Free Ride, another beautiful game by Friedemann Friese, designer of High Voltage and Vrijdag, takes us to the Golden Age of Railways in Europe. Around the end of the 19th century, a growing network of railway lines was built in Europe. This allowed people to travel to the big cities to visit beautiful buildings influenced by Art Nouveau and historicism.
In Free Ride you are responsible for building the railway lines that will connect the major cities of Europe. Then you move your train along the growing rail
network to transport passengers to visit the famous structures in these cities. Moving your train along your railway lines and state railway lines is free. If you use railway lines owned by your fellow players, you must pay them, which converts their lines into state railways.
To pick up passengers, you can choose from an open view of city maps that show different passenger travel routes. Move your train to one of the cities in the picture and choose that itinerary by picking up this starting city map along with the destination city map. When your train arrives at its destination, complete this itinerary and receive victory points for both cards at the end of the game. Initially you can only provide one itinerary. Your train will later be able to carry two itineraries at the same time and travel faster over the rail network.
The goal of Free Ride is to visit as many different cities in Europe as possible.