Let’s Make a Bus Route

In Let’s Make a Bus Route (バスルートをつくろう), you and others each control a bus company in Kyoto and are creating new bus lines to respond to the needs of local students, the elderly, and tourists and commuters visiting the city, while also trying to avoid traffic jams. Can you bring people by sightseeing spots while also getting them to their destinations? Which lines will be most pleasing to users?

it is a 2-5 player board game where players draw bus routes on a map of Kyoto. You play the role of a bus company employee tasked with making a new bus route.

To make an effective route you must fulfill the needs of visiting tourists, commuters, students, and elderly passengers, while balancing impacts on the city including road traffic. Can you build the bus route that delights the most riders? Wouldn’t it be wonderful to connect to a famous sight-seeing spot while building your requested route? When the busses start moving will you have built the route that delights the most riders?

Game Contents

The goal of this game is to create a bus route that its passengers find charming. Take a player board & a pen and draw your bus route directly on the shared main board. Extend your route by drawing a line along the city roads. Reach an intersection with a passenger and you pick them up by making a check on your player board. By then connecting to a sight-seeing spot or a station the passengers give you victory points.

Each player has their own individual route planning card as well as demand cards (bonus points) that everyone shares. Balancing these goals can be tricky. When your route uses the same road as other players you can cause traffic which might lead to penalty points.

Player’s Turn

1. Flip a Bus Stop Card

At the beginning of a round a bus stop card is revealed. Everyone checks the color of the bus stop card.

2. Draw Your Route on the Main Board

Beginning with the start player, each player draws their route on the main board’s map. Each route is made of one continuous line. Players extend their routes following their individual player board’s path advancement chart. (Each player’s path advancement is different.)

3. Mark Player Board

Note icons at any intersections you’ve reached, and place marks in the corresponding sections of your individual board.

4. Fulfill Demand Cards

See if you have met the conditions to receive bonus points.

That ends the round. After 12 rounds we move on to final scoring.

Pen drawing fun & strategy

In “Let’s Make a Bus Route” players enjoy drawing bus routes directly on the main board with dry-erase pens. As other players extend their individual routes and approach yours, continuing on your intended path can become tricky.

Different types of riders (Tourists, Commuters, Students, The Elderly) all score differently. Placing checks for passengers and areas (Sight-seeing spots, Stations, Universities), before other players can earn you extra bonus points, so strategically planning your route while keeping in mind your main destinations, is very important. Having different demand cards in play, even using the same map, promises to make each game enjoyably different.

All game illustrations are created by Takako Takarai. From the smallest icon to the roads everything was lovingly hand drawn to bring a warm ambiance to the game. The bus illustration shown is modeled after a Bonnet Bus, which was used for routes in the 1960’s. It’s not a bus model that you will find in modern day Kyoto, but the classic, pop silhouette garnishes the game colorfully.

Contents

1 Map Board
1 Bus Board
5 Player Boards
12 Bus Stop Cards
6 Demand Cards
5 Route Planning Cards
5 Pens
1 Start Player Marker
2 Rulebooks (Japanese & English)

For 2-5 Players.
Playtime: 20-30 minutes.
For ages: 10 and up.