The internet may be full of communists today, but the Russian Revolution was not what the kids call a good time. The Bolsheviks eventually won, but there were a lot of other factions. You had your White Russians (distinct from what The Dude drinks), you had the Allies intervening to try and stop the communists, including some Americans, and, of course, the leftists had splintered because that’s what leftists always do. Because Russia collapsed during World War I, there were also some guys that had been fighting with the Russian government that existed but didn’t exist anymore and kinda just wanted to go home but …well, it’s complicated. Because of the whole “Russian Civil War” thing, these guys, the Czech Legion, wound up having to go all the way across Russia on the Trans-Siberian railroad on…the last train home (cue the hooting and cheering like a Marvel audience because I said the name of the movie) to the port of Vladivostok, whereupon they’d sail most of the way around the world to, hopefully, get home.
Last Train Home
Developer: Ashborne Games
Price: $40
Platform: PC
MonsterVine was supplied with Steam code for review
You may be shocked that I am reviewing a real-time tactics game about an obscure episode at the end of World War I/during the Russian Revolution. This is the kind of game with “immersive” options in the audio menu using the various actual languages of the people involved. Sure, there’s combat. It’s lethal as all hell. We’re talking 1919 combat. Bolt action rifles and machine guns and, uh, bandages. You wind up in a firefight and your guys get hit, they’re probably dead if your medics aren’t quick. That’s where the “tactics” come in because you’ve only got a few dudes, it’s a long way to Vladivostok, and there’s a whole lot of Russians. But if you’re smart, if you’re clever, and if you use terrain, cover, and overwhelming firepower when the opportunity presents itself, you might be able to pull this off.
That’s not the point, though. You’ve got a train (like in the title!) with a few people who really want to get home. And–trigger warning for internet communists–a lot of Russians, mainly communists, really want to kill your dudes. So it’s not so much about the combat as the management. Remember, you’re in the middle of hostile territory, surrounded by a lot of people who aren’t fond of you, with…some cloth bandages and some medics and that’s about it, so if you get shot up, you better get those wounds covered, or they’re dead and that’s the ballgame for them.
And then there’s ammo. Do you have enough of that? Maybe there’s some you can scrounge on the map. And then there’s the train. The train itself is a mechanical contraption that needs fuel and requires repair and someone has to run it, and various people on the train are good at that, so you may not want them out getting shot by communists. Those people need food, too, so maybe you need them to scrounge for that, but your scouts that are great in combat are also good at scouting for food as well…but if they’re off hunting for wascawwy wabbits or fishing, they won’t be available to let the commies hit the flooooooor. What do you do? You also want to keep up morale and let people rest, but then again, it’s entirely fair to be depressed when you’re stuck on a train rattling along a rickety railroad surrounded by communists trying to kill you. What do you do? Doing more rummaging on the map might mean more supplies, more fuel, and more ammo, but it also might mean running into a communist patrol. What do you do?
So the combat is good, the squad management is good, and setting an ambush with a handful of troops and watching it play out perfectly is the real deal…but that’s not even the point. The point is herding your Czechs through the Russian Revolution, carefully leveling them up and picking their jobs, deciding what they do, hoping they don’t die, and cringing when they do because not only did you lose your best medic, you lost your best train fixer and now everyone’s depressed and the train’s broken again. And that’s what games are all about: Everything being depressing and broken while you’re surrounded by hostiles and communists, just like Twitter.
The Final Word
Come on ride the depressing train (WOO WOO!)
– MonsterVine Rating: 4 out of 5 – Good
