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We sat down and previewed Firaxis Games' upcoming title Sid Meier's Railroads!. We witnessed some cinematics and a gameplay demonstration. Railroads! is the successor to the first two Railroad Tycoon games. The style of play is very similar to the first two. The goal of the game is to start as a rail building entepreneur and progress all the way to robber baron.
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Maps and terrain included in the game include the Eastern and Western United States as well as France, Germany and the United Kingdom. There are at present over 30 modeled trains ranging from primitive trains like the 0-4-0 planet to ultramodern bullet trains. Each of your trains is customizable with decals and with a custom paint scheme.

The interface is very intuitive. Playing the game isn't hard - the interface can be picked up in a few minutes and the concepts of the game are very simple. Laying out track, adding cars and setting up buildings are all very simple. The game shares the same bright look as Sid Meier's Pirates! and Civilization IV - not surprsing considering they use the same engine. The game will also have a terrain editor allowing users to create their own maps.

Multiplayer will be a part of the game for up to four players. I asked about the music for the game - Railroad Tycoon II had a fantastic "hobo music" soundtrack - but there have not been any definite decisions made about musical content. It was mentioned that they might implement a system like seen in Pirates! where different towns or ports will cue different music but nothing is for certain yet.

The game is won by economics - hostile takeovers of rival companies or by meeting pre-set victory conditions. The stock market works much like it did in the Railroad Tycoon games. You have the option of buying your own stock to prevent your company from being taken over or you can invest in competitor's stock in an effort to take them over. THe AI can buy your stock and cause you to lose the game if you don't buy your own stock or take them over first. The dymanic stock market willsplit shares every so often, increasing the number of shares on the market.

Gameplay is real time like in Railroad Tycoon. I inquired about the presence of a time compression feature but was told that such a feature has not been implemented and that it was still under consideration.

I played a great deal of Railroad Tycoon when I was little and I am thrilled to see that we're getting a modern followup. Everything about the game shouts that it is a true sucessor to one of the greatest PC games of all time.

Click here to see the rest of the screenshots for Railroads! in our gallery!