Fast Train to Miyajima is a game from the fourth R&W contest. As I’ve explored R&Ws, I have decided there is a sub genre that can be called ‘Trying to fire Yahtzee’. Fast Train could be described as trying to fire Qwixx. Which it doesn’t do but it’s still not bad.
The game is about twelve trains going to six different cities. Well, actually you are filling in boxes in twelve lines. Fast Train is pretty abstract and the theme wafer thin. The theme does justify the mechanical difference between fast trains and heavy trains, which is nice.
You are shipping goods to Miyajima, Rio, London, New York, Paris and Sidney. You also only have two trains for each city, a fast train and a heavy train. So the company you’re managing is apparently amazingly diverse and limited at the same time. The player sheet shows the twelve lines of boxes, two for each city. The cities are color coded: red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple. Yes, this is important.
In addition to play sheets and writing utensils, you’ll need a red die, a yellow and a blue die. The active player will choose a die and roll it. Everyone will write that number in the appropriate colored line, either the fast train or the heavy train.
And here’s the clever bit. The active player chooses a second die and rolls it. You can either fill in a box in that color OR you can add it to the first die and add that sum the appropriate secondary color! Third die, same deal only you can add it to either of the first two dice.
The game ends when someone completes X number of trains. (X depends on the number of players) Each color is accessed individually. Basically, if you have more fast train boxes but a greater heavy train sum, you score lots of points. If you don’t, itty bitty points. Most points wins.
There are things I like about Fast Train. I like the color mixing and the game-of-chicken-scoring and the fact that the active player has choices that effect the game. I like the theme, as thin as it is. But the basic structure of the decisions is pretty simple. Small numbers in the fast train and big numbers in the heavy train. And I have to wonder if the game will drag with the higher end of the player count where you need to complete more trains. Still, net positive.
Some Roll and Write games are board games where the board and pieces are a piece of paper and pencil. And some are little dice games that you play while waiting for your food or when you’re too tired to play anything else. Fast Train is definitely in the second category.
Mind you, there’s a definite place for that kind of game. There’s plenty of times I’m tired!I have a folder of them I keep handy and Fast Train has been added to it.
Fast Train to Miyajima isn’t amazing but it is a solid little family-weight game that I could picture Gamewright publishing.
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