Railroader
by Giraffe Lab LLC · 7 Dec, 2023
182 downloads
Multiplayer · Cracked Only
Cracked Co-op Only
Online works only between cracked copies — you can't join official servers or players who bought the game.
ProtonDB: Platinum
About the Game
Experience the romance of the transition era as you take the reins of vintage locomotives, master intricate operations, and witness the beauty of a bygone era brought to life.
Railroader is an operations-focused railroad simulator set in transition era Appalachia. Manage and run your railroad to your desire while using period steam and diesel locomotives and rolling stock.
Railroader is an operations-focused railroad simulator set in transition era Appalachia. Manage and run your railroad to your desire while using period steam and diesel locomotives and rolling stock.
Trains with Purpose in a Player Driven World
Your railroad is the lifeblood of the communities it serves: delivering freight cars to customers and moving passengers along the steel arteries that wind along the rivers and up steep mountain passes. You'll receive cars at the interchange yard and it's up to you to get them safely to their destinations, whether it's boxcar loads of machine parts, or bulkhead flats of pulpwood. Every car delivered will get you closer to your goals, whatever they may be: buying powerful locomotives or handsome passenger cars, expanding your mainline, or upgrading your railroad. It's your railroad!A Scenic Mountain Railroad
On the ground or in the cab, the tree-covered mountain vistas – inspired by the Southern Railway's Murphy Branch – will serve as backdrop to your rumbling mainline, night and day. Climb aboard and watch the miles go by in this picturesque environment.Run Solo or with Friends
Railroader is made to scale with your playing style. Shape your railroading experience by accepting contracts with the customers you want to serve, at the level your railroad can handle. Want to run a sleepy mixed train daily? Perhaps a bustling multiplayer server with formal jobs and organized crews? So do we – that's why we made this game! AI Engineers can help you fill in the gaps of your operations, too.What's this about AI Engineers?
AI Engineers can run a manifest freight between yards, or, when you're switching, let you focus on the moves while the AI focuses on the controls. Railroader's AI Engineers can help you be in multiple places at once.Make Your Railroad the Model of Efficiency
ABS and CTC signaling systems not only enable you to run your railroad safely and efficiently, they also give you another way to play: as Dispatcher! Railroader's lovingly recreated US&S Centralized Traffic Control machine will give you a dazzling array of lamps and satisfyingly tactile knobs to throw in command of your mainline.Chimes, Colors & Characters
It wouldn't be your railroad without the ability to make it look and sound the way you envision it. Customize the lettering on tenders and coaches, choose paint colors, and swap whistles to your heart's content!Screenshots
9 images
Version Information
Steam Patch Notes
Official update history
On the site: Build 20238526
Up to date
Build 20238526
Oct 3, 2025
This release contains no game changes from 2025.1.0a, but we have updated to Unity 2022.3.62f2 in response to a Unity security vulnerability. According to Unity there is no evidence of any exploitation of the vulnerability nor has there been any impact on users or customers.
Meanwhile, work continues on the MoW update!
View on Steam
Meanwhile, work continues on the MoW update!
Build 18404845
May 9, 2025
This is a hot fix release that includes the following:
View on Steam
- Tutorial bug/typo fixes.
- Fix for broken Crews panel in the Company window.
Build 18391076
May 8, 2025
There's a lot to learn about Railroader and for a long time now we have wanted to create a more interactive tutorial, with better cues and feedback. For those of you who are new to Railroader we hope that it helps get you on the right track, pun intended.
If you run into any stumbling blocks please let us know in the Discord or Steam Community! Note that if you had previously started but not completed the tutorial, you will need to restart it with a fresh Company mode game.
Also in this release:
After this we plan to get back to focusing on MoW work. More to come on that down the line!
View on Steam
If you run into any stumbling blocks please let us know in the Discord or Steam Community! Note that if you had previously started but not completed the tutorial, you will need to restart it with a fresh Company mode game.
Also in this release:
- Fixed AE Waypoint Mode pulling high of switch when the most logical route would be to change directions. (RR-789)
- Fixed/adjusted Bryson CTC blocks. Boundaries are now west of wye and service track switches, and east of easternmost crossover. (RR-783)
- Fixed Barker's Creek West occupancy gap. (RR-787)
- Fixed keyboard input for diesel throttle/reverser difficult to move notch-by-notch. (RR-805)
- Fixed case where loader saved while loading in an older version could continue animating as if it were loading in the new version.
- Fixed releasing mouse button over window while dragging control not releasing the control.
- Fixed Invert Mouse preference not respected in overhead camera view. (RR-809)
- Adjusted `/stats` display to use a rolling average and show top and bottom 1% frame times, rather than min and max.
- Increased click distance for angleocks.
- Internal: Fixed unload assuming cars have single load. (RR-807)
- Internal: The new tutorial is implemented in Lua, but please bear in mind that the implementation is tailored to that purpose and not intended to support modding at this time. Official modding support is still something we plan to look into in the future.
After this we plan to get back to focusing on MoW work. More to come on that down the line!
Build 17575382
Mar 3, 2025
We are pleased to announce that Railroader 2024.6 is now available on the main branch after several months on the experimental branch! This release brings major new features like Auto Engineer Waypoint Mode and Timetables, along with new engines, new scenery, and numerous other enhancements and fixes. Check out our announcement post for a full overview of what's new:
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1683150/view/498314610455086160
An important note for those of you who were using mods with Railroader 2024.5: please check them carefully for updates for 2024.6! Many 2024.5 mods are incompatible unless updated! (Railroader does not yet officially support mods.)
Also, a reminder that we plan to remove the 2024.5.x branch on March 17th.
We expect to continue building out scenery as well as refining our equipment, but there are two key features that we plan to focus on over the next few months: Maintenance of Way and the Tutorial.
