Planet Bob - Playing The Train (C64)

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Hi there!

 

Back in the heyday of their creativity Accolade created The Train:

 

 

While not sharing the peacefulness of Test Drive or the humor of Card Sharks, The Train still offers a similar outstanding experience. I really liked Accolade back in the day, since they were constantly trying to be significantly different than what the standard game formulas were at the time. Sometimes their insistence on being innovative resulted in weird stuff like the "strategic" Serve & Volley tennis game , but often enough they delivered true gaming highlights.

 

The Train in its core is a mixture of classic crosshair shoot'em ups and a simple train simulator. It's also embeded in a minimalistic storyline, which is creating an overall movie-like flow, not unlike the Cinemaware games. The very good graphics and SFX also add much to that experience.

 

Neither the anti-aircraft or bridge/station taking scenes, nor the train simulator part by itself are really difficult, but the game requires to find some overall playing strategy and well executed timing.

 

I choose the medium difficulty level and won it on my third try:

 

 

I think it's a pretty good game, albeit it's rather short and once you've beaten it a few times, there's very little replay value.

 

Some future day the "Playing..." series may see another war game from Accolade in the form of "Power at Sea", but first it'll continue with something else.

 

Greetings,

Manuel

 

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