REVIEW

The Official Guide to Sid Meir's Railroad Tycoon

Written by Russell Sipe
Published by Compute Books
Price  $12.95  (it  cost  me œ11.95 last  year  but  the  current 
interest rates may well have changed this.)

The  book  covers the Story of the Railroads,  the Story  of  how 
Railroad Tycoon was written and how the game itself operates.

For a large part of it, it goes into the detail that you wish the 
instruction manual had.

It  looks at each of the four scenarios telling you how  to  best 
play  each  of  them and giving an  explanation  of  the  history 
surrounding them.

It  explains how to determine the best place to build your  track 
but  if you haven't worked this out for yourself by now then  you 
haven't been playing it long enough.
It gives costs per square of all the different categories of land 
eg, clear, forest, swamp and how these prices change depending on 
the economic conditions.  It soon becomes evident that it is best 
to build on land when it is cheap, that is during Panic times.
When  building tunnels Railroad Tycoon tells you the distance  in 
miles.  There  are  two miles per square (or three miles  if  the 
track is diagonal) so you can work out where the tunnel is  going 
to exit.

The "Improving Stations" is explained in more detail than in  the 
manual and it reveals that;

By adding a switching yard switching times can be cut by half.
By adding a restaurant you get an extra œ2000 per full  passenger 
car,  by adding a hotel you get an extra œ5000 per full passenger 
car  and  the  numbers are cumulative meaning that  by  having  a 
hotel  and a restaurant at a station you get an extra  œ7000  per 
full passenger car!

The  "Smooth Operator" chapter tells all about the  operation  of 
the  trains and how to ensure maximum revenues.  It also  reveals 
that  a named train will create additional income  for  passenger 
cars.  As it is likely that the train that sets a speed record is 
one  carrying  mail  make sure that you  change  the  consist  to 
passengers to get more revenue.

There  is  a large section on how to win the game  through  stock 
market  and  financial dealings.  There  are  various  strategies 
suggested to enable a smooth takeover, it looks good on paper but 
it  rarely  succeeds  without a fair  share  of  near  disastrous 
moments.

Sid  Meir suggests never having more than œ1,000,000  outstanding 
in bonds and to have these at either 2% or 3%.  The best time  to 
buy  bonds is during Boom times but if this is not possible  then 
roll them over during Boom times.  When the economy goes to  Boom 
sell  your bonds and then buy them back  immediately.  The  bonds 
that  you now have will be 2% or 3% and the  interest  repayments 
will be substantially lower than they were previously.

One part of the book explains the attributes of the other tycoons 
that  are  competing  against you.  The worst  people  to  be  in 
competition against are Hudson and Rothschild who will attempt to 
takeover you and have the skills to do it.

Rate  wars  are the death of many a good railroad and  this  book 
suggests various strategies to survive/win them.

1.  Build  a  station  just outside the radius of  the  rate  war 
station and dump all cargoes there and then build track from this 
station into the rate war station and start taking all the dumped 
cargo there.

2.  Have a war train waiting to take as many different cargoes as 
available to your network to the rate war station to ensure  more 
points than your opponent in the voting by the city council. 

Ever  fancied  building  the US Transcontinental  or  the  Orient 
Express.  Chapter 9 details the routes of these two famous lines. 
It  also tells you that you will be very lucky to ever manage  to 
do this without the use of the embezzlement key;
     Go to the F1 screen
     Hit the $ key (shift 4)
     You now have an extra œ500,000 to play with.

The  final,  quite long,  chapter in the book is a talk with  the 
designers,  Bruce Shelley and Sid Meir. From this conversation it 
appears  that Railroad Tycoon was 3 years in the making  and  was 
nearly called "The Golden Age of Railroads".

This  book  is  the  perfect  companion  to  the  award   winning 
simulation  and  is excellent value for money as  it  adds  extra 
depth to the game.

Written by Martin Wright