This week there were eight of us so we split into two tables and my group, which included Nige, Nicky and Guy, got to try out Age of Industry, Martin Wallace's streamlined version of Brass. I'm not going to compare the two as it's too long since I played Brass that I can't really remember enough to do such a comparison justice. However, Age of Industry is more straightforward in only having the one railway age and it is undoubtedly shorter. However, it still takes a lengthy time to play, especially with those who haven't played before or tend to ponder their moves quite a bit.

The game works and it all fits together logically but it is very dry and I found the endgame a bit anti-climactic as expansion became more difficult and people were tweaking their positions to add the odd point here and there before the cards ran out. I would definitely play the game again (and I would like to try a different approach next time) but it's not one that I am going to suggest that often, if at all.

In our four-player game on the Europe map, Nige piled on the debt early to get lots of industries out and eventually got to a position where he could repay and keep his engine going without worrying about debt (Clearly, that's a strong way to go). I took a more cautious approach to debt and got decent board position in the North West but got cut off from the rest of the Northern ports for quite a while. However, I had built up a decent rail network. Guy and Nicky seemed to struggle a bit with the debt but what we all hadn't factored into our debt management was the ability to pay off outstanding loans at the end of the game from our railway profits, hence we were probably too cautious in taking on debt. Nobody was surprised when Nige turned out to be the winner in a low-scoring game but it was fairly close with me coming in second.