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A-Train: City Simulator |OT| The Money Jungle of stations, lines, and overgrowth

rdaneel72

Member
Also LOL at the guy in the nintendolife comments section that said this game should be $3. Just lol.

I'm not what you would call a hardcore sim player, I'm very casual and I'm having a blast with this game. The pace is slower and more relaxed than an action game, but it suits portable perfectly. Also, it's not priced at $30 because its niche, it's a full retail game.

Wow. I guess this game does look like every FTP piece of shit in the App store, except you don't have to wait 6 hours between play sessions and you can't buy more miles of track with real money IAP. A shame that some don't recognize that these type of managment sims were a real genre before cell phone games devalued them.
 
Do you guys usually sell the shares you buy when they are a little high, or do you keep them to get the perks?
I have know the omnielectric ones that give me a 3% electric save on all my trains. I bought them fro 13.30 dollars the share, and know it had go up (the most I have seen of any share) to 16.60 dollars and I dont know if thats any good. As I said I havent seen a share going that up in all the time I have been playing, but at the same time I want to keep the perk.



Same here.

The stock market oh man... I've learned that if your secretary says the economy is expected to be slow that year, heed her warnings.
I usually sell if I can make a profit and buy it back when it dips to get the perk back. There's no waiting period or penalty to doing this so why not?

Wow. I guess this game does look like every FTP piece of shit in the App store, except you don't have to wait 6 hours between play sessions and you can't buy more miles of track with real money IAP. A shame that some don't recognize that these type of managment sims were a real genre before cell phone games devalued them.

Man, so sad and so true. The nintendolife review is unfortunate. How much of the game did he even play?
 
How do I post rival data here? Does miiverse have to support screenshots before we can post them? I've never don't the screenshot thing so I don't know how to do this
 

TheMoon

Member
Woo, I finally bought it just a few minutes ago. First time charging my eShop funds with paypal-gifts.com - smooth process.
 

Toma

Let me show you through these halls, my friend, where treasures of indie gaming await...
Speaking of the slow pacing in the tutorial missions, I just unlocked the option for the game to continue calculating (incl. autopause) while I close the system. Pretty handy as I can just set the auto stop to the next fiscal year, and then continue whenever I pick it up again.

Not helpful if you want to play NOW, but then again, I might as well do something else in the meantime other than staring at the screen :p

Edit: 15 minutes of waiting until the end of Fiscal Year 1, then another 66 minutes for Fiscal Year 2 before I can continue playing. One year seems to equal around 1 hour, good to know.
 

daxgame

Member
Woo, I finally bought it just a few minutes ago. First time charging my eShop funds with paypal-gifts.com - smooth process.

:O did not know about this. I hate using my CC informations, so this interests me.
Would a German\UK eShop card bought there work for any PAL 3DS?
I suppose so, but better be sure...
 

TheMoon

Member
:O did not know about this. I hate using my CC informations, so this interests me.
Would a German\UK eShop card bought there work for any PAL 3DS?
I suppose so, but better be sure...

Someone mentioned recently that it only works with paypal accounts that are associated with an address from that country. I have no firsthand experience with it, though. Like I said, this was my first time using it (and I'm from Germany buying funds for the German eShop).
 
Someone help me with the last thing of the 3rd tutorial. I need to get the total assets to 1 billion, but im stuck in 73000000 and as much as I build the number is not going up, also, everything is giving me profits, apart of 1 or 2 freight stations.
What am I doing wrong?

The stock market oh man... I've learned that if your secretary says the economy is expected to be slow that year, heed her warnings.
I usually sell if I can make a profit and buy it back when it dips to get the perk back. There's no waiting period or penalty to doing this so why not?



Man, so sad and so true. The nintendolife review is unfortunate. How much of the game did he even play?

Well, theres the money you need to pay for the transaction lol.
I dont think their company is going down lol, it hasent stop going up and up and now is up to 19 (when I bought it at 13).
 

Xater

Member
I must have missed something. I've been playing the first tutorial for almost 15 hours and I have not even hit 6000 people yet. Every few days two of my trains collide at a junction switch where two lines intersect. Are there tools to control that later in the game?

