Arcade Expansion Pack Use the special dice of the Arcade Expansion in addition to your regular Route dice and find new ways to score points! Feed Pluck-Man with enough Fruits to eat those pesky Ghost in the Pluck-Man Expansion! Respect your commitment for urban planning to gain precious points with the Tetromino Expansion! Send Aliens to attack … Read more

Matt: Hello! Before I hand over to my fictional robotic counterpart, I just wanted to point your attention towards the home of the new unofficial Shut Up & Sit Down forum. We unfortunately had to shut down the servers we were running ourselves, but we wish the new forum all of the best and would highly recommend getting over there for a good old gander – they really are a very lovely bunch. And without further ado, here’s a robot with my face and voice:

Mart Leez: This Tuesday, we’ve got Wingspan with Elizabeth Hargrave, and on Thursday Tom and Matt will be playing some “board games”! Then, next Tuesday, Matt will be playing some Fugitive with Tim Fowers, and having a cosy print-and-play session on Thursday. That’s all from me, your favourite LeesCorp information dispenser. Have a pleasant week!

Tom: Huh. It seems a lot more sprightly this week. Guess the repairs worked after all – I was worried that we’d have to naturally end Mart’s character arc after a slow degradation through relentless employee abuse. But hey – seems like it really is a ‘joke too convenient to kill’.

Ava: I guess that’s the benefit of having complete authorial power over a fictional construct.

Mart Leez: You know I can hear you, right?

Tom: Back in your box, Mart, there’s a news going on.

Remember Roland Wright from our review of Welcome To? Well, he’s only done it again.

Railroad Ink should be arriving in shops any week now, and that’s cause for celebration. This game of rails, roads and mounting desperation makes its competitors look like amateur hour. The only questions remaining are (a) should you buy the Red or Blue edition, and (b) when can we expect an expansion?

Have a great weekend, everybody.

In the multiplayer puzzle game Railroad Ink, your goal is to connect as many exits on your board as possible. Each round, a set of dice are rolled in the middle of the table, determining which kind of road and railway routes are available to all players. You have to draw these routes on your erasable boards to create transport lines and connect your exits, trying to optimize the available symbols better than your opponents.

The more exits you connect, the more points you score at the end of the game, but you lose points for each incomplete route, so plan carefully! Will you press your luck and try to stretch your transportation network to the next exit, or will you play it safe and start a new, simpler to manage route?

Railroad Ink comes in two versions, each one including two expansions with additional dice sets that add new special rules to your games. The Deep Blue Edition includes the Rivers and Lakes expansions. Increase the difficulty by adding the River route into the mix, or use the Lakes to connect your networks by ferry. These special rules can spice up things and make each game play and feel different. Each box allows you to play from 1 to 6 players, and if you combine more boxes, you can play with up to 12 players (or more). The only limit to the number of players is the number of boards you have!

Can you hear a distant rumble of people applauding, firing party poppers and doing synchronised donuts in their cars? Don’t panic! Nothing could be more natural when our post-Gen Con podcast rolls around. It’s possible that there’s never been such a diverse and exciting array of games tucked into a single SU&SD podcast. Today, Paul and Quinns exchange first impressions of Keyforge: Call of the Archons, Fantasy Flight’s new collaboration with Richard Garfield where every deck ever printed will be unique to you. Up next is Gen 7, the dramatic and curious sequel to Dead of Winter that takes place aboard a generation ship. Then there’s Nyctophobia, a game where all but one player is blindfolded and being hunted by a murderer. Critical Mass, which might be the best game of mecha-on-mecha violence ever made? Railroad Ink, which is the first roll-and-write game we’ve found that could steal the throne from Welcome To. And the pair close by talking about The Estates, which is both the meanest and most devious game of auctions that Quinns has ever experienced. Among those six games are no less than four contenders for the prestigious SU&SD Recommends badge. You heard it here first- the rest of 2018 is going to be absolutely fabulous. UPDATE: We now have a complete transcription of this podcast, courtesy of SU&SD fan InkyBloc!

Review: All 28 Railroad Ink Expansions

Railroad Ink Challenge: Shining Yellow Edition

Railroad Ink Challenge: Lush Green Edition

Railroad Ink Dice Expansions

GAMES NEWS! 18/05/20

Review: Railroad Ink

Podcast #84: The Post-Gen Con Blowout!

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