Introduction

Ticket To Ride: Nordic Countries is the most recent US release of the Ticket To Ride franchise. My family has only played the US Version, despite owning the Swiss expansion and the Marklin edition. Because of that, we were not familiar with the tunnel rules or the ferry rules that are present in TTR: Nordic.

Ticket To Ride: Nordic Countries is a version of Ticket To Ride that plays well with two or three players. Three players are the maximum number that can play.

Components

The game comes in the standard sized Ticket To Ride box, complete with a plastic insert that will separate all your components nicely for storage.



There are three sets of trains in Nordic colors like white and purple, and the black of a winter night.



I like the colors of the trains as they add to the experience of railing through the arctic reaches of Scandinavia.

The cards are all 1910 sized cards which make them much easier to handle than the cards that come with the base Ticket To Ride. There is snow on the cars to add to the whole theme.



In addition there are more route cards than in the US game. The routes are shorter and worth less points, but give the game a bit more emphasis on route completion.

The map, like all other Ticket To Ride maps is sturdy and beautiful.



There is one long link on the map with nine spaces to achieve it! Most of the links are shorter in the one to three space range. There are also several tunnels and ferry routes.

The rulebook is standard Ticket To Ride fare. It is well written and provides several examples to aid in understanding. Days of Wonder has yet to disappoint me with one of their rulebooks.

Gameplay

This review is written assuming that you have played one of the Ticket To Ride games. Thus, I will not explain the basic mechanics of play but rather the exceptions from the normal mechanics of Ticket To Ride.

The first difference comes in drawing of destination tickets. You draw five and keep at least two. This is two more than the standard Ticket To Ride. Like I said before, most of the links in this game are fairly short as are the routes on the destination tickets. An average game can see someone completing seven or eight tickets.

Then there are the wild cards or the locomotive cards. The locomotive cards can be draw like any other card from the face up cards. There is no longer a restriction on how many you can pick up. Both cards you pick up could be locomotives.

Locomotives cannot, however, be used to complete normal links. If a link requires four white cards it requires four white cards and not three white cards and a locomotive. Locomotives are used in completing tunnels and ferry links, however.

For ferry links, one or more of the spaces on the link will have a train symbol on it. For each of those symbols you will need one locomotive card. So, for example, if there is a ferry route that is three white spaces and one of them has a train symbol on it, it would require two white cards and a locomotive card.

Tunnel routes are played like normal routes except that you may use a locomotive. After you have played all of your cards to place the route, three additional cards are drawn. If any of those cards are a locomotive or the color of the route being played you have to play extra cards or forfeit placing that link that turn.

Then there is the nine space link towards the top of the map. This one can be played numerous ways. You can play nine cards all of the same color to claim the twenty-seven point monster. If you have only eight of the cards you could play 8 cards of the same color and any four cards from your hand. Likewise you could play 7 cards of the same color and 8 cards from your hand. It keeps going from there.


Conclusions

I have played this both two and three player with my family. My wife and I play it and it is just as cut throat if not moreso than when we add my daughter to the mix. The short routes towards the bottom of the map make for a lot of jockeying early on for the best routes through tight areas. I found this version to be more fun than the original Ticket To Ride for that reason.

I am also taking Tom Vassel's advice about storing Ticket To Ride Switzerland with this game. By adding the board and cards for Ticket To Ride Switzerland to the box you can play either game without dragging out a base set like USA or Europe.


Note: Pics are from Boardgamegeek contributors and are not my own. Many thanks to these people for sharing their work on the Geek.