Mark Ellis: Train Bridge Inspector is a free game about dubious construction

Mark Ellis

In any given situation, there's a game jam for that. There's probably even a game jam about whether something is a game jam or not. There's definitely a game jam about trains. It's called Train Jam, and it asks its participants to spend 52 hours making a game on a train.

Mark Ellis: Train Bridge Inspector is just one of the many games to come out of this process. Made by Adriaan de Jongh and Vlambeer's Rami Ismail, it casts you as Mark Ellis, the titular Train Bridge Inspector.

Your job is to assess a procedurally generated bridge, and determine whether a train can safely make it across. Whatever you pick, the train will make an attempt—leaving you free to watch a massive disaster while smugly revelling in the fact you warned against it.

The bridge is unstable more often than not. Really, the question is whether it'll collapse before or after the train has made it across. Still, it's plenty entertaining for a game in which all you do is click a tick or a cross. You can download Mark Ellis: Train Bridge Inspector from Itch.io.

Thanks, Crate & Crowbar.

Phil Savage
Editor-in-Chief

Phil has been writing for PC Gamer for nearly a decade, starting out as a freelance writer covering everything from free games to MMOs. He eventually joined full-time as a news writer, before moving to the magazine to review immersive sims, RPGs and Hitman games. Now he leads PC Gamer's UK team, but still sometimes finds the time to write about his ongoing obsessions with Destiny 2, GTA Online and Apex Legends. When he's not levelling up battle passes, he's checking out the latest tactics game or dipping back into Guild Wars 2. He's largely responsible for the whole Tub Geralt thing, but still isn't sorry.