Maglev Metro First Impressions

Maglev Metro was top of my “I want to play that” list.

It was, but it is no longer!

Utilize state-of-the-art magnetic levitation technology to build a metropolitan rail system, transporting workers and robots beneath the city. Replace ageing Manhattan and Berlin subway systems with newer, faster, quieter technology.

Maglev Metro Game Overview

Quick Rules Summary

Players will take actions to build tracks as well as stations that go onto a map. Players will use trains to pick up and deliver passengers to the relevant colour station using their tracks.

Delivered passengers go onto the player’s board making future actions more powerful, increasing point scoring or even adding additional action points for the player to use.

How do you win?

You score for passengers on your player board and stations connected on the map.

Each player has 4 personal goal cards and will score any one of them. They can score all 4 by unlocking the ability to do so on their player board.

Main Mechanisms

Pick-up and deliver is the main mechanism of the game. There is also route building as you build out those tracks and of course action point allowance.

USP

The tiles you lay for the track are transparent. This means when I lay my track over yours, you can see yours underneath. Each colour is slightly shifted on the tile so if all players build on the same space you can see all 4 tracks clearly.

Theme

I mean, building a new tram/subway system isn’t new. The fact that it’s ‘magnetic levitation’ and that some passengers are robots as well as humans, does not come out in the theme.

I wouldn’t have known about the robot workers if I hadn’t been told. It could just as easily be factory workers and office workers. (Based on their destination.)

Setup

Boards out, bits and bobs out. You have to do some jiggery-pokery with the meeples for the player count and during setup. If you know what you’re doing this won’t take long at all. The main thing to remember is to not put any meeples in the bag until you’re sure you’re done.

Components & Artwork

Obviously, the tiles are really nice, as are the meeples to be fair. They fit in the trains well.

The trains themselves have metal bottoms and glide smoothly across both the plastic and cardboard tiles. One reason for this is the indented boards hold the station in place which in turn hold the track tiles in place.

I didn’t notice any art of note at all.

Ease of Teaching

Very simple. There are only 9 actions to take and 8 of them are very straightforward. The awkwardness in teaching will come from explaining some scoring items, unlocking human passengers, score multipliers and those personal goal cards. The goal cards are fine but hidden information.

Similar Games

I very recently played Wormholes which is an action point, pick up and deliver game and was more fun.

Arguably, Maglev Metro is a better game, but not as fun which is all important.

Maglev Metro Review

Positives

It looks really nice.

Turns are quick, but not too quick.

There are two maps in the base game which changes the game up a bit.

The randomising of personal goals means each game will feel a little different.

Delivering passengers to increase your action strength makes the pick-up and deliver part mean a lot.

Working out if you want to improve your abilities now or use meeples to score points later is a really fun problem to have.

There is a lot to balance on your player board…

Negatives

…but sometimes this felt too restrictive. I couldn’t build a purple station because I didn’t have any violet meeples, that was because…

…I had a goal to not pick up any violet or purple passengers. This means neither myself nor my opponent built the purple stations prolonging the game’s end far too much.

A player who was experienced with this game says some games can stalemate like this and ‘break’ in other ways.

My opponent had a personal goal to collect as many violet passengers as possible, as I didn’t want any he got them all which was worth a lot of points.

Despite the randomised goals and multiple maps, I’m not too sure about replayability.

It is really expensive.

Maglev Metro Summary

A decent game I’m glad I got to play and will again, but I’m glad I didn’t buy it.

Jesta ThaRogue