To start building a transport empire, the player must construct transport routes, consisting of stations near industries or towns, and in the case of trains or road vehicles, physical routes. One transport route can utilize several different forms of transport, e.g. truck-ship-train. The player's company and the individual stations each have ratings that depend largely on the efficiency of moving goods from one stations to the other. Higher ratings then attract more goods to a station.

The other necessary components of a transport network are the vehicles themselves, built at appropriate depots, which must be connected to the road or rail networks. Towns and cities have their own road networks, but extra roads may be needed to connect them to other towns, or to various resources.

Once a resource or passenger is picked up at one station, then delivered to another station, near to where there is demand (a town, for example, demands passengers) a profit is awarded to the player. The amount awarded depends on the delivery time, distance, and amount delivered. How important each factor is depends on the type of goods being delivered.

At times, subsidies are offered for delivery of one resource between two particular places, and the first company to do so is awarded a subsidy for a certain period for that route, giving them extra profits on that route. This encourages the player to create a larger more complex transport network, rather than simply improving on previously profitable routes.

One concept which is designed to stop players from mutilating the landscape or the towns is that of the Local Authority. Each city has a rating for each transport company, and if this is too low, it will prevent the player from blowing up houses, or constructing stations. This value is affected by the level of service, the destruction of trees, etc.

Over time, cities develop and expand according to economic factors and new industries or other resource sites appear. Some natural resources are eventually exhausted and industries without transport service may shut down. Also, new, improved vehicles are introduced and eventually replace older models.


One major weakness of the game is the woeful artificial intelligence which is incapable of constructing sane networks, and often destroys the landscape of a game by leveling mountains (which costs it nothing, nor lowers its local authority rating) in its attempt to connect two railheads.


The original game often has difficulties running on modern systems, one way to overcome this is through OpenTTD, which also allows play on Mac and Linux (besides the standard Windows).

• Wikipedia entry