East Portland Tabletop Arcade: CHOO CHOO (Hobby games at the Midland Library)

The next East Portland Tabletop Arcade will meet on Sunday, August 2nd, 2026, from 1:00 to 5:00 PM in Community Room 1F of the Midland branch of the Multnomah County Library. I've been choosing a broad theme each month and bringing a few selections in that vein to have available. Playing these is hardly mandatory, of course - I'll have a number of other games with me, and I hope that anyone who attends will feel free to bring stuff that they're interested in getting to the table. For July, the theme is CHOO CHOO, and I'll be bringing several railroad-themed games:

CHICAGO EXPRESS (Bohrer, 2007, 3-5 players, medium complexity): In Chicago Express, the B&O, C&O, Pennsylvania and New York Central railroads drive from the East Coast across the growing eastern U.S. to Chicago. Smaller, more aggressive railroads like the Wabash spring up to further expand America's extensive railroads. The sharpest railroad executives vie for the maximum return on their investment in this luck-free business game lasting about one hour.

NORTHERN PACIFIC (Holland, 2013, 3-6 players, low complexity): Northern Pacific is a luck-free railroad-building game that lasts about twenty minutes. Players start the game with one large investment cube and three small investment cubes in hand. The game board shows the United States from Minnesota to Washington. On a turn, a player either places one of their cubes in a city (other than Seattle) that hasn't yet been reached by the train or builds track. If they build track, they choose one of the railroad lines exiting the city where the train is currently located and place a locomotive on it to show the current endpoint of the railroad line. When the railroad visits a city where players have placed investment cubes, they retrieve those cubes and take additional cubes from the supply. When the railroad reaches Seattle, the round ends. Players tally the number of cubes in hand and records this number on the "good investments" track; they record the number of their cubes still on the game board on the "bad investments" track. They then reset the board as at the start of the game, then begin a new round. After three rounds, whoever has made the most good investments wins!

TICKET TO RIDE: NORDIC COUNTRIES (Moon, 2007, 2-3 players, low complexity): Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries takes you on a Nordic adventure through Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden as you travel to the great northern cities of Copenhagen, Oslo, Helsinki, and Stockholm. The goal in "Nordic" remains the same as base Ticket to Ride: collect and play cards to place your trains on the board, attempting to connect the different cities on your ticket cards. Unlike the USA or Europe maps, Nordic is designed for 2-3 players only and has a heavier focus on blocking your opponent and more aggressive play.