Contract Requirements

Contracts in the game primarily provide you a way to level up. Each time a contract is fulfilled, you’ll gain experience which in return will help you increase your player level and ultimately unlock more options for you to explore in the game. Contracts are handed out to you by the different people you meet in the game each time you expand your railway network. They usually come with a variety of tasks that includes delivery of raw materials or the items that you manufacture in your station (like steel, saw blades, or iron powder).

There are a lot of instances in the game where completing a pertaining contract will provide you with a way to solve other contracts. For instance, in Britain, you’ll be given a lot of possible contracts at the beginning of the game but are limited to only using yellow trains. Drawing out that rare of a train might be a long shot using the free containers in the shop, however, a sure way of getting one is simply done by completing one particular contract (the guy requiring steel that is known to have his own train empire).

An easy way to view all pending and available contracts is by simply clicking on the icon as shown on the image above.

In other instances, new compounded materials are introduced when you get to complete a set of contracts (might be a reward item, a referral contract, or simply unlocking it when leveling up). This way too, you’ll be able to provide service to other clients when you get your hands on that new material. Having said all that, it is of great importance that you deliver to your contracts in order to progress in the game.

Requirements

Contracts usually have requirements in them. The requirement usually differs in the item that is needed by the client, the quantity they require, and the posted limitation to the type of train that can proceed with the delivery. As shown in the image above, you’ll see more details of a contract upon clicking on it. In the example, you’ll see that there are four tiers of completion to the contract. Completing each tier will reward you with the promised items. Apart from the required item/s to push through with a contract, you’ll also have to check these things in the contract:

Volume of the item needed - you should be mindful of the items you put in your warehouse in the game as it can fill up pretty quick and there is no easy way to upgrade it. Instead of hoarding raw materials in your warehouse (like you would in most games), just stick to getting the raw materials if you are about to use them. You can also get extra storage space from your facilities by processing the stuff and keeping them there until you need them. However, you can only do this for a set number of items at time. Having to spend extra time collecting raw materials and then being forced to throw them away because you lack storage space for a newly compounded item is a major waste of your time and effort. DO NOT hoard items in this game.

Number of Available Dispatchers - it will only make sense to get a contract if you know you can deliver the goods. If you have something set for one contract and will last for quite some time (say 1 hour wait time), try your best to send all your available dispatchers to finish that whole job so that you’ll only have to wait for exactly one hour. Otherwise, if you delivered half of what is needed in the contract, and then go back there after an hour, you’ll have to wait another hour to have the other half of the deliver-ables finish the contract. Be smart how you queue your dispatchers in this game.

Train Class Requirement - be mindful of the train class requirements of each contract. Although the first few contracts would seem to pass through seamlessly, you might find one or two that wouldn’t push through despite the availability of the required item and dispatchers. If this happens, make sure that you also have the required type of train for the job.

Quick Tip:

Be mindful of how you queue your contracts. You might want to start doing those that have the least duration to complete its "delivery cycle". This usually is the case for the first and second tier of most contracts in the game (at least in Britain). Do the ones that you can wait to finish, and then, before you go offline, queue up the ones that will take the most time to finish.