Ticket To Ride - Review

I am jealous of the Europeans. No, it’s not the fancy berets they wear in
France or the watches you can get in Switzerland (although some fish and
chips from England would be mighty tasty right about now). No, it’s not the
majesty of the ancient buildings of Athens and Rome nor is it the breakneck
speeds one can travel on the Autobahn in Germany (although that could have
come in handy on my last trip to Gen Con). No, I am jealous of the Europeans
because they still travel on trains, that majestic iron horse that here in
America has fallen to it’s most utilitarian of roots. However, if you are
like me and yearn for the days of yesteryear, noted game designer Alan Moon
has given to us a new reason to shout “all aboard!”

Ticket to Ride is the latest offering from prolific game designer Alan Moon
(New England, Ten Days in the USA). The concept of Ticket is quite simple:
earn the most points by claiming rail routes across the American
countryside. You claim routes by collecting cards of various colors. In
order to claim the route between Los Angeles and El Paso, for example, a
player needs to collect six black or wild cards. This gives the game an
almost rummy feel that many people will find familiar and easy to
understand. Further, with wild cards in the hands and spaces on the board,
it provides a great deal of flexibility during game play.

Once you claim a route, you place your train cars to signify the route is
yours. The longer the route, the more points you earn. Claiming the route
between Portland and Seattle, for example, is one square and gives you one
point. The route between Los Angeles and El Paso, however, is six squares
long and earns a whopping 15 points. Since claiming six short routes might
only net you six or twelve points, it is usually advantageous to save your
cards for a longer route, unless you need the shorter route to complete your
Destination Ticket.

What are those, you ask? Players earn additional points by completing
Destination Tickets, which players usually receive at the beginning of the
game. A destination ticket card shows two cities and a point value. The
player then receives those points at the end of the game if they have
claimed routes that completely connect those two cities. That’s the good
news. The bad news is if you don’t connect them, you lose that number of
points at the end of the game. In a game where every point counts, it
becomes critical to connect those cities.

Actual game play is very simple as a player chooses between three things
each turn. A player may either draw cards to their hand OR play cards to
claim a complete route OR draw additional destination ticket cards. Once a
player has taken one of these actions, play goes to the next player. When a
player depletes his or her train car reserve to two or fewer pieces, each
player gets one additional turn. Once that player has one additional turn,
the game is over. Each player then award (or deduct) points for destination
cards and the player with the longest continuous track receives one final
bonus. The player with the most points wins.

Overall, the game becomes a delicate balance of hoarding cards and
preventing one’s opponents from claiming routes. While it is easy to be too
aggressive in claiming routes, the converse is true as well as a passive
player might find themselves locked out of the routes they need to connect a
destination ticket. While this balance provides for a great deal of tension
and strategy, the game itself isn’t complicated. Some might call the game
simplistic, I tend to call it elegant.

The game checks in at a hefty $45, but when you open the box, you’ll
understand. The board is a gorgeous, stylized map of the United States with
the scoring track along the board’s edge. Made of sturdy plastic, the train
cars will survive repeat playings. Almost casino like in their quality, the
cards will also survive the repeated beatings this game will receive. Yes,
$45 seems like a lot of money compared to Candy Land or a deck of cards, but
the quality certainly justifies the price (and this coming from a confirmed
cheapskate!)

If I have one gripe about the components, it’s the map on the board.
Someone should take Mr. Moon aside and give him a proper geography lesson.
I won’t tell you where the mistakes are, but I can spot at least two glaring
and two additional subtle mistakes in the game board. While I’m sure the
subtle ones are due to the nuances of the game, the glaring mistakes are
such that someone in production should have caught and corrected them.

Oh, and speaking of Europeans, this fine game just received the Spiel des
Jarhes award for 2004. For those of you who don’t know, the SDJ is the
gaming equivalent of the Nobel Prize and puts this game in the company of
Carcasonne and Settlers of Catan. So you don’t have to take my word for it,
you can take the word of a bunch of game crazed Germans as well!

So, yes, the Europeans have berets, the Autobahn, fish and chips, and great
watches. However, they no longer have a monopoly on travel by train, even
if it is just in our imagination. Ticket to Ride is not only a great game
for the train enthusiast; it gives a great game experience to anyone who
plays it, including those who don’t know they like games yet. Easy to learn
and fun to play, Ticket to Ride offers a little bit for everyone to enjoy.
Let’s let the whistle blow and hop aboard, because just like the Beatles, we
have a great Ticket to Ride.