Microsoft Train Simulator, London and South East Add-on

[joediesel]

Hi, I'm thinking of buying this from Amazon, but the reviews don't look too promising, complaining of crashes and program corruption. I really want this route though, it's my home area, and reminds me of my train spotting days and one of my favourite loco's, the Class 37. Has anyone else had experience with this ad-on ?

Joe.

[Easilyconfused]

A lot of people have experience of it since it has been around a while now. It is very good and I still enjoy running trains on it. There are some patches for it on the Making Tracks website that are really required to correct a few odd issues. Making Tracks also have some bonus content for it on their website too (along with a ton of other great stuff).

It is an intensive route and will make your PC work for it so check the specification carefully and have a search around the forums here and at Making Tracks. A lot of what is written on Amazon is quite frankly inaccurate.

It is in the CD ordering here and also available on Making Tracks own site.

[shebarose]

Even though its old its well up there with some of the best MSTS routes


[Edit:]

My post count is 666

[rufuskins]

It was one of my first buys and it duly crashed.

Installed TrainStore and it worked a treat.

Highly recommended, especially as there are many activities for download off UKTS.

Ruf

PS Don't forget the additional service packs that can be obtained from Making Tracks.

[michaelhendle]

It's a realy good route and both Charing Cross and London Bridge are fantastic,it rael represents London in the late 60's to the 80's the only thing is it's heavy on the frame rates especialy in the London area but once you get past Lewisham and New Cross the frame rates increase.

As others have said best to use both trainstore and MSTS bin,and make sure you download the patches from MT in sequence,about the only item of stock missing for that era are the Hastings DEMU's,you get a good selection of emu's and some class 33 and 71,emu's are CEP,CIG,MLV,414,201/5/7,VEP,EPB,Railair VEG,Most come in Blue,Blue/Grey and Green.

I would suggest it pays to buy a brand new copy either from MT or UKTS at least if there is a fualt you can get a replacement with no problems.

Michael

[buffy500]

about the only item of stock missing for that era are the Hastings DEMU's,y

For the record, there IS ( and always has been) a Class 201 in LSE.

Personally I would be somewhat skeptical of some of the comments on Amazon, the person who was the most vocal if I'm honest appeared to have some axe to grind against MT based on some of his comments.
There are more reviews than when I last looked so I'm not sure of what most say, but just remember that there is a much greater body of customer experience on this forum, so before basing any decisions on LSE or MT, see what people here say, which is what you are doing.
Poor support was the result of the publisher doing it, anyone contacting MT can expect a better response than from the publisher, who has no tech support department with experience of even simple well known issues.

You know what its like, MSTS can be temperamental in the extreme, someone visiting from 'Call of Duty' land might not accept that some things need tweaking..
I'd suggest reading all 13 reviews and feedback here for the full picture.

[NiallGray]

That review is from early 2006. Back in 2006 my then pc (at that stage a few years old) was rubbish for running LSE. The settings were down very low.
My current PC runs it on full settings with no problems, even in London.

It's a cracking route and until Great Eastern came out was head and shoulders above anything else around at that time (In my opinion!)

[yerkes]

If you have any liking at all for third-rail SR stock, you have to get this. The quality and range of rolling stock is excellent. I have never had a technical problem with the route, to the best of my recollection.

[energize]

Definitely buy it. It was the first add-on I bought for MSTS back in 2004, and even at the tender age of 13 I was very impressed. As well as the lines to Redhill and Tunbridge Wells it includes the branches to Crystal Palace & Caterham (though there weren't any activities for the latter) and Redhill - Tunbridge Wells before electrification.