Microsoft announces all-new Train Simulator

Mike Roque wrote:

L'mont wrote:I'd LOVE to see more commuter routes. If they could incorporate either of the largest commuter railroads in this country it would be great. For me at least, it would be the most fun to have a realistic SIM of commuter ops in NYC area.

As I reported on my blog, Auran (the Trainz people) are releasing Trainz Harlem Line Edition, a prototypical representation of New York's Harlem Line.

I don't have any experiance with TRAINZ. Is it worth picking up? I'd love to try out the Harlem line.

At the risk of going off-topic, I posted the note about Trainz, but let's keep this topic to the new version of MSTS. If you'd like to discuss Trainz, please start a new topic.

pgengler wrote:

Rockingham Racer wrote:

harryguy082589 wrote:Some sort of MMORPG?

Okay; what's that?

The short version is something like this:

Traditionally, multiplayer games have just a few people playing at once (as few as two, some games as many as 16/32). A "massively multiplayer online" (the MMO of MMORPG) game, instead of having just a few people playing different games, has one big world in which everyone plays.

In the context of Train Simulator, I imagine the idea would be to have a virtual rail network, and a person would connect to this whole network and run a train. Along the way they'd pass other trains, controlled by other players, and not necessarily people you know.

As for my thoughts, I think it would certainly be an interesting addition, and it could be fun, but I don't know how feasible it would be to implement such a thing, or how well it would work in practice.

The Flight Simulator folks have something called "Vatsim." Basically a virtual world that anyone can log on to and fly, and see other aircraft as well... It's a global system, and there is a ton of activty there. Has there ever been anything like this for MSTS..?

Nope! Too bad too, imagine a virutal world that you could enter with A.I. train dispatchers. You could run a train in a web based world with other live participants. Sounds good to me!

All MSTS fans get to do on the web is share Loco/route designs......

I take it there is nothing new?

I went and sent a letter to Microsoft Games, requesting the MBTA be put on the game.

travelsoccerkid1 wrote:I went and sent a letter to Microsoft Games, requesting the MBTA be put on the game.

Every time you run a Breda you end up crashing to the desktop.

travelsoccerkid1 wrote:I went and sent a letter to Microsoft Games, requesting the MBTA be put on the game.

Any Reply ?

GP40MC 1116 wrote:

travelsoccerkid1 wrote:I went and sent a letter to Microsoft Games, requesting the MBTA be put on the game.

Any Reply ?

Man, five days and I'm still laughing!! LOL, Microsoft answers to NO ONE, haha.

Only kidding. Seriously though, what news with this game? There hasn't been any real news since January.

I wonder if it will be able to be run full-featured on a less than state of the art gaming computer? From what I have read, as well as direct conversations with dyed in the wool gamers, the current Flightsimulator runs very poorly on "normal" computers, even with most of the features turned off. To run it at or close to full featured requires a top shelf gaming computer in the $6,000.00 and up price range.

Hopefully, the new railroad offering will not suffer from that limitation.

They should expand the NEC route up to new york and maybe even to boston

Ken W2KB wrote:I wonder if it will be able to be run full-featured on a less than state of the art gaming computer? From what I have read, as well as direct conversations with dyed in the wool gamers, the current Flightsimulator runs very poorly on "normal" computers, even with most of the features turned off. To run it at or close to full featured requires a top shelf gaming computer in the $6,000.00 and up price range.

Hopefully, the new railroad offering will not suffer from that limitation.

I respectfully disagree with the "dyed in the wool gamers". Last August I bought a Dell XPS400 with 2.8ghz dual core and 1gb memory for just under $1k. The system ran FSX just fine with all settings set at "high". I have since upgraded to 3gb oF memory and can now run with all settings maxed at "Ultra-high". Dell has pretty much the same system (XPS410) on sale now for $899 including a 19" flat panel monitor.
Regards,
Bill

cwhowell2 wrote:

Ken W2KB wrote:I wonder if it will be able to be run full-featured on a less than state of the art gaming computer? From what I have read, as well as direct conversations with dyed in the wool gamers, the current Flightsimulator runs very poorly on "normal" computers, even with most of the features turned off. To run it at or close to full featured requires a top shelf gaming computer in the $6,000.00 and up price range.

Hopefully, the new railroad offering will not suffer from that limitation.

I respectfully disagree with the "dyed in the wool gamers". Last August I bought a Dell XPS400 with 2.8ghz dual core and 1gb memory for just under $1k. The system ran FSX just fine with all settings set at "high". I have since upgraded to 3gb oF memory and can now run with all settings maxed at "Ultra-high". Dell has pretty much the same system (XPS410) on sale now for $899 including a 19" flat panel monitor.
Regards,
Bill

FSX and TSX (or whatever it's going to be called) should work fine on on a $750-1000 system. If I'm going to run MSTS on a $6000 system, it should come with a full cab along with intergrated controls and vibration simulation, and a working air horn!!!

rcervel wrote:FSX and TSX (or whatever it's going to be called) should work fine on on a $750-1000 system. If I'm going to run MSTS on a $6000 system, it should come with a full cab along with intergrated controls and vibration simulation, and a working air horn!!!

And at $6k for FSX, I would expect a live stewardess.

I can't wait.. I feel like pulling out my MSTS now but it was so buggy and some sounds needed to be worked on.