Razor Train

A Razor Train is a train used by the Combine for transporting freight and prisoners between cities and outposts.

Overview
As with much of Combine technology, the Razor Train is large, mostly featureless, and imposing. Custom-built to work on human rail networks transporting standard, secret cargo, human prisoners and Stalkers. One particular function they serve is to transport human prisoners to Nova Prospekt, the Combine-controlled prison/laboratory, and transport completed Stalkers and Overwatch Soldiers to the Citadel. Their ram-like, razor-thin appearance and all-black finish add to the threatening look of the fast moving vehicle.

Razor Trains resemble modern "hood unit" locomotives, one of which bears a dark red marking on the sides. Perhaps the most disconcerting aspect of the Razor Train is its horn: a distinctive, discordant bellow that announces the Train's arrival and sounds more like a wounded animal than an air horn. This is by no means always the case, though, as several times during the third, seventh, ninth, and tenth chapters of Half-Life 2, they emit low air horn bellows instead. In addition, both of these sound effects are occasionally higher than normal, exhibited in chapters 3 and 7.

While razor trains are very fast and completely unyielding to any objects that may be on the tracks, from other vehicles to people to even friendly Combine units, implying they are entirely automated, all locomotives have what appear to be a driver's cab. This would suggest that razor trains may be crewed, or at least can be driven manually.

As seen in the Combine Depot and in Route Kanal, the trains seem to carry short loads in rapid succession at high speed as opposed to fewer but more heavily loaded trains. Seen in chapters 3 and 7, Razor Trains accompany human trains on the same railways.

Razor trains are unarmed. They do sometimes serve as an environmental hazard, however, specifically during the chapters Route Kanal and Highway 17.

List of appearances

 * Half-Life 2
 * Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar
 * Half-Life 2: Deathmatch
 * Half-Life 2: Episode One