Also, do you need to own the land around stations for it to develop? Some of my earliest stations went from drastic development, back to slow, and I don't know why. There are plenty of building materials in range. Maybe the land I own is all filled up and I need to buy more?

Still enjoying it, but I want to finish this scenario and start the next one. Knowing what I know now, my next scenario should go much more smoothly.

You are clearly doing something wrong. Basically to win this scenario you build a loop around the island. One stop in every city. Then get enough trains running and deliver materials to the ones that need it. Development should be guaranteed this way and all you have to do is wait. Also you don#t want to own any of the land.
 

rdaneel72

Member
You are clearly doing something wrong. Basically to win this scenario you build a loop around the island. One stop in every city. Then get enough trains running and deliver materials to the ones that need it. Development should be guaranteed this way and all you have to do is wait. Also you don#t want to own any of the land.

Ok, I've played 15 hours, but only 6 months of game time has passed. I get caught up watching my trains, and laying track, so maybe I just need to crank up the flow of time?

How many in-game months should it take to clear the first tutorial (expand population to 10,000)?
 

TheMoon

Member
Man, so sad and so true. The nintendolife review is unfortunate. How much of the game did he even play?

What I found especially funny:

It doesn't help that there isn't a place where all the lessons taught in these tutorials are compiled for later reference, meaning that if the player forgets how exactly to navigate the endless menus to perform a particular action, it's a case of trial and error until the action is rediscovered.

*cough*

vakva.jpg

hwot9.jpg
 

Xater

Member
Ok, I've played 15 hours, but only 6 months of game time has passed. I get caught up watching my trains, and laying track, so maybe I just need to crank up the flow of time?

How many in-game months should it take to clear the first tutorial (expand population to 10,000)?

Took me around an in game year I think. I play around max speed most of the time and only slow it down when I am actually building stuff or planning out routes.
 
What I found especially funny:



*cough*

That doesn't help if you're on tutorial #2, and you need to remember something said in tutorial #1. It also doesn't help if you need clarification on something that was said 3 hours ago, as you'll have to skip backwards through an entire novel's worth of material that has been said during that time in order to get back to the piece of information that you're looking for. It's a pretty legitimate gripe; a handy little notebook with all of those lessons separated into individual sections would help a lot more than having to skip through one long ream of information.

This game is pretty fun, but I find myself doing absolutely nothing a lot of the time while waiting for the next appointment to roll around in these tutorials. I agree with an earlier comment in here that there needs to be a faster speed option than what is given to you.
 
That doesn't help if you're on tutorial #2, and need to remember something said in tutorial #1. It also doesn't help if you need clarification on something that was said 3 hours ago, as you'll have to skip backwards through an entire novel's worth of material that has been said after what you're looking for.

It's a pretty legitimate gripe. A handy little notebook with all of those lessons separated into individual sections would help a lot better than having to skip through one long ream of information.

The digital manual is right there, I hear what you're saying though.
Maybe a compendium of terms and lessons would be best, like in many top tier rpg's.

This is not a 6/10 game, regardless.

This game is pretty fun, but I find myself doing absolutely nothing a lot of the time while waiting for the next appointment to roll around in these tutorials. I agree with an earlier comment in here that there needs to be a faster speed option than what is given to you.

I guess I'm weird, I keep building and expanding and optimizing, regardless what stage I'm waiting for the secretary to "clear".
 
The digital manual is right there, I hear what you're saying though.
Maybe a compendium of terms and lessons would be best, like in many top tier rpg's.

This is not a 6/10 game, regardless.

The digital manual is pretty light. The chapter on streetcar stops consists of the following: "In the Streetcar Stop Menu, you can build and renovate streetcar stops." You're not going to find the wealth of information that is available to you in the tutorials, like the nuances of land value, optimal track layouts, or the impact on the world value of a commodity when exporting it to a smaller-sized city -- for these things, you better hope that you fully grasp them the first time they tell you and not forget them hours after they tell you, or take notes (which is not the worst thing in the world, but still, a compendium would be nicer).

