[UPDATED REVIEW POST 1.0 RELEASE]

My initial review for Railroads Online was a mixture of positive praises for what the game offered, and constructive criticism on what I believed could be done better. Overall, seeing as that was written before the actual FULL release of the game, I was able to give RO the benefit of the doubt and cling to the age-old 'it's only Early Access' spiel...

RO is no longer protected by that moniker.

The game, in its current state, is simply not acceptable for a game that is now considred '1.0'. A fully released title that you can now buy physical copies for on the PS5. Oh, yeah, that also happened. A console release that really shouldn't have been the team's priority. The game is just as busted there too, though.

The game still lacks content. At the end of the day, most of your time will be spent building, and that is where most your fun will be spent. Once you actually start running trains? The problems begin to arise. The loop of simply running resources back and forth gets stale after a while. This wouldn't be too much of an issue if this wasn't all the game had to offer. The actual simulation and physics engine is still...inconsistent and lackluster. This game seems to advertise itself as a realistic depiction of American 3ft narrow gauge, but I don't see it. Sand is useless, seeing as there is no wheelslip mechanic. Their implementation of knuckle couplers was rushed and laughable. There's no real firing simulation. Customization of your engines and rolling stock is still very limited (How does the 8/18C 4-4-0 in this game NOT have anything for it besides the default Eureka appearance? This was a VERY prominent engine on the narrow gauge). The ability to actually build up your world is limited to default Unity assets that get repetitive, and more props are locked behind DLC (Some locos and rolling stock too). The maps themselves are...bland and empty. They feel so dead. There's numerous bugs that have been present since early access, yet still exist in the 'complete' version of the game. I can't even list them all here, but there is a forum thread in the discussions page that keeps getting updated...

I'm really just ranting at this point. I had high hopes for full release. I shouldn't have had so much faith. This is still an early access game hiding behind a '1.0' facade. This game also still runs terribly. I do not have a bad rig. I run a i9 and a 3080ti on my system, and I still struggle to maintain 60fps with modified settings. Performance has been a major issue since the shift to Unreal 5, and we're breaking two years since that happened.

I would tell you to hold off and wait for the developers to make things right, but we're going on near half a year without an update. They released 1.0, plus the console versions, and vanished. Complete radio silence since then. Absolutely typical, and I expected nothing less. Railroads Online used to take up so much of my time. I loved this game, and it had so much potential. The vision for this game died a long time ago. Now, I implore you all to simply wait for Century of Steam, which already looks so much more promising, and it's nowhere near complete.

At the very least, thanks for memories, RO. The good times were still good.

[UPDATED REVIEW POST 1.0 RELEASE] My initial review for Railroads Online was a mixture of positive praises for what the game offered, and constructive criticism on what I believed could be done better. Overall, seeing as that was written before the actual FULL release of the game, I was able to give RO the benefit of the doubt and cling to the age-old 'it's only Early Access' spiel... RO is no longer protected by that moniker. The game, in its current state, is simply not acceptable for a game that is now considred '1.0'. A fully released title that you can now buy physical copies for on the PS5. Oh, yeah, that also happened. A console release that really shouldn't have been the team's priority. The game is just as busted there too, though. The game still lacks content. At the end of the day, most of your time will be spent building, and that is where most your fun will be spent. Once you actually start running trains? The problems begin to arise. The loop of simply running resources back and forth gets stale after a while. This wouldn't be too much of an issue if this wasn't all the game had to offer. The actual simulation and physics engine is still...inconsistent and lackluster. This game seems to advertise itself as a realistic depiction of American 3ft narrow gauge, but I don't see it. Sand is useless, seeing as there is no wheelslip mechanic. Their implementation of knuckle couplers was rushed and laughable. There's no real firing simulation. Customization of your engines and rolling stock is still very limited (How does the 8/18C 4-4-0 in this game NOT have anything for it besides the default Eureka appearance? This was a VERY prominent engine on the narrow gauge). The ability to actually build up your world is limited to default Unity assets that get repetitive, and more props are locked behind DLC (Some locos and rolling stock too). The maps themselves are...bland and empty. They feel so dead. There's numerous bugs that have been present since early access, yet still exist in the 'complete' version of the game. I can't even list them all here, but there is a forum thread in the discussions page that keeps getting updated... I'm really just ranting at this point. I had high hopes for full release. I shouldn't have had so much faith. This is still an early access game hiding behind a '1.0' facade. This game also still runs terribly. I do not have a bad rig. I run a i9 and a 3080ti on my system, and I still struggle to maintain 60fps with modified settings. Performance has been a major issue since the shift to Unreal 5, and we're breaking two years since that happened. I would tell you to hold off and wait for the developers to make things right, but we're going on near half a year without an update. They released 1.0, plus the console versions, and vanished. Complete radio silence since then. Absolutely typical, and I expected nothing less. Railroads Online used to take up so much of my time. I loved this game, and it had so much potential. The vision for this game died a long time ago. Now, I implore you all to simply wait for Century of Steam, which already looks so much more promising, and it's nowhere near complete. At the very least, thanks for memories, RO. The good times were still good.