After the convincing demo published in recent days, A-Train: All Aboard! Tourism prepares for its debut this March 12th. As you can imagine, this is a City Management Simulator that will put us in charge of a company for the management of stations, buses, trains, railways and roads dedicated to tourism. However, we are not faced with a game that wants to show itself "serious" in the shades, and in full Japanese style we will interact with different manga-style characters who will support us in our work. Don't be fooled though! Because despite the air you breathe is decidedly light and cartoonish, it is not a game to be taken lightly, and the simplicity of some game mechanics can soon translate into a general complexity for their management. That of ARTDINK is a management game not to be taken lightly, which can engage all types of players without the need for conundrums or various tricks.
"A wolf in sheep's clothing"
Bright colors, not bad landscapes, smiling characters, tourist destinations and attractions of all kinds welcome us to the game, but under such a beautiful cover there is a title that is anything but friendly. but let's proceed step by step and find out together A-Train: All Aboard! Tourism.
As soon as we start the game we will be asked if we want to start a game, or if we want to head to construction mode where we can create our customized map and city. Clearly the recommended choice is to start a new game from the basics, starting from choice of our name, ours compagnia, and the features of our business card, after all ... we will be the real ones presidents of the company! This position, as you will see later, will not involve simply managing the transport network, but it will also be important to decorate the city by establishing subsidiary structures, advertise your company, keep an eye on the finances and the power of our brand. The more powerful we become within the scenario, the more we will have carte blanche.
We will be able to select the game scenario and the starting conditions of the game, but to begin with it is highly recommended start with the first two scenarios (out of a total of 8) that will serve as a long tutorial… and trust me, it will be really needed. Each scenario can be played in easy, medium or difficult mode, decisive change, because it will make you start with reduced basic factors: as already mentioned, the economy is important, fundamental, and choosing a higher difficulty will make you start with a minor capital, with little trust from shareholders and minor power of your brand. Keep in mind that even playing with the basic difficulty can reserve its troubles. How do the scenarios differ? In addition to the morphology, clearly also the composition of the countries, and above all in the objectives. Our mission purpose we will be briefly described during the choice of the scenario, complete with hint of plot following and dialogues between our collaborators and our secretary during the mission. The choice of mission is totally free, and you can also start from the last one on the list. Furthermore, once the game is launched, it will be possible to add new scenarios to your collection via download. Last but not least, it concerns the modern historical period (in short, the year) in which the A-Train missions are located, which will vary from mission to mission and will change some small things in the game, but also the vehicles and buildings available.
The first steps in A-Train: All Aboard! Tourism will be quite confusing, but the presence of ours Secretary and a very clear tutorial (perhaps too verbose) he will know how to direct us in the game. There are many mechanics that we will have to learn, starting with the management of the camera: this will be freely manageable both in docked and portable mode, with optimal immediacy for the latter version thanks to the total operation of the controls tousch screen, to say the least simple, intuitive and direct. We will be able to alternate a free room with an isometric camera, to keep an eye on everything that happens in our city, although in some cases it seems not to have everything under control, given the rather limited output zoom.
Once you have learned the basics to position stations, tracks, trains, set the tourist route, itinerary and so on, it starts to get complicated: if on the one hand everything was clear and intuitive so far (despite a rather cumbersome menu management) , when you start talking about numbers and statistics, things get complicated, both for a practical matter and for the dozens of factors to be taken into account for respect costs and time deadline. Therefore, the dialogues with our collaborators will also have a lot of weight to understand immediately in which direction to move and be fully aware of our goal. If the eyes and the cartoon style have touched you, get ready to collide with reality.
As already mentioned, your influence will also have an impact on what you can and cannot do, as well as your financial resources. Be thrifty, but at the same time dare, because it's the big “wow effect” things they're most capable of attract tourists! Everything must be perfect and functional, a well-oiled machine that will increase the prestige of the city, and of the company.
A refined palate
The sore point of A-Train: All Aboard! Tourism it is undoubtedly about localization. As it is easy to imagine already from its presentation, the title is purely oriental, and despite the fact that management systems of this type are also strong in Europe, the development team wanted to focus on a localization dedicated only to oriental languages, with the sole exception of the "universal language" English. It goes without saying that to make the most of the experience in our country you need a very good knowledge of the English-speaking language, especially to get to grips with the many lines of text used to explain the various passages, and progress in the game. On a technical level, the game defends itself well, with a weight on the console that is not excessive, but with very long initial loads (both for the opening of the game and for the initialization of the game). It must be said, however, that once the game map is loaded, the uploads in the game will be totally absent.
