Designed by: Hisashi Hayashi
String Railway is a train game with a difference – the tracks are made of string.
The game itself has no board as such but is composed entirely of string and cards. One black string decides the shape of the ‘board’, a grey circular string is added to show a mountain range and a blue string represents a river. Each player begins with a home station and a set of strings in their colour – four short, and one long.
On your turn you first of all take the top card from the deck, which is full of different kinds of stations. You then add it to the board in a place of your choosing and connect it to your network by placing one of your strings. But in placing your string you can join up with other players stations too, and the different stations score in different ways – some reward you for building them, some get you points when other players link to them, some are worth more when built in the mountain range, and so on. The thing to remember here is not just placing the stations though, but also the string itself: because every other string your ‘track’ crosses – be it river, mountain, or another track – costs you a point.
Play continues for five rounds at which point each player has laid their track, at which point scores are tallied.
If you wanted to, you can be a bit cheeky with where you put your stations. But it's low-level sneakiness.
Low. The whole game takes half an hour maximum, once you're up to speed.
Although the game is pretty simple, there *are* decisions to be made. Where do you place your station so it gets you maximum points, whilst not helping the other players too much and not hampering your own network?
If you like it, String Railway is unlikely to play the same way twice. The mountains and river change the set-up, and the cards come out randomly.
2-5
Players
8+
Years
30-60
Mins
Sam says
A reasonably non-taxing game suitable for families. The lack of a combative element makes it great for little ones, but the novelty of the string is a double-edged sword: you want it to do your bidding and often it can't, then after a couple of plays the novelty falls away and you're left with a game that is just ok - clever, but a bit procedural, and a bit luck-based.