Train Station 2

Train Station 2: Rail Strategy Review

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I’ve been spending way too much time playing Train Station 2: Rail Strategy on my phone. It’s a lot of fun. I wanted to share a bit about it here. I’m not being compensated in any way for writing about it. I just like the game.

I recorded a walkthrough video for it if you’d like to view that.

This is a strategy game where you gather resources by train, combine them in factories to make manufactured goods, then deliver them by train again. It’s not a train simulator by any means – more like FarmVille on rails. But it has TRAINS.

The Trains

Union Pacific GTEL Locomotive
Union Pacific GTEL Locomotive

You start out in Britain with a steam engine and George Stephenson giving you missions. As you finish the missions, you get rewards and more missions. There are other people / destinations that want materials shipped to them, and you get rewards for shipping to them as well.

You can get new locomotives by finishing certain missions. Initially there are only steam locomotives, but over time diesel and electric locomotives become available as well.

Locomotives are also classified by their rarity – common, rare, epic or legendary. Some examples:

  • Class A-1 “Berkshire” or New York Central “Hudson” are COMMON
  • DRG Class 44 or Erie K-5A are RARE
  • Union Pacific’s gas turbine-electric “Veranda” or SŽD EMCH 3 are EPIC
  • Baldwin’s 60000 steam loco is LEGENDARY

Improving the Trains

You get shipments of what looks like nuts and bolts daily, and you can also buy or find them. These can be assigned to improving your locomotives’ pulling capacity.

Jobs

Jobs in Train Station 2
Jobs in Train Station 2

The game offers you missions, or as it calls them, “jobs”. Basically you have to deliver a certain amount of a certain good to them. There’s no time limit, but some jobs require a certain type of locomotive. You can see in the screen shot above that a couple of jobs have no “suitable trains” meaning that I didn’t have any free locomotives of the right type (epic).

Each train requires a dispatcher, so that limits how many trains you can send out at once. This page explains how to get more dispatchers.

The Factories

Factories in Train Station 2
Factories in Train Station 2

You start with the smelting plant (which takes ore and coal and makes steel). As you increase in levels, more factories are available. For example, the sawmill produces lumber at the start and later can produce barrels, plywood and pallets.

The iron mill in Train Station 2
The iron mill in Train Station 2

Each factory has a few spaces where you can queue up things to be made, and the finished products can be stored there temporarily. The image above shows two “incoming” slots and three “outgoing” slots. I’ve expanded it once using gems.

Your Station and Town

The station is just “north” of the tracks in the screen shot above. Oddly all maps lead to the same station, whether you come from England, the US, Canada… it must be one big extradimensional station.

The town surrounds the station. When you begin, it’s quite small, but over time new buildings get unlocked and you can also expand the buildings from tiny shacks into condos and libraries and other buildings. Your population grows, and that’s really one of the goals of the game – expand your population.

Gems

The game has a few “currencies”, including coins, but the main accelerator is gems. You can use gems to hurry things along; you can make a train arrive at its destination instantly using gems, or complete production at a factory, or upgrade facilities… gems can do a lot.

Gems can be earned by finishing certain jobs; sometimes you get them when leveling up. You can also purchase gems using real money, which is what the game developers are encouraging you to do. Be frugal with gems and use them when you really need to.

Here’s more on how to get gems in TrainStation 2.

Socialization

The odd thing is that this game has no social aspect. You can’t collaborate with any friends playing the game. There’s no real connection to Facebook or Twitter or any other social network. There are forums on the Pixel Federation site but that’s about it. It’s a little surprising.

The game has a Facebook page where they share bonus codes and upcoming news. The bonus codes are entered into the game by pressing the “gear” icon in top right and then pressing the “Redeem Code” icon. The bonuses aren’t substantial but every little bit helps.

Walkthrough Video

I recorded a walkthrough video.

Other Videos

Check out my TrainsStation 2 playlist on YouTube!

Resources

To Sum Up

I think you can tell that I like this game. It’s something fun to play when you have a few minutes, and it’s just addicting enough to keep you coming back to it. Give it a shot if you like!

Download Train Station 2: Rail Strategy: Apple / iOS

35 thoughts on “Train Station 2: Rail Strategy Review”

  2. I love the lead in picture of what looks like an Amtrak P42 leading a freight train. Someone out there is likely having an aneurysm over this!

    • No doubt! I’d love to see P42s leading freight… somewhat like the VIA F40PHs that CP leased a while ago.

  3. I haven’t heard of the game but then I don’t always make enough effort to come out of my technology cave. The game description sounds a lot like the original Sim City which I used to find wildly addictive. That and the equally aged Railroad Tycoon (both were Sid Meyers titles). On Railroad Tycoon I could follow the paths to profitable railroads but my locomotive nostalgia would take over and I was often reluctant to invest in new technology. If the game had included railfans, they’d have been interested I suppose.

    I’ll have to look into this.

    Chris

    • Hi Chris, I loved Sim City so much… it was super addictive. I never really got into Railroad Tycoon for some reason.

  4. Ok. This game is cool. But I’m having a hard time with the iron mill plant, all my in going and out going spaces are full. How do I fix this? When, I tap on the items. It says warehouse full.

    Thank you Aaron

  5. Hey! Do regions ever run out of jobs? I have Britain 100% done but “medium” level jobs continuously appear. Do they ever stop? Granted you get rewards, but they take a lot of resources and time that could be spent completing other regions. Thanks!

