Railway Islands from QUByte Interactive and Rising Moon Games is a relaxing puzzle game with trains. Learn more about this charming title in our Railway Islands review!
This is a double review for Railway Islands. Ceidz and EdEN played the game, and this review presents what they both had to say.
A minimalist and relaxing experience with a unique look. You are the manager of a railway line responsible for delivering resources to Islanders, residents of a group of distant islands. Create a safe path and deliver all the resources to the small towns on the islands.
Railway Islands is a relaxing puzzle game in which you have to create a path for your train on each island you’ll visit. You’ll have to move and rotate all of the hexagonal pieces available until your train can reach the exit, all while successfully delivering packages to each of the locations present on the island. Finishing a challenging level and seeing the train go through each location is fun and satisfying to watch.
The gameplay is quite easy to get the hang of, and the game only requires you to move the pieces to the right spot. And then, when you have placed a piece, you can change its orientation with the L2 or R2 buttons. You can press the Square button to launch your train at any time, so you can work on your track in increments. There are no consequences for launching your train on an unfinished track, so you can definitively use it as you please to progress. You also have to visit every location on the island. Otherwise, the next level will stay locked. Speaking of which, there are 50 levels, and they’ll become increasingly difficult as you progress.
I also liked the presentation of the game. Each island is unique, and there are four seasons to experience as the game unfolds. Each island is beautiful, and the puzzles are well-designed. As for the soundtrack, you’ll hear waves and birds as you try to create the right track for each scenario, which adds to the relaxing factor.
The game has a full trophy list with a Platinum. The list includes 8 Bronze trophies, 9 Silver trophies, and 7 Gold trophies. You’ll have to complete the tutorial island, complete an island without collecting all items, create your own island, play a workshop island, favorite a workshop island, and beat all the islands in the game. If you need some extra help, you can check out this Railway Islands Trophy Guide.
I enjoyed playing through Railway Islands on PlayStation, but there’s one aspect that could use some improvements. The controls felt a bit stiff on the PlayStation controller. When trying to move a hexagonal piece, the hand cursor is always snapped onto the tile below, and even moving it to the desired location felt like a chore. Moreover, because of the 3D perspective, you’ll often land the piece next to where you wanted to, and I had this happen even late in the adventure.
As Ceidz mentioned, Railway Islands offers us a colorful and fun puzzle experience in which you need to get your train from point A to point B as you make all stops on your path to collect the packages that need to be delivered. It’s a simple premise but one that gets the job done. The game offers a minimalist presentation with a relaxing soundtrack to match.
On Nintendo Switch, you’ll move a cursor around the screen with the left analog stick so that you can select each tile with the A button. You can then rotate that piece as needed with the ZL or ZR buttons. There’s also the option of swapping tiles around. The right analog stick can be used to rotate the camera by pressing left or right, as well as to zoom in and out by pressing up or down. Once you think you’ve found the right way of placing each tile, you can press the Y button to start your train’s engine.
The Workshop section allows you to create your own island puzzles so that gamers from around the world can check them out. You’ll start out in the open sea as you use all of the different tiles from the 50 levels in the main Campaign Mode to build some new puzzles. There’s also the option of playing the puzzles created by other people, which certainly increases the game’s replay value. Building your own levels will allow you to get a better feel for how to complete the levels in the main game.
Railway Islands is a colorful, charming, relaxing, and fun puzzle game that will test your skills as you work on a series of levels of increasing difficulty. The game does a good job of introducing new elements at a steady pace so that you don’t end up feeling overwhelmed. Railway Islands is out on PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch at a low price of only $3.99.
Disclaimer
This Railway Islands – Puzzle review is based on PlayStation copies provided by QUByte Interactive.
