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PUZZLE
Raide Review: A Puzzle Game About Train Tracks That Actually Doesn't Waste Your Time
I've played enough 'cozy pixel art puzzle games' to last three lifetimes, but Raide somehow managed to keep me clicking for two hours straight. It's just train tracks. How did this happen.
Paul
January 15, 2026
7.3
Overall Score
"Raide is that rare puzzle game that respects both your intelligence and your time—a combination so unusual in 2024 that I'm genuinely suspicious."
First Impressions (Or: Here We Go Again With The Pixel Art)
I clicked on Raide fully expecting another forgettable 'uwu cozy puzzle experience' that would bore me within five minutes. The setup is absurdly simple: you're rebuilding old train tracks. That's it. No story about a grandfather's legacy or saving a dying railway town—just tracks that need fixing. I genuinely appreciated this lack of emotional manipulation. The first few puzzles seemed almost insultingly easy, just basic connection problems that any functioning adult could solve. Then around puzzle seven, Raide revealed it actually had teeth. Suddenly I'm dealing with limited track pieces, specific entry and exit points, and spatial constraints that made me actually stop and think. The game doesn't hold your hand or explain its escalating complexity—it just quietly gets harder while maintaining that calm, understated presentation. I found myself leaning forward in my chair, which is how I know a puzzle game has gotten its hooks in me, much as I hate admitting it.
The Puzzle Mechanics: Simple Rules, Surprising Depth
Here's what got me: Raide uses maybe four or five track piece types—straight sections, curves, and a couple variations—and builds an entire game around rotating and placing them correctly. This should be boring. This should be the kind of game I close after ten minutes while muttering about wasted potential. Instead, the spatial reasoning required actually engaged the parts of my brain that have been dormant since I last played a proper puzzle game, which was probably SpaceChem in 2011 and nothing since has come close. The constraints are what make it work—you can't just spam pieces everywhere. You have limited inventory, specific connection points, and tracks that need to flow naturally without overlapping or creating impossible angles. Some puzzles took me fifteen attempts because I kept trying to force solutions that looked right but geometrically couldn't work. The game respects the actual physics of how train tracks connect, which sounds boring but creates genuinely satisfying 'aha' moments when you finally see the solution. I actually said 'oh, THERE it is' out loud to my empty room like a lunatic.
Endless Mode and Those Damn Secrets
After finishing the main 20+ puzzles—which took me about ninety minutes because I'm apparently slower at spatial reasoning than I remember—Raide unlocks an endless mode that procedurally generates tracks. I expected this to be throwaway content, the kind of mode developers add to pad playtime. Wrong. The endless mode is legitimately challenging and weirdly meditative. Tracks generate faster as you progress, adding time pressure to the spatial puzzle-solving, and I found myself in that dangerous 'one more round' headspace that puzzle games used to create before they all became match-three garbage. Then there are the secrets. The developer notes mention 'mysteries' and hidden content, and the community feedback confirms people have found stuff I haven't. This drives me crazy. I've replayed several puzzles looking for whatever I'm missing, clicking on background elements like I'm hunting for adventure game items. I still haven't found everything, and it's genuinely bothering me. A free browser puzzle game is living rent-free in my head. This shouldn't happen at my age.
Presentation: Pixel Art That Doesn't Annoy Me
Look, I'm exhausted by pixel art. Every indie game uses it as a crutch, slapping together some chunky sprites and calling it 'retro charm.' Raide's pixel art actually has personality—the tiny trains chug along your completed tracks with genuine character, there are small environmental details that change between puzzles, and the color palette shifts in ways that kept things visually interesting without being garish. The UI is clean and intuitive, everything responds immediately to mouse clicks, and I never fought with the controls, which is rare enough to warrant praise. The sound design is minimal—gentle clicking when you place tracks, a satisfying whistle when you complete a puzzle, ambient background sounds that suggest a railway environment without being intrusive. What's missing is actual music. I would have loved some understated acoustic guitar or piano to accompany the puzzle-solving, something to fill the silence during longer head-scratching sessions. The ambient approach works fine, but music would have elevated this from 'nice' to 'I'm recommending this to people.' That said, the presentation never got in the way, which is more than I can say for most games trying this aesthetic.
What Actually Works Here
Raide succeeds because it understands puzzle design fundamentals that most developers forget: clear rules, escalating complexity, immediate feedback, and respect for the player's time. Each puzzle is self-contained and small enough that failure doesn't feel punishing—you just reset and try again. The difficulty curve is nearly perfect, introducing new concepts naturally without tutorials or hand-holding. I never felt lost, but I also never felt like the game was insulting my intelligence, which is a difficult balance. The 'name your own price' model means there's zero barrier to entry, and even if you pay nothing, you're getting a complete experience with more content than many $10 puzzle games offer. The developer clearly playtested this extensively and iterated on the design until it felt right, which shows in how polished and confident the whole package feels. This is the kind of focused, well-executed small game that justifies indie development as a medium. It knows exactly what it wants to be, executes that vision competently, and doesn't waste your time with unnecessary bloat or feature creep.
Rating Breakdown
Quality
7.5
Polished beyond what I expected from a free itch.io game—no bugs, clean UI, and that satisfying click when tracks snap into place actually works every time.
Innovation
6.2
It's track-laying puzzles with a twist on perspective and constraint management, which I haven't seen done quite this way since... okay, I can't think of when, but it still feels familiar enough.
Value
9.1
It's literally free with 20+ puzzles, an endless mode, and secrets I'm still annoyed I haven't found—this is absurd value and I hate that I have to admit it.
Gameplay
7.8
The core loop of rotating and placing track segments kept me engaged way longer than it had any right to, and I genuinely wanted to solve 'just one more' like some kind of addict.
Audio/Visual
6.9
Charming pixel art that doesn't try too hard, minimal but pleasant sound effects, though I wish there was actual music instead of just ambient railway ambiance.
Replayability
6.4
Endless mode gives it legs after you've solved everything, and those 'secrets' the developer mentions have me considering going back, which is more than most puzzle games get from me.
What Didn't Annoy Me
Puzzle difficulty ramps up perfectly without ever feeling unfair or cheap
Actually free with genuinely substantial content instead of being a glorified demo
Track-placement mechanics are more satisfying than they have any right to be
Endless mode adds real replay value instead of being forgettable filler
Clean, responsive controls that never fight against you
Hidden secrets give puzzle completionists something to obsess over
What Made Me Sigh
No music, just ambient sounds, which makes longer sessions feel a bit empty
Could use 10-15 more main puzzles because I finished faster than I wanted to
Some visual clarity issues on particularly complex track layouts
The secrets are obtuse enough that I'm still annoyed I haven't found them all
Final Verdict
Raide is that rare puzzle game that respects both your intelligence and your time—a combination so unusual in 2024 that I'm genuinely suspicious. It delivers focused, well-designed spatial puzzles without burying them under forced narrative or manipulative progression systems. The core mechanic of rebuilding train tracks sounds mundane until you're fifteen attempts deep into a single puzzle, rotating pieces in your mind like some kind of geometry savant. At free-to-play with optional payment, this is absurdly good value for what you get. My only real complaints are that I wanted more puzzles and actual music. If you have even a passing interest in logic puzzles or spatial reasoning challenges, download this immediately. Just don't blame me when you're still clicking tracks together two hours later, wondering where your evening went. Kultisti made something genuinely good here, and I'm reluctantly impressed.
Raide
Tags
puzzle
trains
pixel-art
cozy
logic-puzzle
minimalist
free
track-building
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