    • You’ll have five jobs at all times, three from your current region and two from random previous regions. There will certainly be times when you don’t have a job for a particular region but there’s always a chance of getting a job for a region you’ve finished. You can always trash those jobs if you’d like one from another region and I encourage you to trash jobs that ask for too much material or effort for little reward.

  6. Steve, thanks for all the info…

    I’ve been playing for a while, but I can’t seem to grow my population. It seems like I’m missing something, in order to get buildings you need a population of 450 or more I’m at level 29 and stuck at about 280… I upgrade the few buildings I have every chance I get, but it doesn’t seem to impact the overall population.

    I’ve got plenty of coins and gems, but I can’t use them to buy buildings until my population grows.

    I appreciate any advice on this element of the game… I recently got 8th place in the global logistics level and am enjoying the game play – but really seem to be stuck with growing my population.

    Thanks again

    Ty Coon
    Level 29

    • Hi Doug, sorry you’re having trouble with your population growth. You should have at least five buildings on your map at all times, and four of them are eligible to be upgraded. I made a video here about buildings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Oel4h0FJQ4
      You need materials and probably some plans to upgrade them. I go into it in the video. If you still have issues, please comment here or on the video and I’ll see what I can help with.

  7. I built the gasoline factory in the USA portal, but it doesn’t produce gas, what am I missing? Thanks

    • HI Jerry, can you send trains to the gasoline factory to get gasoline? It won’t produce it on its own – you still have to send trains to get it like you do for all destinations.

  8. I just got to the Canada region a few days ago and have been doing jobs. But now I have the job to get 280 cheese delivered but no way to even get cheese from my Food Processing Plant. And, there is nothing I see to even ‘unlock’ that feature?
    Help?

    • Hi Steve, you have to wait until you reach level 220 before you can make cheese (in your food processing plant). I know it’s a bit annoying but I think it’s their way of pacing the game so people don’t finish the story job too quickly.

  11. Hello. I’m new to the game and the forum here.

    Can you tell me if there is anyway to stop a train from doing its current task so I can send it or another train to complete another task or harvest the supplies I need to complete other tasks?

    Thanks in advance.

    • Hi Eric, welcome. All you can do with a train sent on a task is complete it by spending gems on the task, or wait until it finishes its task on its own. There is no way to “cancel” its task.

  12. What trains are allowed to pick up has at the gas factory? Nothing I have is allowed to go there after wasting all that time delivering 7500 fuel cans

    • It has to be a legendary train, Todd. If you look carefully there is a small gold star beside the “3m 0s” when you click on the gasoline factory.

  13. Well of course. I never got one of those, and they automatically advanced me to the next region…now it’ll take “diamonds” to get a tiny chance to buy/win one of those. I have every other US train in multiples, but never hit a legendary train. A terrible flaw in the design of the game that there is no other way to get the trains you don’t have but to spend the ultimate currency for a tiny CHANCE to get what you need. I now officially HATE this game.

  14. I am not playing this game anymore. It’s too much time consuming. No, no, it’s really fun, but that’s exactly the problem …

    Anyway, maybe a few hints for those, who are still playing.

    1. Don’t act too fast

    Wait for say 4 days until you are doing the next step. In the meantime get all the gifts every 4 hours, get the daily gift and get especially the blue maps by fulfilling the ship trade tasks. You get a lot of parts and money to upgrade your locomotives. And you get blue maps to grow up your population.

    2. Save keys

    About 20 levels before you reach the next region don’t spent the keys. Collect them. If you opened the first level of the new area you get a bunch of locomotives for your keys.

    3. Get locomotives from special events.

    Fulfilling tasks of special events you get another type of keys valid for this event only. For these keys you get spare parts to upgrade your locomotives and even new locmotives of any type. A building for 80 people is available as well. Don’t try to win the contests. That is not necessary.
    After three events all of your locomotives are nearly perfect.

    4. Don’t try to upgrade too fast to a new region

    If you open a new region after say three special events you have enough locomotives to fulfill any task. To start with appropriate locomotives in the new region you saved a number of keys (see ebove).

    5. Get additional emeralds playing some advertized games

    Sometimes you need only a few minutes to get 50 emeralds

    • These are great tips – thank you, Rainer. The key message is “go slow” and don’t be in a hurry to rush to a new region or to spend keys or engine parts.

    • What does it mean at the bottom trains section, it shows trains I don’t own yet. I thought I got a couple in the containers

  15. Great overall BBC advice here. I’m new to the game, just on Germany level, but having an impossible time getting the needed legendary train. Got plenty of epics and rates. Wish there was an easier way to get the legendary. Spending 200 keys for a 5% chance to get a legendary is nuts!

    • Hi Erik, thanks for stopping by. It is very frustrating to get a legendary by opening containers. I usually advise opening regular containers at 100 keys/box. Your chance of getting a legendary is slightly lower but your chance of not getting a common is better… plus there’s the frustration of spending 200 keys and getting yet another common train!

  16. Hi. I’m a fairly new player, but love the game and am at level 11, so I have Germany. Germany produces iron ore, but it doesn’t show yet on my map. When will I have access to that? I have a few iron ore in my warehouse, but those were either from the whistles or exclamation points to click on. Appreciate how helpful you are to everyone! 🙂

    • Hi Diane the iron ore is in Britain. You’ll find copper ore in Germany. You get it from the Copper mine which is south of the station. You need to complete missions to build the copper mine.

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