who remembers this gem from 2007 it would be if funny if EA would come back to this years later and put it on console as a remaster like trainz another old train simulator definitely would give DTG a run for their money 2 other competitors
I do! Still have it in my small collection of old physical games. By the way, this is the original version of what now is Train Simulator Classic. It all started as Rail Simulator, then got turned into Railworks, then Train Simulator with the annual update with the year in the title, then finally being simply branded into Train Simulator Classic. So EA won't do much with it. It was originall developed by Kuju, EA simply was the publisher. Now it is DTG's property. And as you probably guess by now, Train Simulator Classic most likely will not come to consoles.
Yep, this is what has become "RailWorks" then "Train Simulator (Classic)" after Paul Jackson (ex EA) and Tim Gatland (ex Fund4Games, now Rivet's boss) bought the game from Kuju (and took over parts of the team who themselves just bought themselves out of EA's publishing contract) with their company RSDL (Rail Simulator Development Ltd), which became RailSimulator.com (RSC) which is the company behind the trading name Dovetail Games. If Microsoft hadn't dropped Kuju while they where developing MSTS2 for them and lost interest in train sims, there'd probably be no TSW today. DTG might just be an addon producer for MSTS x Both RS versions (European and US) are still present in TSC, as the European Loco & Asset Pack and US Loco & Asset Pack, as well as the initial routes Newcastle-York, Bath-Templecombe, Oxford-Paddington, Hagen-Siegen and Cajon Pass. Hagen-Siegen was done by GermanRailroads of MSTS fame, which eventually became virtualRailroads that are in turn part of TSG's Maik Goltz's history. Makers of Cajon Pass made their own sim - Run 8. For TSC players, I've recreated the very first demo scenario for RailSimulator, available on Steam Workshop: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2720906241 Fun fact: many billboards in TSW are actually taken from Rail Simulator (Reifen, Gasthäuser, One-Click Shopping, Fly Anywhere and others...)
Hard to believe but it was the last time I tried train simulator games till four months ago. Have the JT Mallard also.
I enjoyed Rail simulator when it came out, apart from trees clipping through the cab. Still have my copy of Southern Bell spectrum 48k by Hewson somewhere too.
Yes although the initial release was a bit disappointing and it took several iterations before Kuju, then RSDL and RSC got it right. Though shouldn’t this really be in Off Topic?
Out of curiosity, I did. 13 threads in 1 month. Makes you a record holder as I don't think anyone else has got anywhere near
Remember buying the US cover version of it from Gamestop back in the day, though I didn't really play it as much Also, if it was released today, there would be so much backlash over Cajon that was included in it.
that's a proper history lesson. Thank you! I never would have thought that all this would be so connected.
Do you remember when they brought out a patch that was supposed to reflect head sway when all it did was make the damned thing worse by the rails zig zagging, they put it back to normal in the next patch after that as it was truly dreadful, I couldn't play it with that zig zag.
I remember playing Trainz like 1000 years ago lol... had no clue how to control the trains, so just played with the most simplified controls, and had tons of fun creating super unrealistic tracks to drive em on lol ... my dad would love TSW if he had powerful enough PC to run it
Isle of Wight was DTG's very first DLC for Kuju RailSimulator, when they were still named RSDL. The next one was - who would have guessed it - a Class 66 A good source of history (and with the demise of UKTS the only one possibly) is german forum rail-sim.de, as it kept all the threads since release of the demo in 2007. Here's an interesting interview from 2009 with DTG founder Paul Jackson: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/interview-paul-jackson-on-railworks#more-20172
Man, I miss the Japanese routes from the original MSTS. Wonder if it's possible to get the original game running on Win11?
My god though, the screenshots show how far we have come. Yet in 2001 it was like a breath of fresh air as, other than Trainmaster 4 and some other very basic games with a cab view, it was streets ahead of anything seen until that point. Of course there was the less than sterling discovery that Kuju had left the game full of bugs, notably the physics “Cutbank” syndrome where your train would derail or fly in the air if it met a set of points more than about 6 miles from the previous. And the half finished editor with scant instructions and no native DEM or mapping import.
It's weird, but I think the use of the old 2d foliage in TSC still looks more realistic looking than what we have in TSW. Probably because they are actual copies of real trees rather than the generic ones we have currently. I'm probably in the minority on that opinion though.
It's like AP skies look better to me because they are photorealistic. To me, TSW has this clinical sterile UE look, the metallic blue tinted clear atmosphere and the ever same cloud formations, metallic reflective terrain, purple sunsets plus the unnatural autoexposure. It's especially noticeable when coming from an ETS2 or Forza session which both have great natural lighting and skies - TSW just looks off. I cannot immerse myself in TSW, the train models are fine, but there's stuff of equal quality or better in TSC, also sound wise. See the 205, 411 or 37 from AP. Unrivalled. And even exhaust emissives look more realistic in TSC. The scenery fidelity has not really improved from TSC to TSW, it's just it's rendered with UE. Turn off all postprocessing and look how the game looks. Given the editing tools in TSC, it'll stay my train sim of choice. Just installed three new (to me) freeware routes, more than enough to play there. Closing the circle, Kudos to Kuju for starting it all. Only Zusi is older I guess (from those who survived, yes I have played Mechanik in DOSBox .
