Choo-choo Train!
| Developer: Shiny Shoe | Graphics: |
 | |
| Publisher: Good Shepherd Entertainment | Sound: |
 | |
| Year: 2020 | Difficulty: |
| |
| Genre: Strategy | Lastability: |
| |
| Number of players: 1 | Rating: |
8/10 | |
A game of cards among friends, what could be more convivial! Magic cards, for example…
In my experience, it often went belly-up in the end, because whatshisname’s victory depended on how to interpret an obscure, poorly explained rule. Whatshisname was incredibly argumentative, he cited official sites to support his arguments. Whatshisname was always right and he almost always won. Incidentally, he quickly found himself spending Saturday nights alone.
Obsessive, calculating, sociopathic—can I help it if I have all the qualities needed to excel at Magic…
I must say, I’m a little surprised at how long it took to see this somewhat niche but undeniably popular hobby adapted for computers and consoles (or smartphones). A digital version has the obvious advantage of letting the computer play referee, managing complex mechanics quickly and accurately, like those “counters” so familiar to Magic fans—the ones where you pile tokens on cards strewn over a table corner, between pizza boxes. Not always the most practical.
The first major success, of course, was Hearthstone (2014), a multiplayer, competitive, evolving game—or maybe a cash cow? The “collectible card” part certainly seems to outweigh any notion of strategic gameplay. I never tried it, but the addictive nature, the aggressive marketing, not to mention the community … of people, of humans, yikes, cooled me off—maybe unfairly.
It would take years before the concept was adapted for the benefit of a single player by Slay the Spire (2019), a real video game without any ulterior commercial motive. This time, the computer replaces not just the referee but also the friends!
I played Slay the Spire and don’t have fond memories. I remember the final boss, who alternated between two phases: a harmless ability during which you could do whatever, and then an overpowered attack that you couldn’t survive without just the right defensive card. And this card would turn up about half the time during the “benign” phase. So, my painstaking runs usually ended in a barely disguised version of “heads or tails”.
Enter Monster Train… Context: Hell has been invaded by overly excited little angels, turning it into a frozen wasteland. You’re the driver of a four-story locomotive, transporting the last ember capable of rekindling the great furnace and restoring the climate, in the name of love and virtue—or maybe the reverse, whatever.
The battles take place inside the train, which is, I guess, on a long journey, but you’ll only see the locomotive’s interior. I’ll admit, for a spectator, it might look a little repetitive. By the end of one run, you’ve seen all the scenery, heard all the music, and fought most of the available enemies. But for the player, for me, the variety is obvious. Case in point: the timer showing over 200 hours that I would have spent on a solo card game…
The number of cards isn’t even particularly high (220), and yet the interest keeps refreshing, with new cards to unlock gradually, four factions, 25 difficulty levels, and then a slew of extra game modes determined by “mutators” (or “modifiers”: extra effects layered on top of the difficulty setting). These aren’t just a way to stretch the game’s lifespan on the cheap—the mechanics actually stay fresh and interesting, in my opinion.
The great merit of Monster Train is that it offers a very gentle difficulty curve. This doesn’t mean it’s easy—it starts very low and ends very high. Plus, the Rogue-like mode has this characteristic I quite enjoy: your game’s success isn’t predetermined by the first rounds. There have been times I was tempted to quit after a disastrous start, only to stumble upon an artifact or card that radically changed my luck. Sometimes it’s the opposite—a promising deck crashes and burns after a single poor decision (like continuing to play cards while the boss has a red X on them … only to find out the red X has shifted to your units, thanks to an unexpected side effect).
While luck is part of the equation—hard to avoid in this genre—it’s far less oppressive than in Slay the Spire. I blame most of my losses on my own mistakes, rather than on a bad card draw. That said, I did hit an unexpected difficulty spike when I chose one particular faction combo that took me quite some time to get the hang of.
In the end, the toughest mode, if you’re a competitor, is the “Daily Challenge”. Everyone plays the exact same game, each in their own lane (no interaction between players). The goal is no longer just to reach the end but to score more points than others to top the leaderboard. This means playing far more aggressively. As I write this (in 2023), there are about 500 players on the board each day, with the leader generally flirting with 50,000 points. Finishing in the top ten verges on an actual feat (in the definitive ranking, naturally, which is only available the next day).
I realise I’ve barely described how the game progresses. It’s hard to do without getting under the technical hood, listing precise rules, and risking losing half the audience. Fans will click on the gift at the bottom of the page—a video review that I entirely agree with (N’est-ce pas!).
In the same vein, recently released: Vault of the Void (2022), Mahokenshi (2023), and Power Chord (2023). These aren’t recommendations since I haven’t tried any of them.
|
