Need some help with the game? Check out our Subway Scramble tips and walkthrough!
In Subway Scramble, you play the savior to the subway traffic congestion problems of 5 major world cities! The task seems daunting at first, especially since there isn’t a heck of a lot of instruction or strategy suggestions for playing the game itself. But after a while you will get used to the mechanics of the game (no pun intended), and you’re on your way to solving the world’s mass transit crises.
The object of the game seems simple: use the 3-car trains to deliver passengers of varying colors to their respective colored station. You move your trains by clicking on either end car of the train according to which direction you want it to move on the track. When you drop off a passenger to his color station, you pick up the next one waiting in line for the car where the passenger was dropped off. If other cars have passengers that are not the same color as the platform, they remain. If you are able to deliver 2 passengers of the same color to their station, you will get a bonus and about 5 people waiting on the platform will disappear and give you bonus points for the drop-off. If you deliver 3 passengers of the same color, all people waiting on the platform will disappear and each gives you bonus points, plus your car will be clear to pick up new passengers from the next platform you visit.
The bonus points don’t stop there – every now and then bonuses will magically appear floating along the track, and running into them will give you 100 or 200 bonus points. Also, if you see any rats, running into them will give you 100 points for the first one, and grow with each rat you run over (I like saying, “run over” rather than “collect,” gives this game an edge, hah). Rats of course are only on the New York levels: these bonus items change depending on the city you are in. In London it’s the underground hit record, in Paris it’s stolen paintings, in Moscow it’s “dropped” rubles (as in, money on the street?) and in Seoul it’s lost cell phones!
Sometimes along the track you’ll see other useful items, such as a “paint can”… what this does is changes the colors of all your passengers to the color of the paint can. This is nice to do especially for those 3-car bonuses. However make sure you actually have passengers in the cars… the paint can will only change the color of the car if it has a passenger in it. Another item of interest is the lightning bolt, which will speed up all of your trains for a short duration.
You can also control the signals at a platform, changing it from red (stop) to green (go). This is useful when you want to maximize your color combinations, and you want to skip over a station to be able to pick up a key passenger to form a 3-car combo.
Of course being in control of the world’s subway systems is not without its risks. You have a Crash Limit of 5-7 crashes per level, indicated in the upper right hand corner of the screen. Once you’ve hit the limit the game is over. Also, some levels have switches that change the direction of your tracks, with up to 4 different combinations. You can also crash your train into a dead end track that you forgot to switch back (there are some dead-ends that are safe, they are marked with yellow and black stripes). Also, as the level progresses, passengers continue to pile into each station, and at some point you will get a “Full Station Warning” which basically means you need to alleviate the crowded station or else it’s game over.
There are two options for game play: “Around the World” and “Rush Hour (Easy-Medium-Hard).” In the “Around the World” version of the game, you complete levels by delivering a certain number of passengers. Even though there is no set time limit, you do still have to worry about station overcrowding. You have the ability to earn up to 3 tokens per level: the first is the “level” token, awarded when you complete a level; the second is the “expert” token if you obtain an expert score as indicated; and the third is the “safety” token when you complete a level with no crashes. Collecting enough tokens will give you access to a new city, which at the start of the game will be marked with a “lock” symbol (except for New York). At first you will be able to get by with just obtaining the level token, but eventually you’ll find that you’ll need to make sure you can get the safety and expert tokens on the easier levels to gain access to new cities.
In the “Rush Hour” version of the game, you must deliver all passengers in a set time period. There seems to be only a finite set of boards here, and the only difference I see between easy, medium and hard levels is the initial time period is shorter.
This game, while looking pretty simple on the surface, is actually quite challenging – especially when trying to obtain expert tokens, because it becomes crucial that you get as many 3-car combos as possible to maximize your score. Not only that, it is more beneficial to get a 3-car combo at a more crowded station, since ALL people at that station will count as bonus points. The more people, the more points – it’s as simple as that. Also making sure you get as many extra bonuses as possible helps tremendously, especially the collectible items, since their value goes up by 100 points per collection. When not trying to obtain an expert score, you should definitely be aiming to get a safety token. There are a few levels where it’s easier to obtain an expert token than a safety token!
At first I wasn’t all that excited about Subway Scramble, but now I can’t seem to stop playing it! You can replay any level you want to try to beat your high score at any time. The music is also really well done, and even though it’s playing in a loop you don’t always feel like it’s terribly repetitive. It’s definitely a game you can either play for a short break in your day, or spend long afternoons while it’s raining outside.
Special thanks to Kirem Weers and PlayFirst for providing the full version of the game.
