"This here engine's been in the family for 100 years!" Dust stirs in the old station as Mr. Wallace, your neighbour, paces through the neglected space telling you about the train that stands there. He pops a reddish-orange copperberry in his mouth. "Copperberry?"

"Sure," you say, taking one from his overflowing basket.

There's bushes and bushes of them just outside the train station. More than old Mr. Wallace can eat that's for sure. More than you can eat too.

"It still runs!" Mr. Wallace says. "Boy I'd sure love to start up the ol' train company again. But without someone like you to do the driving I just wouldn't be able to do it."

"Are you sure this thing still runs?" you ask, gesturing to the train. It’s covered in cobwebs and dust, like the rest of the station.

"Well yeah, I think so at least." His voice is weathered from years of being young, and then many years of being less young. "To be honest, I haven't started it up for 20 years. It hasn't hauled anything proper for probably 50." A lot of time has passed since he last thought about it, it seems. "Yeah maybe it doesn't run. I don't know. I used to take it for a ride with my daughter every Christmas before she moved out to the mainland."

"Well we could give it a shot now. Might be my only chance to see it," you tell him. You're planning to move out to the mainland next month to start a new job at Corpo-corp Company. Exciting stuff, medium amounts of money in return for hopefully a lifetime of waiting for retirement.

Mr. Wallace's eyes light up. "You'd help me get it going? I'd love to see it drive again."

"I can try," you say.

You did a science fair stand about steam engines back in elementary school. How different could this be?

4 hours later...

"SHE'S A BEAUT!" Mr. Wallace yells over the roar of the fire, boiling water, and steam exhaust hissing from the old train engine. "WANNA TAKE HER FOR A SPIN?"

"YES!"

"WHAT?"

"YES I DO!"

"WHAT???"

You nod your head profusely, and climb up into the train. It's a lot quieter in the cabin. Mr. Wallace passes you the little basket of copperberries. "Bring these to Carl down the tracks will you? He's got quite the appetite! I wish I could send these more often."

"Will do Mr. Wallace." Mr. Wallace steps off the train and you head out onto the weathered old tracks. You smile as the chugga chugga of the piston firing up fills you with determination.

Poking your head out the window you look back to see Mr. Wallace beaming bigger than you've ever seen him smile. He holds his arm up and tugs on an imaginary cord. You pull on the real one, and your train lets out a playful little whistle.

Growing further into the distance you see Mr. Wallace clap his hands together with a big shrug of satisfaction and he yells out, "Toot toot!". Your own smile can't stop growing. You look forward and watch the tracks go by, imagining a life where this is how you spend your days, rather than in the big city, working for yet another Corpo-corp in a sea of Corpo-corps.

Maybe this could be what you do next? Start up a little train company with old Mr. Wallace.

You give the cord another tug, and hear an echo of another joyful, "Toot toot!" from a dusty old train station far behind you.

Just maybe.

Hello!

I'm Cameron and I've always dreamed of making my own game, and with my recent exit from my own Corpo-corp, I get a shot at it. And I'm not alone! Spencer and I are teaming up to make this little train game a reality.

I had an old “Train Game” prototype on the shelf for a little while. And now, between the two of us, we are re-imagining the game and the stories in it from the ground up. We want to drive a playful little train. We want to make friends, and help them out with our little train company. And we want to share that game with you! Everything is very early still, but we're excited about this project and can't wait to show you more.

Until then, I hope this little story of old Mr. Wallace at the train station fills you with determination like it does for us. We're making a game!

Toot toot!

Cameron

P.S. if you want to follow along with development. Stop by our Discord server! We're posting screenshots and updates there more than on our other socials. If you prefer though, links to all our socials are on our website! :) See you around the tracks...