It's supply and demand, and I'm getting everything I want. This is something economists would no doubt be delighted to hear - to an economist everything is economics - but urban planning really is. You're an economist in these games, is what I'm not-so-subtly implying. but naturally, like with Motorways, the randomness of what station appears where, where people appear and what they want, is the challenge. Every line should ideally have access to every type of stop - circle, triangle, square, diamond, star, curvy diamond thingy, etc. In Metros it's diversification, egalitarianism. You want one big motorway going from all the blue houses to all the blue factories, if you can, with minimal interference from the greens who want to go somewhere else. In Motorways it's about specification, and division of labour. The limits here are the number of different lines.īut the real difference is strategy. Twenty real-world cities to design subways for (London, New York City, Paris, Berlin, Melbourne, Hong Kong, Osaka, Saint Petersburg, Montral, San Francisco. Nowhere is a beginning or an end, for that reason - every station both origin and destination - and a Metro line can technically have infinite length, as opposed to the limited roads of Motorways. Rather than going from houses to offices or factories, the little people of this world appear as shapes at stations, which must get to other stations of the corresponding shape. The concept is the same, just with lots of little, structural differences. or Tokyo, but the Euro-starkness of Metro is a fine replacement. If you're like me, you might have come to Mini Metro backwards, via the also-special Mini Motorways, Dinosaur Polo Club's follow-up urban planner that's been on Arcade for a little while already. Bringing it to the subscription service is a sign Apple gets it. It's what Apple Arcade is all about, selling mobile gaming as something more than a vehicle for toilet-break microtransactions (cleverclogs will tell you it always has been, if you knew where to look, but the volume of guff does make that old attitude forgivable). This is the mobile game, simple and clear and immaculately well-suited to the platform.
This is why subway maps make for a perfect video game, and Mini Metro - now Mini Metro+, with a few enhancements made to it for its arrival on Apple Arcade - is the perfect example. Compared to every other kind of public transport map, a tube map is as simple to look at - but it has to have been made by a genius. You know the sort - made of wood, a bit tactile, and always passively educational, the kind designed by friendly faces in white coats that do want you to have fun, but also develop very specific parts of your brain while you're doing it. I look at London's tube map and see a kind of Scandi children's toy. Much of it is just in the looks: the minimalism and the weirdly playful colours. Here, the passenger numbers are automatically decreased when things get hectic, meaning that you cannot lose.There's a special elegance to subway maps.
Do you build more lines, bridges or add stations, to keep the city happy? It is harder than you think! Dinosaur Polo Club have a great record of providing updates for Mini Metro, along with game tweaks and even an ‘endless’ mode. However, to access the vintage maps, you must deliver 1,000 passengers on the original map of the three cities. I forget whether this was what worked, but my main technique was to keep the line with the tunnel very short, as it's the bottleneck, and have longer lines joining it at multiple points, both sides of the Thames river. Paris, 1937: In contrast to the sleek modern design, the elegant Seine dances through Paris in this pre-war map. Kind of lame, but try restarting a handful of times until you get a good starting config.New York City, 1972: Inspired by the iconic London map, Massimo Vignelli produced this modernist interpretation of the MTA.London, 1960: Nearly 30 years since his revolutionary first map, Harry Beck created his last vision of the underground in 1960.
The new updates are free and also feature sound effects.
Its visual elegance combines with fast, real-time puzzles to provide an addictive gameplay format. Released on iOS in 2016 to positive reviews, the game has a beautiful, minimalist look which is well suited to iPhone and iPad usage. Is your subway system going to grind to a halt, or can you keep it on track? The new map updates are quite a reward for your efforts! So, subway queues mean you lose! Redesign your network as the city grows with tracks and tunnels but beware, you only have limited resources. Your ability to design an efficient travel structure will influence passenger movement and train traffic.
Plan and draw new train lines, connect stations, get carriages moving and keep the population happy. Mini Metro (iOS, $4.99 – App Store) is a strategy simulation game from Dinosaur Polo Club, where you must design subway maps to keep a busy city moving.