Ticket to Ride: London

A fun addition to the franchise. You don't have many buses - so games go by fast. The addition of bonuses from connecting zones means this game isn't just a Ticket--to-Ride lite.

Being a fan of ticket to ride and have already played most versions (Europe mainly and own rails and sails) we wanted a quick version to be able to take on holiday.

Ticket to ride London is a really nice quick version of the game without loosing any of the game dynamics that we love.

Box is much smaller then rails and sails so perfect for taking away and having a game while the kids are in bed.

Would also recommend it to anyone who has never played ticket to ride before as a good gateway to wanting move versions.

Excellent short game and excellent service from Thirsty Meeples.

So I've played Ticket To Ride (USA, Europe, Switzerland) A LOT. Like more than 1500 plays a lot. So my approach to this game was certainly "Why have they made this? Does it do anything different or are they just cashing in on the franchise?". And after playing London about ten times I'm very happy to say my answers to those questions are "Because the TTR game concept is brilliant this is certainly a different take on it and it is a valid game even without all its siblings". All sceptical thoughts have been dispelled - this is a great game!

If you haven't played a Ticket To Ride game then let me introduce you to London!
The board is a map of (a famous bit of) London, showing iconic locations that are all connected by 'routes' of differing lengths and colours. You all start the game with a pile of coolio plastic buses, some coloured cards, and some secret destination tickets that by the end of the game you need to have connected together with your buses somehow. You spend your turns picking up more coloured cards in the hope of collecting sets, which you can then use on later turns to put your buses on the board with. The colour of the set you need must match the colour of the route you want to claim, with grey routes being claimable with any colour set. A critical addition is that there are special wild cards that can be any colour, giving you much greater flexibility in what cards you can play when. You can also decide to pick up more destination tickets! You score points for claiming routes on the board (with longer routes gaining more points), for completing your destination tickets (which are kept secret until the final scoring is tallied) and for possibly joining all the locations in specific areas on the board. However, you lose points for any destination tickets you have failed to complete! The game comes to an end when someone runs out of buses, so you need to keep an eye on everyone else!
So that's the 'dry mechanics' discussed, but TTR games are brilliant because of the interactions that emerge from these rules. Yes, you all have to collect cards to play your buses and yes, you all have to spend turns claiming routes to join your destinations. But oh ho ho can these things be done in interesting ways.. The board is small and tight and everybody's destinations will almost certainly overlap, so you're going to get in each other's way. You *want* to get in each other's way! You want to make your destinations as easy to connect as possible, and cause as much havoc for your opponents as possible! Sometimes you want to finish quickly before everyone else is done but sometimes you want to do as may tickets as possible. And this is the crux of why I love TTR games. You need to somehow disguise where you are going, figure out where other people are going, finish as quick as possible, be as obstructive as possible, and yet somehow still complete your destinations. There's a lot to think about. The game is constantly giving you difficult choices such as "Should I claim that route right now and use a wild card, or have I got time to try and collect the colour I need to save that wild card for when I *really* need it?", "Do I really need that route, or if someone else takes it can I go another way?", "Oh dear, since someone just took that route I needed, where do my cards let me re-route now? How screwed am I?", "What? Someone just took two more tickets?! Does that now mean even if I complete all my tickets I still won't have enough points to win, or have they already failed some tickets and were trying some disaster-recovery by getting some new tickets they *can* complete?", "Should I try and finish quick because we're all running out of buses or have I got time to get more tickets and still complete them?", etc etc.
There are definitely different ways to play TTR. I play with my children (4 and 8) and we all just get tickets and try and complete them, and it's pretty obvious where everyone is trying to go - it's just fun getting cards and placing buses! And at the other end of the scale it can be a ruthless game of efficiency, deception and screwing-over, where timing is everything. There is risk-management in the timing of route-claiming and in set collecting. It's a game that just doesn't get old for me. If you wonder what all this Ticket To Ride fuss is about then London is a brilliant introduction. It's really quick to play, looks lovely, doesn't take much space, comes in a small-ish box and is fun with all player counts. It also (from my 10ish plays) doesn't seem to have an obvious way to win each time. We have had victories from getting loads of tickets, finishing super-fast with the long routes and winning by completing the 'region' bonuses. So I can see lots of longevity in this one.

If you have played Ticket To Ride (of some flavour) read this!
London is different. I haven't played New York which seems to be closest, but this compares favourably to TTR, Europe and Switzerland. I guess it is most...

This game behaves like a smaller, shorter version of the Ticket to Ride main titles, it is very easy to learn even for very casual gamers, and have the nice touch of its 60's-70's London setting. Double-decker buses instead of trains, cards referencing songs of that time, and of course the map with London highlights. If you want a travel version of Ticket to Ride played in about 30 minutes, or even if you just want a nice gaming souvenir from London, this is your choice.