If you’re familiar with strategy game legend Sid Meier, you may have fond memories of one of his titles, Sid Meier’s Railroads! Well if you were wondering if it would ever be playable in the palm of your hand…now it can, courtesy of Feral Interactive.
Sid Meier’s Railroads! Is the third instalment of the Railroad Tycoon franchise, and the first to feature prolific PC game designer Sid Meier since its initial entry. It’s also arguably one of the most well-remembered and regarded strategy titles of the early 2000s, aside from Sid Meier’s Civilization series.
So it isn't a surprise that Feral Interactive would pick this title as their next adaptation for mobile, as strategy has been their genre of choice for adaptations. Having performed more technically impressive feats such as bringing Alien Isolation to smartphones, more recently the company has worked closely with companies such as Creative Assembly to release a number of entries from their Total War franchise to mobile.
Railroading players
Feral making another port is not surprising, as the developer has made its reputation with mobile versions of famous PC titles including Relic Entertainment's Company of Heroes. However, this latest release offers an insight into their business model, and a surprisingly retro monetisation model. Priced at $12.99, by all accounts a more-than fifteen year-old game should not see any success, but clearly Feral are hoping that Sid Meier’s impressive back-catalogue has its dedicated fans.
It could also be argued that, with the difficulty that can be found in running a game like this - and other titles Feral have ported (Rome: Total War) - on modern systems, that a mobile port may be one of the few stable ways fans can revisit these classics. In other words, Feral are clearly banking on there being enough Sid Meier fans on mobile, hankering to return to one of their favourite titles, to support this latest release.
Last month, a Socialpeta report examined the performance of the strategy genre on Google Play and the App Store.