I agree with you: It's not a 6/10 game. However, his complaint is still valid, I think.

I guess I'm weird, I keep building and expanding and optimizing, regardless what stage I'm waiting for the secretary to "clear".

Well at the end of the first tutorial, I pretty much had everything perfectly optimized by the end of the lessons, but I had a year's worth of in-game time needed to hit the tutorial goals. I guess I could've spent that time expanding things to shorten the time needed, but I really just wanted to move on to the next tutorial and learn more about the game -- probably when I get out of the tutorials, I'll go into full micromanage mode.
 

TheMoon

Member
That doesn't help if you're on tutorial #2, and you need to remember something said in tutorial #1. It also doesn't help if you need clarification on something that was said 3 hours ago, as you'll have to skip backwards through an entire novel's worth of material that has been said during that time in order to get back to the piece of information that you're looking for. It's a pretty legitimate gripe; a handy little notebook with all of those lessons separated into individual sections would help a lot more than having to skip through one long ream of information.

This game is pretty fun, but I find myself doing absolutely nothing a lot of the time while waiting for the next appointment to roll around in these tutorials. I agree with an earlier comment in here that there needs to be a faster speed option than what is given to you.

Sure, a better interface for it would be great. Just found it odd because the review made it sound like there was nothing when there is something.
 
I know very few people have already beaten scenario 3 but if someone could help me with this...
Someone help me with the last thing of the 3rd tutorial. I need to get the total assets to 1 billion, but im stuck in 73000000 and as much as I build the number is not going up, also, everything is giving me profits, apart of 1 or 2 freight stations.
What am I doing wrong?

Im in 800000000 right now, but it goes at snails pace. What is the better way to get more money with assets?
 
I know very few people have already beaten scenario 3 but if someone could help me with this...


Im in 800000000 right now, but it goes at snails pace. What is the better way to get more money with assets?
My biggest income is derived from building what the city needs (found in the city info chart) and housing and multilevel commerce buildings. Have you expanded or are you still at the center area of the map?

There are so many variables between one persons experience to another it's hard to say what you haven't done yet.

For example, I expanded rail service to one of the outlying communities across the water and set up a bunch of vacation homes and lots of shops and things. It brought in tons of money. Also don't forget under projects menu to do seasonal promotions.
 
My biggest income is derived from building what the city needs (found in the city info chart) and housing and multilevel commerce buildings. Have you expanded or are you still at the center area of the map?

There are so many variables between one persons experience to another it's hard to say what you haven't done yet.

For example, I expanded rail service to one of the outlying communities across the water and set up a bunch of vacation homes and lots of shops and things. It brought in tons of money. Also don't forget under projects menu to do seasonal promotions.

Yep, thats what im doing, I expanded to the north made the island a small town with also some oil industry and then just on the top of the map to make a bigger town with Canyon, multiple apartments and commercial buildings in canton (centre of the map), aurora island (less there) and Canyon (similar to canton). I just expanded now a railwork to Cairo (NorthWest), built an hydroelectric plant in the waterfall, a material factory and made a new passenger station in the center to start expansion. I hoping this town makes me 200000000 assets I need.

The thing I found surprising is how soon I won 700000000 in assets before going public, and then it all went to crawling pace, even going down some.

But thanks for the help :)

EDIT About the city needs chart, I dont understand very well what it wants. Do I build leisure for example when the graph shows its color point more on the center, or when its more on the outside? I didnt understand very well how the secretary explained that.
 
Yep, thats what im doing, I expanded to the north made the island a small town with also some oil industry and then just on the top of the map to make a bigger town with Canyon, multiple apartments and commercial buildings in canton (centre of the map), aurora island (less there) and Canyon (similar to canton). I just expanded now a railwork to Cairo (NorthWest), built an hydroelectric plant in the waterfall, a material factory and made a new passenger station in the center to start expansion. I hoping this town makes me 200000000 assets I need.

The thing I found surprising is how soon I won 700000000 in assets before going public, and then it all went to crawling pace, even going down some.