Railroader's current tutorial is functional but we see a lot of possibilities to make it much more visual and engaging. One of our goals is that Railroader be accessible to players who are interested but don't know a lot about trains, and we see this as an integral part of that.
Maintenance of Way is something we've been talking about internally for a long time. Aside from being an interesting part of railroading to simulate, we think it would add compelling tension for mid-to-late game players, as well as being a natural means of making completing milestones more immersive. We have a lot of ideas we're excited to work on, but this is a very large feature and we expect it to take some time before we have progress to share – or a new experimental branch to try it out!
Thank you to our Railroader community for your support! We're happy to finally share all of the progress in 2024.6 with you, and look forward to making Railroader even better in the future.
View on Steam
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1683150/view/498314610455086160
An important note for those of you who were using mods with Railroader 2024.5: please check them carefully for updates for 2024.6! Many 2024.5 mods are incompatible unless updated! (Railroader does not yet officially support mods.)
Also, a reminder that we plan to remove the 2024.5.x branch on March 17th.
What's Next for Railroader?
We expect to continue building out scenery as well as refining our equipment, but there are two key features that we plan to focus on over the next few months: Maintenance of Way and the Tutorial.
Railroader's current tutorial is functional but we see a lot of possibilities to make it much more visual and engaging. One of our goals is that Railroader be accessible to players who are interested but don't know a lot about trains, and we see this as an integral part of that.
Maintenance of Way is something we've been talking about internally for a long time. Aside from being an interesting part of railroading to simulate, we think it would add compelling tension for mid-to-late game players, as well as being a natural means of making completing milestones more immersive. We have a lot of ideas we're excited to work on, but this is a very large feature and we expect it to take some time before we have progress to share – or a new experimental branch to try it out!
Thank you to our Railroader community for your support! We're happy to finally share all of the progress in 2024.6 with you, and look forward to making Railroader even better in the future.
Build 15169177
Jul 27, 2024
Fixed an issue that caused the game to fail to properly initialize games created/loaded in a session after the first one.
View on Steam
Build 15157290
Jul 26, 2024
- Fixed AI moving inconsistently when a switch is set against it and there is another train on that switch. It now ignores such trains and stops in advance of the foul point. (RR-495)
- Fixed jerky animation when un-leaning. (RR-544)
- Fixed unable to interact with some cab controls while leaning out the window. (RR-408)
- Fixed case that could cause interchange to not receive cars, erroneously stating it is at capacity. (RR-545)
- Fixed sound on striking track bumper.
- Fixed coal/water/diesel loaders failing to load equipment in cases where the load point is close to another car, particularly coal on the K-28T. (RR-542)
- Fixed turntable not properly lined in new game. (RR-525)
Build 15083054
Jul 19, 2024
Adjusted how hotboxes are triggered to better prevent them occurring in unintended circumstances. In particular, hotboxes now only occur when moving faster than 15mph.
View on Steam
Build 15080783
Jul 18, 2024
- Company window Locations panel now automatically selects nearest location when opened.
- Fixed AI engineer continuing to stop for signal after diverging switch is thrown, e.g. train moving from Ela siding to switchback. (RR-524)
- Made AI engineers more resilient in the face of internal errors.
- Changed MU to require that it is connected not just by air to the source engine, but that it is coupled, too, to avoid confusing behavior after uncoupling. Anglecock setting does not matter. (RR-520)
- Fixed CTC panel not initializing properly when first CTC milestone is unlocked. (RR-529)
- Fixed CTC not fully clearing route when setting signal to stop while throwing switch, which could prevent setting a route into that same track from the opposite direction. (RR-526)
- Fixed CTC bell's unnatural carrying distance. (RR-530)
- Fixed "(Overhaul)" destination being cleared before overhaul was fully completed. (RR-528)
- Updated turntable pit texture.
- Fixed truck brake animation jumping when brakes change state midway through.
Build 15023358
Jul 13, 2024
Thank you for your feedback on Railroader! We have a few bugfixes and adjustments for this build.
View on Steam
- Quit confirmation now shows time since last save.
- Doubled S-23 tender coal capacity, fixed firebox tooltips.
- Fixed C-55 water hatch tooltips. Minor model updates to C-46, A-26.
- Fixed wear & tear damage only being applied to railroad-owned cars. Changed delivery damage fine threshold to 95%. (RR-514)
- Fixed oiling tooltip appearing if Wear & Tear has been disabled.
- Fixed AI engineer continuing to ignore a stop signal it was instructed to pass, after the signal has already been passed. (RR-517)
- Fixed B-65 tender trucks not showing bearing oiling tooltip. (RR-515)
- Fixed hotbox not appearing on a consistent bearing for clients/host. (RR-513)
Current Release
20238526
Uploaded May 11, 2026
System Requirements
OS
Windows 64-bit
CPU
Intel Core i5
RAM
8 GB RAM
GPU
Nvidia GTX 1660 6GB
How to Install
1
Download all files
2
Extract the .ZIP file to a folder (use WinRAR or 7-Zip)
3
Run Railroader.exe to play
Troubleshooting tips
• Run Redist/_CommonRedist installers if game won't start
• Add folder to Windows Defender exclusions
• Run as administrator
Download
Direct link available
Size
4.6 GB
Build
20238526
Password: cracked-games.org or 123
CRC32
58FD57C0
SHA-256
9df15397e77d66a1adaa8d2474c2ea86ff32af72f9f93cace547073e857f4d4a
How: Right-click the downloaded file → 7-Zip / WinRAR → CRC SHA → compare with the values above.
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View AllDownload Railroader for PC with a direct link or via torrent. Get the full version of Railroader for free. Railroader is a Simulation released by Giraffe Lab LLC.