K-BAN'S KORNER
TransAmerica (Winning Moves/Rio Grande Games, 2 to 6 players, 30 minutes; $24.95)
Railroad games are usually both long and complex. Not so for TransAmerica
by Franz-Benno Delonge, a railroad themed connection game for those with short
attention spans and little tolerance for learning new rules. A new game that you
can be playing in a couple of minutes and takes 5-10 minutes per round is ideal
for getting newbies to the table.
TransAmerica’s
board is a map of the US with a triangular grid superimposed. There are 35
cities, in 5 different colors by geographic region, labeled with large circles.
Most of the grid lines are single width, but those that transverse mountains or
rivers have 2 parallel lines (indicating that they require 2 actions). A deck of
35
city cards thoughtfully shows the location as well as the name and color of the
city on the front and the color alone on the back. Before each round the city
cards are divided into 5 stacks by color, shuffled, and dealt one to each
player. As a result, everyone has one city in each region.
Your mission is to connect your 5 cities with track (black wooden sticks)
before the competition does likewise. Prior to laying track, players, in turn
order, place their cylindrical start piece anywhere on the board (but most
likely in a location close to one or more of your target cities). On subsequent
turns, tracks are placed on the grid at the rate of 2 per player or 1, if
crossing a river or mountain. Every track you place must ultimately be traceable
to your start piece, however. Play proceeds clockwise and rather quickly, as
tracks laid become communal property. Once
your tracks connect to an opponent’s, a larger network is formed and it
becomes relatively easy to connect to distant regions. The trick is to have
others do the heavy lifting for you, so you can concentrate on your trouble
spots to complete your circuit.
As soon as a player can demonstrate connection of all 5 of their cities
by revealing the appropriate cards, the round immediately ends. The player going
out first gets a score of zero. Everyone else scores as many points as actions
needed to complete their mission. All start with 13 points (marked with a mini
wooden locomotive) and count down to zero. If, at the end of a round, a player
has hit zero, the game ends and whoever has the most points remaining is
declared the winner.
If no one has reached zero, tracks are swept clean from the board, the
cards are re-sorted, shuffled and dealt as before, with start player rotating
clockwise. Sure, the luck of the draw can thwart the best-laid plans, but
there’s always next round. Keys to consistent victory are initial placement
based on your cards and placements of others. Getting others to complete
sections of track that you need is vital.
An earlier version of the game, Iron
Road, was produced by Winsome
Games. TransAmerica
is both more visually appealing and lower in price. Rio Grande Games will be
importing TransAmerica
this summer with English rules.
Make no mistake, TransAmerica
is light family fare and not for budding rail barons (or rocket scientists). Our
weekly play-testing group uses it as an opener, while waiting for stragglers to
arrive. If you want to introduce non-gamers to our pastime, all aboard for TransAmerica!
- - - - - - - - - - - - Steve Kurzban
(More traveling ahead! See K-ban's take on Santa Fe Rails and Clippers!)
Editorial Clippers Dschunke Santa Fe
Santa Fe Rails Starship Catan Theophrastus