Mass Transit is a cooperative game all about helping commuters make their way home after work!
How Do You Play?
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On their turn, players will play two cards. They can either play them onto a meeple’s commuting route, or they can discard the card to help the meeple make their way home.
Cards played on the commuting route build out the roads, canals, and rails, with some cards like yellow cards, causing delays along the way. Throughout the game as you draw to replenish your hands, you’ll draw the suburb cards the commuters are trying to get home to. These will need to be played along the routes of each commuter.
To move the commuters towards their destination, you’ll discard cards that match the station the commuter is currently on (gray for gray bus routes, blue for blue ferry routes, red for red train routes) or discard green walk cards to walk to the next card or change stations.
You win the game by getting all 6 commuters home before the deck runs out and players can no longer play 2 cards on their turn.
Watch a quick video of this game being played on our Instagram!
What Do We Think?
Mass Transit was a surprisingly addicting game. Unassuming in its appearance, we have been playing it pretty much nonstop since we opened the box.
I love this style of game because it is the perfect game to grab and play when you are wanting to fill 10 minutes or so — such as while waiting for dinner to cook! It’s been living on our kitchen counter and I’m not mad about it.
While it is simple to teach and play, Mass Transit still provides a very tricky puzzle for everyone to solve. Though cooperative, you aren’t really allowed to discuss what cards are in your hand. This means that you could have just drawn the perfect card to complete a route but then your fellow player was required to place a card that messes up your plans so you have to change course. You are allowed to say vague things though. Often we found ourselves laughing as someone would say “Wow, what a lovely route for someone to take the bus home with, don’t you think?”
And of course, the more we played, the better we became at knowing how and when to use our cards so even less talking was required!
There’s for sure a random element to the game as with anything that deals with cards being shuffled and drawn randomly. This just adds to the challenge of it all. If you draw a whole bunch of yellow traffic stop cards first and can’t find your suburb till the bottom of the deck, odds are high you’ll lose. But thankfully, Mass Transit plays quickly so you’ll have plenty of time to shuffle up and try again.
We all really enjoyed the puzzle. We’ve currently lost more games than we’ve won, but all agree we’re getting much better. We get close to winning most games which, in a puzzle game like this, feels really satisfying. For any fans of solo games, this is another great option as the rules remain the same for solo play!
Summary
Mass Transit is a lovely and simple small box game. I think this is a great game, (and theme!) for anyone looking for a quick game with a small footprint to can take with them on their travels. Fun to play with anyone, or on your own!
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A special thank you to our friends at Calliope Games for sending us this copy of Mass Transit for review. As always, our thoughts and opinions are our own.
Game Info:
Title: Mass Transit
Players: 1-6 Ages: 8+
Designer: Chris Leder, Kevin Rodgers
Artist: Mark Quire
Publisher: Calliope Games
