In Metro, the players (2-8) take turns placing tiles to complete train track lines that connect to their stations, which will award points based on their length. At the beginning of a player's turn, he will be shown the tile he can place for that turn. The game ends when the board is full.
A player gets points for each tile their track touches (and gets points if the track loops back through the same tile). If your track ends at one of the center stations, you are awarded double points (keep in mind, none of the center stations belong to players, and nobody is awarded points for tracks that leave the center stations).
Stations are distributed clockwise and in order, starting with the station in the upper left hand corner on the north wall For example: If your game has three players, the first station belongs to player one. The next one (to the right of the first one) belongs to player two, the next belongs to player three, and the next belongs to player one again. This pattern loops all the way around the board until all the stations are assigned. Make sure you pay attention to which stations belong to whom! Keep in mind, you get points for tracks LEAVING your station, not ENTERING your station.
To play this game, you will enter commands (as listed below) into the Console to interact with the game. The Console will give some information, like the current players turn, and will inform you if you have made an illegal placement.
You have the option to use a graphical user interface or a text user interface (switching explained below). By default the game uses the graphical UI, but if you use the text UI, there are different ways to read the board a tiles: Tiles are displayed as squares with numbers on the edges, where corresponding numbers connect. For example:
34
3 2
4 1
21
In this tile, the 3 connects to the other 3, the 4 to the other 4, and so on.
All information for the game while using the text UI will be displayed in the console
Stations are set up the same in the tui, and the letters DO NOT show which player owns them, but simply their
input and output lanes:
A is an outgoing lane, B is incoming
D is an outgoing lane, C is incoming
E is an outgoing lane, F is incoming
H is an outgoing lane, G is incoming
Use the following commands to play the game:
At the beginning of the game, you will be asked to enter players. Enter each one (2-8) and when you have entered all the players you wish to play with, use the command "Done," and the game will start.
place(x, y) This places the tile you have available to place at the given x and y position which may range from 1 to 12 You cannot place a tile somewhere where a score of one will be returned unless that tile can't be placed anywhere else
commit After placing a tile, you must commit your decision to end your turn
remove If dissatisfied with your tile placement, the remove command will remove it and allow you to place it somewhere else
resign If you give up and just want to quit, type resign and your score will become zero and the game will end
save This will allow you to save a game part way through to load later If you want to be able to load that game, you MUST enter the names of the same people who played in the saved game in the order that you entered them the first time (find the .txt file in the game's folder if you don't remember). If done successfully you will be asked if you want to load your previous game, at which point you may answer "yes" or "no"
tui This will allow you to switch from a graphical UI to a text based one which is printed out in the console
The text UI has a few extra commands:
display player
Displays the current player
display score
Displays the current scores
display board
Displays the current board
display tile
Displays the current tile
gui
Will switch back to the graphical UI