Transportation

On the cusp of the twentieth century, America is the undisputed land of industry. Factories fire their machines twenty-four hours a day, and demand is skyrocketing in the cities. A small but fierce rivalry of shipping barons must manage their amazing airships and the extensive railroad system in order to get goods to the cities before the demand is met by someone else. Anyone who can't stay competitive will be left with nothing but dust in their coffers!

The process is simple: Factories produce the goods (machinery, textiles, chemicals, food, and luxuries) that are coveted by the city folk. Airships – forbidden from landing in the cities but capable of carrying cargo over great distances – must be used to gather those goods and deliver them to depots along the rail network. Trains then haul the goods to the cities that want them, earning cash for the competitor who gets there first! Will you be the "King of Air and Steam?"

Kings of Air and Steam spans five rounds, and at the beginning of each round, players plan their Airship flights using four of their movement cards. When everyone is ready, everyone reveals their first planned card. According to the turn order and movement limits of their cards, players move their Airships, then take an Action; Actions include Building Depots, Upgrading your Airship or Train, Shipping Goods by rail, and Soliciting Funds from the bank. When all players have acted, the second planned cards are revealed, and so on through the four planned cards until all players have finished carrying out their plans for the round. All the while, players must keep aware of the rising values of the different types of Goods and try to get the most-valuable Goods from the specialized factories that produce them to the cities that want them. At the end of the game, the player with the most money and the greatest shipping network will be declared King of Air and Steam!

Kings of Air and Steam includes seven teams of characters, each with unique powers to give them a competitive edge, and a modular game board that makes each game a different experience.

In Brass the players represent industrialists in northern England during the hay-day of the industrial revolution. Each player needs to build an economic engine that surpasses the other by the time railways are established and the foreign markets have been saturated with English cotton.

The goal of the game is to have the most points at the end of the game. These are obtained in three ways:
1) Building industries and having them successfully utilized
2) Building canal or rail connections to cities that have many successfully utilized industries
3) money at the end of the game (very inefficient).

Game play is divided into two phases - the Canal Phase and the Rail Phase. At the beginning of each phase players are dealt a hand of cards that represent a mix of the cities and the available industries.

On his turn, a player has two actions (except first turn of the game where there is only one action) and must spend a card for each one. Available actions include:
1) building an industry
2) building a connection [either canals or rails based on phase of the game]
3) develop their own industries which removes lower victory point industries from a player's board in favor of higher victory point ones
4) sell cotton
5) take a loan (absolutely necessary a few times a game.

At the end of a player's turn they replace the two cards they played with two more from the deck. Turn order is determined by how much money a player spent on the previous turn - from lowest spent first to highest spent. This turn order mechanic opens some strategic options for players going later in the turn order allowing possibility of back-to-back turns.

After all the cards have been played the first time (deck size adjusted for number of players) the Canal phase ends and a scoring round commences. After scoring, all canals and all of the lowest level industries are removed for the game, new cards are dealt and the Rail Phase begins. Rail phase is identical to Canal Phase except players may now occupy more than one location in a city and a double connection build (though expensive) is possible. At the end of the Rail Phase there is another scoring round and a winner is crowned.

The use of the cards limit where you can build your industries but any card can be used for the develop, sell cotton or building connections actions. This leads to a strategic timing/storing of cards. Resources are common so that if one player builds a rail line (which requires coal) they have to use the coal from the nearest source which may be an opponent's coal mine which gets that coal mine closer to scoring (i.e. being utilized).

[Side Note]
Brass provides a game of timing and positioning yourself to have your opponents propel you victory. The rule book is notorious for being difficult to understand (though has been significantly fixed in the most recent edition). After a few turns the game reveals itself to being far more simple than the rules suggest. A teacher or viewing a how to play video is definitely worth the time.

Steam-belching iron horses roar across the wild plains! Age of Steam relives the era when pioneering U.S. railroads built the tracks that transformed America's economy. The cut-throat action is centered on the industrial powerhouses of the growing nation: Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Chicago, and beyond.

Challenges that await you:

Can you finance both the most extensive track network and the most powerful locomotives?
Which routes will give the best returns on their costs?
Can you beat the opposition to the most lucrative shipments?
Will you make enough money to pay your aggressive creditors?

Competition is brutal, with the game usually going to the player who plans most carefully.

Each self-contained phase in the game keeps players constantly involved in making vital decisions and interacting with other players. Age of Steam also allows towns to be developed into cities, ensuring that no two games are exactly the same.

Ticket to Ride: Europe takes you on a new train adventure across Europe. From Edinburgh to Constantinople and from Lisbon to Moscow, you'll visit great cities of turn-of-the-century Europe. Like the original Ticket to Ride, the game remains elegantly simple, can be learned in 5 minutes, and appeals to both families and experienced gamers. Ticket to Ride: Europe is a complete, new game and does not require the original version.

More than just a new map, Ticket to Ride: Europe features brand new gameplay elements. Tunnels may require you to pay extra cards to build on them, Ferries require locomotive cards in order to claim them, and Stations allow you to sacrifice a few points in order to use an opponents route to connect yours. The game also includes larger format cards and Train Station game pieces.

The overall goal remains the same, collect and play train cards in order to place your pieces on the board, attempting to connect cities on your ticket cards. Points are earned both from placing trains and completing tickets but uncompleted tickets lose you points. The player who has the most points at the end of the game wins.

Part of the Ticket to Ride series.

Online Play

Xbox LIVE Arcade

With elegantly simple gameplay, Ticket to Ride can be learned in under 15 minutes, while providing players with intense strategic and tactical decisions every turn. Players collect cards of various types of train cars they then use to claim railway routes in North America. The longer the routes, the more points they earn. Additional points come to those who fulfill Destination Tickets – goal cards that connect distant cities; and to the player who builds the longest continuous route.

"The rules are simple enough to write on a train ticket – each turn you either draw more cards, claim a route, or get additional Destination Tickets," says Ticket to Ride author, Alan R. Moon. "The tension comes from being forced to balance greed – adding more cards to your hand, and fear – losing a critical route to a competitor."

Ticket to Ride continues in the tradition of Days of Wonder's big format board games featuring high-quality illustrations and components including: an oversize board map of North America, 225 custom-molded train cars, 144 illustrated cards, and wooden scoring markers.

Since its introduction and numerous subsequent awards, Ticket to Ride has become the BoardGameGeek epitome of a "gateway game" -- simple enough to be taught in a few minutes, and with enough action and tension to keep new players involved and in the game for the duration.

Part of the Ticket to Ride series.

Re-implemented by:

Ticket to Ride: Europe
Ticket to Ride: Märklin
Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries
Ticket to Ride: The Card Game
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