Yep, TSW does have it's major plus points though, timetable mode for example. If only we had that in TSC. I think more could be done in TSW regarding foliage, we need new assets I think. The distant 2d tree assets in TSW aren't great, they look pretty flat, whereas in TSC it's pretty much nailed. Noticed in the new Shap route the distant trees are a bit cartoony, not dissing JT's work at all though it still looks incredible as a whole, day 1 purchase for me. Just a TSW issue at the moment. I'm sure in the future it will improve.
Yes but we have a huge arsenal of foliage assets in TSC, and as soon as RSSLO are pushing out a new route someone at rail-sim.de swaps the foliage. We also have to thank DTG for what they made out of RailSimulator, with many enhancements over the years, starting with dynamic lighting. And the open architecture of the game is an El Dorado for creativity. So much to discover, in the screenshots thread I see locos I wasn't even aware they exist in the game. Screenshot courtesy of decrepitts#7027 Mine from remastered Mittenwaldbahn: And 2015's Weardale and Teesdale network from original Kuju member Derek Siddle, with AP sky and AP trees. Isn't it cozy? Funny how this thread started with an "obscure" sim rediscovery.
My first train sim was Swedish (I think) and it was in the mid/late '90s so I honestly can't remember the name, it was quite fun though. I also had a demo of a "sim" which was a Class 91 on the ECML but was effectively FMV with prompts, or at least that is what I can remember about it as it didn't really work properly on my old 486... I had MSTS of course (and used to do quite a lot of repaints - I think my best received ones were the MetroTrain Class 155 and First NorthWestern 150/1. I really did enjoy MSTS but lost interest in it within a couple of years, I had Trainz as well but never really played it, the same for Railworks believe it or not. I actually spent most of my time on BVE/OpenBVE (thanks to the incredible Network West Midlands route) and only came back to Railworks/TSC because I had a hankering for some Class 40 action. I got TSW2 for the same reason (and the Trans Pennine route of course) but quickly lost interest (returning to TSC and the fantastic SELNEC route network and AP mods) until BPO came out and got some juices flowing and now here we are
Oh man, I used to watch this so many times as a kid, lol. Since I was a kid, I never bought any add-ons for the game, but loved to watch this video.
If we're talking first train sim used I give you Evening Star on the Amstrad CPC. It could never hope to be photo' real but it was just a straight port from the Spectrum version with no attempt to use the extra oomph.
I have the original spectrum version, it's probably one of my most prized possessions, I would literally fight to the death to save it......
There was also a visual artefact in external view where the whole train just hunted from side to side as one solid unit.
Ok, firing up WinCPC while hauling a tanker train to Seddin I did a lot of coding on the CPC 6128, its enhanced BASIC was superior to the C64's Microsoft BASIC. No worries, I have arrived safe and sound at Seddin.
Anyone remember the MSTS class 50 on the Settle and Carlisle route?! I remember thrashing it and thinking how awesome it was. I'd love to see it in TSW.
I do. Nice thing is, the MSTS activities can be recreated in TSC pretty easily... Consist data is here (MSTS file headers begin with "SIMIS", which was Kuju's previous name) JINX! Formation Designer, all you need is a text editor.
Its kinda cool that modern TSW can trace its heritage all the way back to MSTS directly and indirectly
Anyone remember the key commands for this old game? (Royal Scot). Quite a lot of similar sims from the same dev on this site. http://www.bbcmicro.co.uk/game.php?id=2612 edit. nvm - Z and X for brakes, < and > for power if anyones interested.
Me too As I recall we did get the game a few days before it was released in the stores I believe the owner of the community forum went to EA in Stockholm to pick up a big box full of games which he then posted out to all of us who had signed up for it. Those were the days
I started off on MSTS in 2006. I had London South Coast the series as an add on (London to Brighton. Victoria to Portsmouth, Bognor Regis, the entire west Coast way, all in one add on!). With this come a huge amount of rolling stock that filled out the route immensely, and something we could only dream about in TSW! Along with that I had Great Eastern (set in the late 1980s) and London & South East (Southern Region route set in the late 1970s). What MSTS did lack was the real life time tables unfortunately. From there I moved onto to Rail Simulator in 2008. I had TSC all the way up until 2015 and then had a 4 year break away from TSC and Train simulation as I didn't feel TSC could offer much anymore even with all the AP upgrades. I returned in 2019 with Train Sim World and have had every title since then. I've definitely seen the evolution from the mid 2000s up until now.
Yeah, something like this It was msts-e-buzz.net and they had some special downloads, like Marias Pass modified with OHLE and swedish assets, called "HNJ", also some "routes" for ships! I remember my first time with Rail Simulator, discovering the features. Once I tried the "L" key on my keyboard and it lowered the sunblind in Class 43. I wrote about it on the forum and then all members were like: "Oh, vad i helvete, I love those small cool features" ;D
For anyone from the US, we used to have a big electronics chain called Fry’s Electronics. Maybe people not from here even remember it. What was cool is you used to be able to go over to the computer games section and they actually stocked a lot of popular addons (back when everything was an install disk) right on the shelf. This went for Flight Simulator addons, too.
