Silver Lining..

[growler37]

Hi
RS has not stood still since release, the upgrades have made a huge difference,with TS2 almost certainly shelved,and my heart goes out to those who have lost there jobs,i agree with the other posters here,try RS i think you will be pleasently suprised,for instance ,download the excellent GWR King and take it for a drive,it shows just how good RS is.
Best regards
Kevin

[stephenholmes]

Hi everyone
I entirely agree with Michael and Geoff(Acorncomputer) there has been alot of mis-information about Rail Simulator
Rail Simulator hasn't required the disc to be installed for some time now
There is quite alot of new content in production and plenty of recent additions to please most Rail Sim fans.
I cannot understand the hostility in some quarters to Rail Simulator.
I made the change last August and I havn't looked back I think Rail Simulator is brilliant.
Thanks to all those who have made Rail Simulator a success
Kind regards to you all Stephen

[TheTazman]

This is also a disaster for the FS community it would seem.

[paulz6]

This is also a disaster for the FS community it would seem.

That really is the 'shocker', after over two decades of a successful franchise.

[RailX]

some really bad news for the msts fans, of course when its true. but there is no official statement from the microsoft side.
and when there is no official statement everything is speculation. of course those bad news can slow down the game progress extremly.
but after the financial desaster 2008, this is no surprise for me. its only the beginning.

[paulz6]

Since they've basically laid off the entire production team, speculation that there will not be an MSTS2 is probably not unreasonable. Whether an independent TS2 can be rescued is another matter. I would have thought the FS franchise at least would be sold off. I'm sure it has value.

[Easilyconfused]

I would refer members to Matt's comments at http://www.uktrainsim.com/index2.php?fo ... eport=1125

There is no official comment or statement from Microsoft and although we do have one member here who appears to have been one of those losing their job we don't really have any hard information.

As Matt states (and I have done similar searches) everything leads back to that one source so until official comment is made please let's try not to get too excited / disappointed by the "news". This could turn into a case of internet rumour becoming "fact" due to the number of times it is repeated on various forums.

[gswindale]

Was also annoyed by the copy protection demanding the disc in the drive. Gamejackal sorted it initially, but then with the upgrades and developers pack, it became more and more annoying, so I went back to MSTS with the best type of copy protection - none.

You do not need the disc in the drive if you get the (free) developer version.

It sounds as though some people are not up to speed on developments.

Hmm - it didn't like it whenI tried the developer version, but that was about a year ago.

Have to say I did give up and haven't followed developments, so may look into it again, but what sort of machine would I need to get it running decently (preferably a laptop)?

[paulz6]

Have to say I did give up and haven't followed developments, so may look into it again, but what sort of machine would I need to get it running decently (preferably a laptop)?

RAM is key to allowing the CPU and GPU to be able to perform at their full capabilities. I would recommend 2GB for XP and 3GB for Vista as a minimum.

I got reasonable performance on my old machine (AMD64 3200+) after upgrading to 2GB and installing an AGP 256MB 7600GTS card. It just wouldn't perform with 1GB of RAM, to much memory swapping (256MB 5600FX). You can tell if you have enough RAM by closing down RS. It should close down immediately. If it grinds away for several seconds you do not have enough RAM, and upgrading processors and graphics cards is not going to solve the problem.

My new machine is a Q6600, 4GB RAM, 2 x 256MB 8600GTS. The performance improvement wasn't massive.

[andymar54]

Re running RS on a laptop,I bought a Dell XPS with Vista installed to run FSX and it runs RS just fine. It has 512Mb Graphics (Nvidia GeforceGo 7950GTX) and 4 Gb RAM, Dual 2.3Gb Processor.
I'm aware my version of Vista can only use 3Gb RAM but updating from 2Gb made a significant difference to running RS.

Andy M

[captaincooke]

I too have not kept up with developments. Is it still fair to say that RS is mainly a driver simulator rather than a railway simulator?

No criticism implied in this question.

[Acorncomputer]

Hi

Rail Simulator is much more than a Railway Simulator, very much as MSTS1 is not just a Train Simulator

If you like driving - you can
If you like modelling - you can
If you like writing scenarios (activities) - you can
If you like route building - you can
If you like signalling - you can
If you like creating your own weather - you can
If you like creating your own textures - you can

and so on.

[rickloader]

I can understand that the advent of MSTS2 has hung like a threat over RS, and MSTS2 apparent loss gives some satisfaction to those who have devoted hard work in developing models for RS. But surely the same harsh economics that appear to have struck microsoft will apply even more forcefully to funding future developmentof RS? ( and I`m not aware of any plannned RS2 - just wishful thinking?)

I don`t think the news will influence those of us still working with MSTS1 . We bought RS, and found it couldn`t deliver key aspects of the game we felt essential. So we shelved it. It would be foolish to devote hundreds of hours working on a sim that can`t fulfil your expectations. Specifically, while the RS signalling, AI, despatcher and scenarios are good enough for a game, they aren`t adequate for a Simulation.
This being the case it is entirely rational to stay with MSTS1. It isn`t fear of the unknown of being outside comfort zone, reluctance to throw away past work, needing weening, or being vindictive about RS. All these accusations are made quite unfairly to MSTS "diehards" by people with a shallow concept of the hobby. Graphics is all to them.
Several respected routebuilders have expressed weariness, and attributed it to burnout after years of creativity. I suspect that if a really competent Sim appeared they would be galvanised. It looked like MSTS2 might be that Sim and if we`ve lost it, I mourn.
In case I seem anti RS, I would love to see it flourish, I applaud the efforts of RSDL, but they are so small. I fear the money won`t be available for the RS v2 which could replace MSTS2
Rick

[paulz6]

I too have not kept up with developments. Is it still fair to say that RS is mainly a driver simulator rather than a railway simulator?

No criticism implied in this question.

I'm not sure that was ever a fair thing to say in the first place. It probably is fair to say the original release was released in a 'ropey' state. My initial reaction is that I was both impressed and disappointed.
Like most IT projects, if you don't hit the first target, you delay the target. If you don't hit the second target, you cut scope.
RS has since had to updates which have improved things considerably. The signaling is now much better (CL approach control, semaphore behaviour etc.) There are still things that can improve and we have another update on the way.
The important point is that the RS engine is still being developed and so will improve. The more people that get behind the simulator, the more it can improve. MSTS is a legacy product. It's core engine is not being developed and there is only so much hacking that you can do.
Add-on content for RS has improved considerably too, especially in the latter half of the year. It takes time to develop add-on content and the quality of the content being produced is far in advance of that for MSTS.
I've never looked back at MSTS since RS was released, just as I have no desire to 'dust off' an old 286.
As a route builder it will take me time to produce a route. In that time the engine is being improved. Hopefully this will continue and things will come together quite nicely.

[Acorncomputer]

Hi

Rail Simulator is much more than a Railway Simulator, very much as MSTS1 is not just a Train Simulator

If you like driving - you can
If you like modelling - you can
If you like writing scenarios (activities) - you can
If you like route building - you can
If you like signalling - you can
If you like creating your own weather - you can
If you like creating your own textures - you can

and so on.

I should also add that there are over 500 A4 pages of detailed information that comes with the simulation to help you achieve these goals.