Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004

List Price: $39.95 Discount Price: $19.84

Features:

• 3D interactive railroad simulation game
• Choose from more than 50 authentic real world trains from famous railroads around the globe
• Create your own routes and worlds, or set industry production levels as operations manager
• Control one or more locos and issue orders to other drivers
• For 1 player

Accessories:
PC Gamer (1-year)	Games for Windows: The Official Magazine

Customer Reviews:

24/7 Fun-Filled Excitement [Posted on 2004-12-09]
Our 6 year old son has been FASCINATED with trains for a few years now (like most boys) and he has played other train software programs. However, when he found TRAINZ on google and liked what he saw . . . we purchased this program for his enjoyment. Well, I gotta tell ya, setting it up was alittle on the "higher" learning curve but now . . . we cannot get him off of this program. AMAZING for us to watch him (6yo) paint the train (Paint Shed), create the track layout including town, cars, and run his trains.

Now . . . he is teaching mom and dad how to run the program.

Listen, if your CHILD is interested in TRAINS . . . . this program is a MUST BUY!!!! You will be "AMAZED" beyond comprehension on the graphics and simplicity of this smooth program. Additionally, you will enjoy countless hours watching your child "dream" and play an educational program and LEARN!!!

Cheers . . . Joe and Jan, Oak Harbor, WA, USN.

Total Failure [Posted on 2004-12-10]
It came on two CDs and you eventually discover that the second CD holds the software which is needed to fix the bugs on the first.

You also need a graphics card or equivalent.

I do not have the graphics capability so although it appeared to load it would not run.

I shall give it away or bin it.

Great Train Simulator and a fantastic value! [Posted on 2005-02-22]
First, let's understand what we're looking at here. TRS 2004 is an advanced 3D Railroad simulation, which can take a decent amount of computing horsepower to provide an enjoyable experience. Those who don't bother to read the system recommendations and requirements on the box or on Auran's Website (such as those amazed that a "graphics card" is needed) will probably be somewhat disappointed when their 5 year old computer doesn't run it well. Most people with a fairly new, fairly powerful computer should find that it runs sufficiently. If your computer can run games such as Far Cry and Doom 3, it should have no problem running Trainz. Again, check the requirements BEFORE purchasing, or don't whine about it later. That being said, TRS 2004 is a wonderful world of railroading. There are so many different aspects to the program, that almost everyone is sure to find something of interest. If you like creating your own worlds fron scratch, you can do it. If you simply want to watch the trains run, you can do it. If you want to drive the trains, you can do it. If you're interested in the assets management aspect such as providing fuel for the power plant, power for the other industries, etc., you can do that. If you want to build and paint your own 3D scenery items, engines and rolling stock, you can do that as well, with the included Paint Shed and the free downloadable GMax, which is a scaled down version of Discreet's 3DStudio Max.

It's amazing how one person can complain that it doesn't come with enough items, and then also complain that those items take up 1.5 gigs of hard drive space. Granted, out of the box TRS 2004 doesn't come with everything you could ever want to run on your railroad, but it does come with a sufficient amount of engines, rolling stock and scenery items from around the world to more than adequately get you started. Add to that over 39,000 additional free items, mainly created by a large and active 3rd party development community conveiniantly archived at Auran's Download Station, and there's an amazing array of just about everything you could want. While downloading larger items for free can be time consuming, faster download speeds are available for an incredible price of under $10 per year, which helps to defray the cost of providing the servers the content is stored on. The support provided by the program's authors is amazing, both via online forums, a helpdesk, and through live online chat sessions. It isn't unusual to catch some of the principles of the company such as the CEO or members of the design team online and answering questions or giving details about forthcoming improvements. Imagine going online and finding Bill Gates providing support for some of Microsoft's products. Of course, that won't ever happen, but that's what you'll find from Auran.

It isn't the perfect program (what program is?). There are a few issues and features which could be better, but at least the people who wrote it are interested and active in making it better. If you like trains, you just might find all of your free time being taken by this program. I've personally spent the last 3 years with this and previous incarnations of this product, and I can truthfully say, in terms of value received compared to price paid, it's both the best and cheapest program I own. Endless hours of enjoyment to be had by fans of all ages is truly priceless.

There's a better alternative! [Posted on 2006-01-11]
All TRAINZ railroad simulators are based on model railroading, NOT real-world railroading, a fact that becomes obvious as one becomes familiar with the simulator. For example, zooming out reveals that the "terrain" consists of a narrow strip of territory--like a model railroad layout--rather than a unified simulated world. In my opinion, Microsoft's Train Simulator, even though outdated, is a much better product and certainly costs much less.
TRAINZ requires an immense amount of processor speed, hard disk space, and graphics memory--be sure to read ALL of the system requirements before buying.
Whatever you do, do not buy the 2006 version of TRAINZ. It is a poorly designed product rushed to market too quickly and has more bugs than a swamp in summer.
Both versions of TRAINZ tout the ability to obtain lots of free content by download (an internet connection is obviously needed--I add this to cover the stupidity of people who think a computer simulation game can be run without a graphics card). This come-on of free content is mostly felonious. Yes, additional content can be downloaded, eating up huge amounts of hard drive real estate; however, once downloaded that content proves mostly worthless because it contains even more bugs and errors than the original program.
I'm happy to see that some people are having fun with TRAINZ, but I have found it frustrating and disasterous.

OK...... [Posted on 2006-03-15]
I like TRS2004 alot. I am hoping to get TRS2006 soon. One problem on my game though.... The water in the driver and surveyor modules does not reflect the sky. Nor does it look too 3D. I have tried both DirectX 9.0c and openGL but I guess there is just nothing I can do about it. My graphics card is an Intel 82845G card and the TRAINZ system requirments said you need a NVIDIA GEFORCE chip. If anyone can help,please write back daily.-(...),Age 11, "the train geek"

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