Type Train: Fastest fingers in the West?

“You is going loco, gringo!”



Okay, there are no stereotypical Mexican banditos in the app, nor badgers for that matter. Just prairie dogs. Fair enough. “We don’t need no stinkin’ badgers!” That’s how the line goes, right?



Am I making sense yet? No? Well neither does Type Train a lot of the time. But that doesn’t stop it from being a groovy and addictive way to speed up your iPad typing skills.

Yup, we’re dealing with a Western themed typing trainer here. iPad typing…very different from touch typing. In fact it’s bloody near impossible to touch type on the iPad, more’s the pity. I’ve had to dust off the old two-finger typing skills for Type Train.

Still, there are worse ways to get back into the two-finger typing saddle.

Here’s the snake’s belly of Type Train…you know…the lowdown.

Yessum, the trains roll in from right to left and you have to type the words emblazoned on their flanks.

Successfully type the word before the train bolts and the train disappears in a puff of smoke…and leaves you with a few points.

Nail enough trains and you progress along the supplied railroad map to the next level of difficulty.

Simple as a retarded cactus.

Well…not quite. First up, if you stuff up a level you’re packed off back to the beginning. Score intact…pride in tatters.

Harsh eh? Well, I sort of like it…nothing turns me off a game faster than low stakes.

And as you roll on down the track, exploding trains left, right, and centre, you get to earn a few bonuses along the way.

A few weapons to help y’all with your Type Train locomotive bashing. And a mysterious new keyboard that remains, for me at least, tantalizingly out of reach.

And then there’s the random, kinda loco elements that appear and disappear as if dropping in from another game entirely.

Why is there a Martian in my Wild West game? There’s a walking skeleton later on too…couldn’t make any sense out of him either. Are they just window dressing or can you interact with them? Dunno. And Type Train isn’t inclined to explain itself. The instructions are few and far between.

I worked out that the Skull indicates how much life you have left, and the train indicates how much of the level is left. It doesn’t say this anywhere in the app…had to work this out for myself.



I still don’t know what all the gold bars are about either.

There’s a tumbleweed rolling across the empty street of a town called Understanding.



Still, let’s not let a little comprehension get in the way of having a good time, eh?

And of establishing my reputation as the fastest letter slinger in the Type Train universe.

And that’s where the competitive, addictive side of Type Train comes in. The Crystal feature enables you to go social with your digital dexterity skills.

Although, I’m admittedly a little hesitant to get buddy buddy with that posse of prairie dogs back there. Have you noticed those big, black, soulless eyes of theirs? 

Might want to have a rethink on the design front, Type Train team. Consult a Disney or Pixmar film…cuteness creates connection.



And I have one more gripe to vent regarding Type Train. It crashed on me…utterly. All I get now is the dashboard and, tap as I might, I can’t get anything to work.



Could be something to do with my operating system, or could be a bug in the app. Care to look into it Type Trainers, please?

Still, a few foibles aside, Type Train is a frenetically fun way to speed up your iPad typing skills. Four of my fingers got a serious work out, and it was dang satisfying to see my score up in lights there.



Tighten up the more ‘loco’ elements here Type Train guys and gals, and you’ve got yourselves a really funky app.

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