Around the end of the 19th century, a steadily growing network of railway lines emerged across Europe. This allowed people to travel to European cities and admire the buildings influenced by Historicism and Art Nouveau.

In Free Ride, you take on the task of building these railway lines. Connect the cities of Europe and transport passengers to their desired destinations. You can use your own and the nationalized railway lines for free. However, if you want to travel on the railway lines of other players, you must pay them money to nationalize their lines for everyone’s use.

Select travel routes from an open display and complete them to earn victory points at the end of the game. The goal of Free Ride is to visit as many different cities in Europe as possible. Free Ride also offers a challenging solo game!

You build railway lines between cities. There are three types of railway lines: your own, those built by other players, and nationalized lines. You can travel for free on your own or nationalized lines. If you want to use the lines of other players, you must pay them 1 coin to nationalize their lines. After that, the line can be used freely by everyone. The number of coins is limited, so you must carefully balance between building your own lines and nationalizing the lines of other players.

During the game, you can choose from 6 travel routes in the display. Each travel route consists of 3 city cards and offers you two different options. You take 2 of the 3 city cards without changing their order, while the remaining third city card of the travel route is removed and placed back in the box. You are not allowed to reverse the route or choose the top and bottom cards.

In Free Ride, it's always about these decisions: Do you build more railway lines or take the train? Do you wait for better travel routes in the display, or do you snatch the best routes away from the others?