But thanks for the help :)

EDIT About the city needs chart, I dont understand very well what it wants. Do I build leisure for example when the graph shows its color point more on the center, or when its more on the outside? I didnt understand very well how the secretary explained that.
If it's more to the center then that's what the city lacks, more to the outside then it's more fulfilled
 
Finally beaten tutorial scenario 3. Building Cairo town was certainly the solution to my problem! So proud of finishing the tutorials, thats how deep the game is.

This game, even if difficult, is sooooo good. Having had so much fun in a tycoon campaign since RCT1. And the small scenes are really funny, loved the one about the banker climbing mountains like a madman (twice lol) and the coo asking for change to play pacman. Tycoon game devs, we need more characters like this in this type of games.
 

pronk420

Member
this looks amazing, I love the look of the town in pixels (not so much the full 3d version). the weather effects are so cool.
 

MouldyK

Member
From the NL Review: "You can put the 3DS in sleep mode and the game can still run (and earn you money) while you do other non-gaming things."

Is this true? If so, it's pretty neat.
 

lewisgone

Member
I'm close to beating Shin Megami Tensei IV and Xenoblade is going to take too long so I just cracked and picked the game up.

While it downloads I'm listening to my favorite rendition of A-Train, Eddie Jefferson's version. Which jazz musician is the title a reference to, OP?
 

Xater

Member
From the NL Review: "You can put the 3DS in sleep mode and the game can still run (and earn you money) while you do other non-gaming things."

Is this true? If so, it's pretty neat.

Yes, that option exists. You can make it so the time still continues when you close the system.
 
From the NL Review: "You can put the 3DS in sleep mode and the game can still run (and earn you money) while you do other non-gaming things."

Is this true? If so, it's pretty neat.

Unlocks in the second tutorial, in case you can't find the option. You may not have access to it yet.

I don't think I can use it, though, because it relies on the game being able to run while the 3DS is closed. I always suspend the game and go back to the 3DS home screen before closing because I've had too many instances where I'd open the 3DS and it wouldn't leave sleep mode, forcing me to hard restart and losing all my unsaved progress. The only solution I've eve read for this is to suspend the game before closing the 3DS.

EDIT: haha so beaten
 

Halabane

Member
wish this was physical. sounds like a game to put on a an old 3ds and let it run and just pick it up now and then while I play other games.
 
wish this was physical. sounds like a game to put on a an old 3ds and let it run and just pick it up now and then while I play other games.

I do too, but I understand why it's not. I would like if natsume had American box art I could download and print out and put on the shelf.
I might make my own
 
Guys, guys!
Holy shit with the scenario editor! Ive seen PC games with worse ones than this game. You can do everything you want, even create a story using the characters. You can use dialogs and choose what face they make when they say each thing, visual novel style.
Its really amazing!
You unoock it after you beat the three tutorials, but its worth it. You also unlock the change difficulty system.
 
Guys, guys!
Holy shit with the scenario editor! Ive seen PC games with worse ones than this game. You can do everything you want, even create a story using the characters. You can use dialogs and choose what face they make when they say each thing, visual novel style.
Its really amazing!
You unoock it after you beat the three tutorials, but its worth it. You also unlock the change difficulty system.

This sounds fantastic. Honestly, this thread is probably the most supportive and helpful source for the game, which deserves some love even if Nintendo don't seem to agree.
 

MouldyK

Member
This sounds fantastic. Honestly, this thread is probably the most supportive and helpful source for the game, which deserves some love even if Nintendo don't seem to agree.

Tempted, but my MH4U travels still continue. Plus, next month has Amiibos, Klay Kirby, Splatoon...too much I want.

Sad I have to leave this game out for now.
 
This sounds fantastic. Honestly, this thread is probably the most supportive and helpful source for the game, which deserves some love even if Nintendo don't seem to agree.

Im tempted to create a visual story scenario with my homecity japanese style and put it on gaf, but I know that will take hours of my life.

Also another little touch is that depending of the year you ar on ALL the characters change their dressing styles. I thought at first it was only for the sceretary, but everyone does on the 4th scenario. I think theres only 2 though. One for 1950 to 1990 and the other 1990 and up.
 
