Year: 2023 | Players: 1-4 | Min: 60 | Ages: 10+
This Express Route review was made after playing the game seven times, with at least one game played at each co-op player count.
What is Express Route?
Express Route is a cooperative pick-up and deliver game where players work together to deliver packages and try to keep their very demanding customers happy.
Express Route was designed by Patrick Marino and published by The Op.
Rules Overview
In Express Route, you and your teammates manage a shipping network, taking turns moving vehicles, managing packages, and meeting rising demand. Each player uses their Control Panel to perform actions and deliver packages efficiently before demand gets out of control. You also each have a unique Specialist, which gives you a helpful setup bonus and a special ability during the game.
Turn Structure
1. Add Packages
Packages are placed on their origin cities on the map, increasing the Demand level based on their values.
2. Draw an Event
Reveal an Event card that introduces obstacles, such as blocking routes, disabling vehicles, or limiting actions for the turn.
3. Complete Actions
During your turn, you use your three batteries to perform actions, including:
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- Moving Vehicles: The three trucks have a gas value of 1-3, determining how far they can travel in one action. The plane doesn’t rely on gas and can fly directly to airports across the map.
- Loading and Delivering Packages: Each vehicle has a load value of 1-2, which tells you how many packages it can load/deliver per action. Each time you deliver a package, you move it to the Delivered Package track and reduce the Demand value based on that package’s value. Four spaces on the Delivered Package track can be filled with any packages, but the other four spaces have requirements (chosen during setup).
You can buy upgrades at any time during your turn. To upgrade, you spend a delivered package that matches the upgrade’s cost, such as its demand value or destination city. Upgrades are key to winning since they can improve the trucks’ range, vehicle load capacity, and battery options.
4. Clean Up
Remove used batteries from your Control Panel, clear event effects, and start the next player’s turn.
Winning and Losing
Your team wins by having eight packages on the Delivered Package track.
You’ll lose if the Demand level gets too high or you go through the entire event deck.
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Pros and Cons
Pros
- Thematically, I think Express Route is super-solid. The map and mechanics make you feel like you’re running a shipping service, with the pressure of managing multiple deliveries and meeting the demands of very needy customers.
- My favorite part of the game is choosing which packages to accept from the call center. It’s funny thematically, but it’s also important strategically to choose the right packages to put on the board. You want them to be close to your vehicles, but it’s also important to think about their destinations and whether or not you should cover other packages on the board.
- I like how the events keep you on your toes. An event could simply raise the demand level, but it could also block areas of the map, forcing you to rethink your plans on the fly.
- It’s awesome that there are 11 different Specialists to use. Those setup bonuses and ongoing abilities completely change how you approach each game and give each player a unique role to play.
- Express Route has a high replay value. Even the base “free-play” mode has good replayability, but there are many other unique scenarios included in the rulebook. Each scenario gives you a list of Specialists that can be used, upgrades that can’t be used, and sometimes specific delivery requirements that need to be used.
- It has a very good rulebook. It takes multiple turns to get a good feel for the game, but the rulebook answered all the questions we had.
Cons
- The early game is pretty repetitive and uneventful. It usually takes several turns to make your first delivery and earn your first upgrade since the trucks move so slowly. It doesn’t ruin the overall experience, but I wish the early game was a bit more interesting.
- Some Specialist combos don’t work as well in two-player games. Without a Specialist who can increase the range of one or more vehicles, your chances of winning are pretty slim; plus, that early game issue is even worse.
- This game doesn’t need to take up so much table space. I like big maps, but the vehicle boards and the main board could have been combined since there’s a lot of unused space on the main board. Also, the Upgrade cards could have been smaller.
Final Thoughts
On the overall, I’ve had a good time playing Express Route. Those early game issues keep me from loving it, but they did nail the theme and I like that the Specialist combos, the different scenarios, and the events make each game feel slightly different.
I prefer Now Boarding as a pick-up and deliver transportation game, but they can both be in a collection. Now Boarding is a real-time game and quicker, while Express Route is more of a laid-back game and a bit more of a puzzle.
If you’re a fan of pick-up and deliver games, there’s a good chance you’ll enjoy playing Express Route. If you need more tension in your co-op games, you might want to skip this one.
Express Route Links
BGG | Amazon | Miniature Market
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