Toy Trains’ Free ‘Infinite Loop’ Replace Evaluate

TL;DR for Toy Trains
(performed on a Meta Quest 3 128 GB mannequin)

Toy Trains builders Something Random just lately launched their “Infinite Loop” replace and we’ve bought some ideas about it!

In the event you’re unfamiliar with the sport, then first take a look at our previous review of Toy Trains the place we praised it for its charming aesthetic and unpretentious artistry; for its finely coordinated use of rating, theme, setting, and perspective to amplify its enjoyable (if maybe considerably unchallenging) gameplay.

However our largest situation with Toy Trains’ first impression? Coming in at round three hours of play, there simply wasn’t sufficient sport. Nicely, the Infinite Loop replace addresses precisely that! There may be now way more sport, certainly.

The place there have been beforehand solely ten ranges (with about eight of them feeling like an prolonged tutorial) there are actually a further twelve—way more difficult—ranges to sort out!

This huge (and free!) replace additionally comes with new instruments that streamline the artistic course of: As a substitute of grabbing one by one out of your catalogue of railroad items, now you can basically paint with them; dragging them throughout the terrain to seamlessly place down many without delay. Fortunately, you may as well erase these items in a lot the identical press-and-drag approach.

So expressing your creativity fluidly now comes sooner; a helpful counterweight to this replace’s more durable puzzles.

Positive, it’s enjoyable—in a manic kind of approach—to frantically snatch items off the desk and toss them over your shoulder when it comes time to make main alterations to your railroad. However it could generally get tedious. Having the ability to easily erase (or assemble) giant parts of railway abruptly provides you the liberty to extra rapidly strive one thing out, fail, and check out once more. This means to on-the-fly see what works and what doesn’t means much less psychological effort to visualise your railroad ten steps forward of really constructing it.

And if that’s nonetheless not creatively satisfying sufficient for you, they’ve additionally added a sandbox mode, permitting you to make your personal maps to choo-choo your approach through-through.

An sudden deal with, the limitless artistic modularity of the sandbox mode is—I think about—the namesake for the “Infinite Loop” replace. Actually, there got here some extent once I needed to admit that I used to be approach past billable hours as a reviewer, however stored taking part in as a result of I nonetheless wished to see what kinds of worlds—stuffed with what kinds of obstacles—I may make for myself to then traverse and overcome.

The infinite Loop replace makes Toy Trains the whole lot I had wished it could be throughout my first playthrough (plus an additional sandbox for good measure!)

However even with all of this fulfilling of unstated guarantees, the sport remains to be not with out its drawbacks.

Whereas the usage of a list of railroad items as the first menu is extra diegetically satisfying—I’m extra totally invited to occupy the residing perspective of somebody truly making mannequin railroads of their basement—it’s simply too sparse.

Sure, it’s charming to have a bodily guide with an in-world cause to exist as my foremost menu system. However it feels as if that artistic alternative is by some means associated to its lack of performance. 

It’s just like the builders had the sense that the extra strong the choices throughout the menu, the much less it could really feel like a toy catalogue. And whereas there’s an aesthetic enchantment to that alternative, it may be irritating once you’re caught looking for choices which might be customary to most trendy VR experiences, but conspicuously lacking from this one.

Sarcastically this give attention to immersion over performance truly leaves me feeling much less immersed, as I’ve to spend my time and a focus groping round in useless for an choice that ought to exist, however doesn’t.  

I imply, the beginning button (a minimum of on the Meta Quest 3) is actually unbound to any motion because the “menu” is at all times current. As such I’d typically discover myself fruitlessly urgent begin to try to alter the desk peak (which steadily spawns incorrectly), re-center myself, or flip off snap-move. Sadly, there are merely no such choices.

Furthermore, the “Infinite” nature of the replace turns into much more finite with none approach of sharing customized ranges. The addition of some kind of hub to browse player-created content material could be a welcome one.

Maybe with that addition, One thing Random may additionally add a solution to differentiate between “taking part in” and “making” customized ranges. For the second, that lack of differentiation can result in by chance modifying or deleting elements of your map, once you had been solely attempting to have an effect on your monitor. That is particularly harmful with the brand new drag-to-erase instrument.

Different, smaller issues persist: The English translation remains to be not nice (strive studying the again cowl of {the catalogue} and also you’ll see what I imply). And the physics behind snapping prepare vehicles to your caboose will get fairly janky after two or three.

Nonetheless, the Infinite Loop replace takes Toy Trains firmly out of the class of a pretty-if-too-short sport for teenagers and into the class of a full-fledged, difficult, puzzle-sandbox VR romp.

And on the unbeatable worth of free, Toy Trains: Infinite Loop Replace will get an 8/10.

Scoring & Rubric

Scores are out of 10, wright here 10 is a masterpiece, 1 is unplayable, and 5 is simply common.
Gameplay has a heavier weighting within the general rating.

Gameplay – 8
Immersion – 8
Visuals – 9
Sound – 8
Efficiency – 8
Replayability – 7

Picture credit score: One thing Random / Toy Trains VR / Auganix