I do not normally play a lot of games, perhaps the occasional Freecell or two and the odd very odd game of Bridge, however I have to confess that the Bank Holiday saw me spending far to much time on Trainz.
Buy Now...
This is by no means a new item but what is new is the compilation just launched by Focus at their £9.99 bargain price point.
Installation took around twelve minutes on a reasonably fast machine. Getting anything sensible from it took a lot longer. This is more of a puzzle than a simulation. The only help you are given is in the readme file where a list of the key presses are listed. After around an hour I got a train moving and from then I was hooked.
There are five types of loco including a UK type 125 offering (I did say this was not new) as well as various types of rolling stock. To begin with I suggest you try a few of the scenarios that are preset however in the long term you can save your own.
It comes on two CDs the first has the original simulation and once that is installed you are told 6.5 is available on the second CD together with other things that would have been extras when the far more expensive Trainz first came out, such as Trainz Paint Shop where the artistic can produce artwork for their own cars and carriages and even for authenticity sake spray them with graffiti.
After everything was installed I had 1.855 GB less hard disk space. I hate to think how people managed when this first came out and the whole hard disc was probably little more than that, however, to be fair, I did install everything.
You can survey your own routes but to be honest I have only dabbled here as I have spent most of my time driving. I have never been a big fan of collecting train numbers but almost every time I travel through Clapham Junction I see numerous people doing just that. I have never been a fan of flight simulators but I know people who think its better than sex, no further comment.
It is even possible to create your own scenarios but again Ive only dabbled. How about Palm Trees and beaches in Manchester just to add that certain touch to your own railway, dare I say you may even be the type to have one to run on time.
In the driver section where I have spent wasted?- most of my weekend you can choose your view and on a reasonable PC you views can be stunning. I have spent most of my learning curve inside the cab but the chase view has things to be said for it and the overhead view allows the angle to be changed and this has its moments.
For anyone who craves more than blood and gore from shoot em ups or purely wants to pursue a childhood fantasy this sub £10 offering has a lot to say for it.
It is stated to run on Windows 98 or later with as little as 128MB and a PII 400 processor. For some reason an 8x or better CD-ROM is specified no doubt this relates to a minimum installation.
http://www.focusmm.co.uk/store/productpages/productinfo/ess404.html
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