Ticket to Ride: Europe 15th Anniversary Edition - the review
Ticket to Ride
Ticket to Ride: Europe 15th Anniversary Edition, distributed in Italy by Asmodee, is a celebratory edition of the game created by Alan Moon that allows you to start competitive matches for 2-5 players with an estimated duration of about 30-60 minutes.In Ticket to Ride: Europe 15th Anniversary Edition we will be called upon to build the most profitable railway routes, trying to beat our opponents on time to make the most coveted tracks our own and complete as many “journeys” as possible. In this deluxe version we will be able to do it with the welcome additional bonus of great improvements in terms of materials and having some variants of the game immediately available.
The product
Without this little historical digression let's see what we will find inside the Ticket to Ride: Europe 15th Anniversary Edition box. The box has a medium-large size and a decidedly substantial weight. Inside we will find a large amount of material: 1 giant board, 5 tin boxes, 240 plastic wagons (in five different colors), 15 railway stations, 5 scoreboards, 110 train cards, 108 destination cards, 1 European bonus card Express, 1 Major Cities of Europe card, 1 regulation. We point out that for each color there are 3 more wagons than indicated: considering that the game specifies that 45 must be used, we believe that the extra ones are there to make up for any losses.Opening the container the first thing we will find will be the regulation. In this regard, nothing to say: the rules are set out in a more than clear way, which allows you to play without any doubts of interpretation. Please note that each copy of the volume shows, on the final page, a code to be able to obtain a digital copy of the game to be used on the Days of Wonder Online platform.
The Beatles’ ‘Ticket to Ride’: How the Carpenters’ Cover ‘Foreshadowed’ ‘(They Long to Be) Close to You’
The Beatles and the Carpenters are very different artists; however, the Carpenters covered The Beatles’ “Ticket to Ride” and released their cover as a single. Richard Carpenter revealed what he did to transform the original Beatles song from an upbeat rock song into a ballad. The public reaction to the Carpenters’ version of the track was very different from the public reaction to The Beatles’ version.
On his website, Richard Carpenter writes he and Karen Carpenter signed with A&M Records in 1969. He said their debut album, Offering, was a product of the mainstream pop music of the time. It had some elements of the Carpenters’ distinct sound; however, the group also drew inspiration from other artists like The Mamas & the Papas, We Five, Harry Nilsson, The Beach Boys, and Buffalo Springfield.
Offering also included a cover of The Beatles’ classic hit “Ticket to Ride.” “‘Ticket to Ride’ is one of our finest tracks,” Carpenter wrote. “Since many of The Beatles’ up-tempo songs are as melodic as the ballads, they can be made, with the right approach, into ballads as well.”
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How the Carpenters turned an upbeat Beatles song into a balladCarpenter said he and Karen helped make the song sound sad together. “Not only did I slow the piece down, but changed, or added, some chord changes as well, along with the melody at the end of the choruses, with Karen resolving on a very effective major seven,” he wrote. “This put her in her marvelous lower register on the word ‘care,’ which sounds terrific and adds to the plangent character of the entire chart; after all ‘Ticket to Ride’ is a sad lyric.
Carpenter said the cover prefigured the Carpenters’ version of “(They Long to Be) Close to You.” “The arrangement ends with a tag of four part harmony (overdubbed, 12 voices in all) singing ‘Think I’m gonna be sad’ that foreshadows the happier ‘wah’ tag that I would later fashion for the ending of ‘Close to You,'” Carpenter wrote.
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The way the world reacted to those 2 versions of ‘Ticket to Ride’The Beatles’ version of “Ticket to Ride” peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, remaining on the chart for 11 weeks. Its parent album, Help!, was a hit as well. Help! reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200, staying on the chart for 46 weeks.
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The Carpenters’ version of “Ticket to Ride” was a success as well — albeit a minor success. It reached No. 54 on the Billboard Hot 100, staying on the chart for 12 weeks. According to the Carpenters’ website, the song’s parent album was originally titled Offering: however, it was later renamed Ticket to Ride because of the minor success of the Carpenters’ cover. Ticket to Ride reached No. 150 on the Billboard 200, staying on the chart for 16 weeks. The Carpenters made “Ticket to Ride” their own — but the public undeniably preferred The Beatles’ version.