I think I'll have to shelve this game for now, I just can't juggle 3 huge timesinks (MH4U, Xenoblade 3D and this ) at the same time.

Game is awesome though, everyone on the fence should just get it right now to support Natsume's bold move to bring it to the west.
 
Speeding through the second tutorial (if I'm lucky, the next time I open my 3DS I should be done my second fiscal year). Has anyone figured out how to manage track connections to other cities? When you start the second tutorial, your train lines link to the north and one track is used to leave the city and the other track for re-entering. But when I tried to do the same for a new connection to the east, trains always leave and return via the same track, which means I have to put in a switch on the return approach so incoming trains switch back to the "correct" track immediately after re-entering the map. Very rarely, trains will collide here if the outgoing train is too close to the switch.

How do I get one track to be outgoing only, and one track to be incoming only?
 

Toma

Let me show you through these halls, my friend, where treasures of indie gaming await...
Speeding through the second tutorial (if I'm lucky, the next time I open my 3DS I should be done my second fiscal year). Has anyone figured out how to manage track connections to other cities? When you start the second tutorial, your train lines link to the north and one track is used to leave the city and the other track for re-entering. But when I tried to do the same for a new connection to the east, trains always leave and return via the same track, which means I have to put in a switch on the return approach so incoming trains switch back to the "correct" track immediately after re-entering the map. Very rarely, trains will collide here if the outgoing train is too close to the switch.

How do I get one track to be outgoing only, and one track to be incoming only?

You can change the outcome/income setting of tracks. When you build a track connection, it asks you "Do you want to construct a line to the neighbouring town?" In that moment, you can click on "Change connection line" on the lower screen to adjust the input/output tracks.
 

Toma

Let me show you through these halls, my friend, where treasures of indie gaming await...
Have a question myself though, I built a port in the third tutorial since the world price for goods is very high. I have the goods sitting next to the port, but nothing happens. What do I need to do to export goods with a port?

I now own A-Train 3DS!

Good decision ;) Always the same people who pop up in threads for good games :p
 

Orbis

Member
Totally gonna dust off the 3DS for this. I'm a huge fan of city/transport games so this is basically perfect as it's portable and I'm travelling all the time.
 
Have a question myself though, I built a port in the third tutorial since the world price for goods is very high. I have the goods sitting next to the port, but nothing happens. What do I need to do to export goods with a port?



Good decision ;) Always the same people who pop up in threads for good games :p

I did the same thing, and like you, it didnt seem to work (you cant see any ships going in and out for it to have a visual indication is working). But at least it was making me money, so i suppose it was working in some form.
 
You can change the outcome/income setting of tracks. When you build a track connection, it asks you "Do you want to construct a line to the neighbouring town?" In that moment, you can click on "Change connection line" on the lower screen to adjust the input/output tracks.

Ah crap. Does that mean I need to remake the connection, or can I edit this option after building? I guess it's not a huge deal if I need to rebuild, not like I haven't torn up entire unbuilt stations just to move them two tiles to the right.
 

MouldyK

Member
Japanese Train Related: https://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=FNleI1eHzi0

Japan’s ‘levitating’ maglev train set a world speed record of 374mph in a test today.

Construction work on the driverless magnetic levitation train – which uses magnets rather than wheels, axles and bearings to move – began in December 2014 with an official launch date scheduled for 2027.

And in a manned test in Prefecture, central Japan, today, the service – which will connect Tokyo and Nagoya – hit a record 374mph, travelling at that speed for roughly 11 seconds and covering 1.8km (1.1 miles).
 

Toma

Let me show you through these halls, my friend, where treasures of indie gaming await...
Ah crap. Does that mean I need to remake the connection, or can I edit this option after building? I guess it's not a huge deal if I need to rebuild, not like I haven't torn up entire unbuilt stations just to move them two tiles to the right.

I think you cant modify and need to remake the connection.

I did the same thing, and like you, it didnt seem to work (you cant see any ships going in and out for it to have a visual indication is working). But at least it was making me money, so i suppose it was working in some form.

I want to know how that works :mad:
 
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