Does anyone have any infomation about this?
Thanks in advance.
Locomania
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PaulGardner
- Getting the hang of things now
- Posts: 39
- Joined: Thu Oct 28, 2004 5:34 pm
Locomania
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASI ... 73-7805521
Does anyone have any infomation about this?
Thanks in advance.
Does anyone have any infomation about this?
Thanks in advance.
-
NeutronIC
- Atomic Systems Team
- Posts: 11085
- Joined: Fri Oct 05, 2001 12:00 am
- Location: E11, London, England
- Contact:
It's not 
I've got a review copy here - it's a kind of strategy game. It's quite pretty and in full 3D but essentially it boils down to the following:
There are a number of entry and exit points and stations. There are also numerous points.
While playing a level your job is to build up a certain score, you get some points for getting a loco through all its jobs (e.g. it arrives and is held at an entry point, it has a work order represented by icons above the cab such as "stop at green station depart through blue tunnel", you then have to set the points and clear the signal to let it run, making sure you set the signal on the station so it stops.
Each train has a random work order and they start to happen at the same time, your job is to clear them as quickly as possible which can mean some juggling. If you take too long between 'completions' then you lose a point, and continue losing points periodically.
Personally after a quick run in the game I found it very frustrating and i'm only on the first level! Maybe i'm just dumb?
Some initial comments:
It uses the same portals sometimes for entry and exit, which means you can have a train almost through to the exit portal when suddenly another train appears and screws it all up. There may be a way to improve this though, not sure.
There are only signals (so far, that i've seen) at stations and the entry point - so you couldn't even say this is an attempt at a simple signalling simulation (which might have been more fun). Once you start a train on its way I am not sure if there's any way to stop it, but i'll find that out before I write the review of course What i'd like to have done is let it in to a particular section and have the trains simply running section to section - but you can literally have them tail-chasing or crashing in to each other quite easily if you're not careful.
Overall so far (after only an hour or two) it's well presented and has potential - I'm just hoping that further experimentation will help iron out some of the quirks i'm having with it - if not then it's seriously flawed imho.
Matt.
I've got a review copy here - it's a kind of strategy game. It's quite pretty and in full 3D but essentially it boils down to the following:
There are a number of entry and exit points and stations. There are also numerous points.
While playing a level your job is to build up a certain score, you get some points for getting a loco through all its jobs (e.g. it arrives and is held at an entry point, it has a work order represented by icons above the cab such as "stop at green station depart through blue tunnel", you then have to set the points and clear the signal to let it run, making sure you set the signal on the station so it stops.
Each train has a random work order and they start to happen at the same time, your job is to clear them as quickly as possible which can mean some juggling. If you take too long between 'completions' then you lose a point, and continue losing points periodically.
Personally after a quick run in the game I found it very frustrating and i'm only on the first level! Maybe i'm just dumb?
Some initial comments:
It uses the same portals sometimes for entry and exit, which means you can have a train almost through to the exit portal when suddenly another train appears and screws it all up. There may be a way to improve this though, not sure.
There are only signals (so far, that i've seen) at stations and the entry point - so you couldn't even say this is an attempt at a simple signalling simulation (which might have been more fun). Once you start a train on its way I am not sure if there's any way to stop it, but i'll find that out before I write the review of course
What i'd like to have done is let it in to a particular section and have the trains simply running section to section - but you can literally have them tail-chasing or crashing in to each other quite easily if you're not careful.Overall so far (after only an hour or two) it's well presented and has potential - I'm just hoping that further experimentation will help iron out some of the quirks i'm having with it - if not then it's seriously flawed imho.
Matt.
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NeutronIC
- Atomic Systems Team
- Posts: 11085
- Joined: Fri Oct 05, 2001 12:00 am
- Location: E11, London, England
- Contact:
Right, re-read the manual and there are a couple of things that can help:
1. You can't stop a train anywhere you like, but if it comes across points that are set against it, it will stop.
2. You can change the direction of a train by clicking on it, so if you get in to a problem you can reverse back and fix it.
3. The *first* level is pretty tough, took me 15 minutes to finally get up enough score quickly enough to beat the 12 point requirement.
4. And then it bloody crashed and I have to do the first level AGAIN.
Bah.
Still, I think once I get the hang of it, this *might* actually grow on me, as long as it doesn't just keep crashing all the time.
To clarify for others: It is NOT a simulator, it is a puzzle game. You do NOT drive trains and you can't make layouts or even build your own puzzles from what I can see. Each puzzle seems to play out the same too I think, so once you've beaten it once and/or got a strategy for it you shouldn't have any problem again - this obviously causes concern for replayability later on though.
There are a number of game modes such as Time Attack (get up to a particular score, losing points all the time, so you have to get enough completed quickly enough to beat it). Time Attack Unlimited just get as much score as you can, no limit. Checkpoint mode gives you a set amount of time to start, when you get a train through you get one more minute added to the clock, keep going until you run out of time.
There is a tutorial but tbh it's so basic it just gives you the operation instructions and no clue about strategy.
There's nothing you can do about trains appearing before another train trying to depart, you just have to reverse the departing train out of the way, set the other train going and then when it's clear bring your departing train back again... I got stung twice in a row before I finally got one train out!
You can either set it to Czech or US locos.
Matt
1. You can't stop a train anywhere you like, but if it comes across points that are set against it, it will stop.
2. You can change the direction of a train by clicking on it, so if you get in to a problem you can reverse back and fix it.
3. The *first* level is pretty tough, took me 15 minutes to finally get up enough score quickly enough to beat the 12 point requirement.
4. And then it bloody crashed and I have to do the first level AGAIN.
Bah.
Still, I think once I get the hang of it, this *might* actually grow on me, as long as it doesn't just keep crashing all the time.
To clarify for others: It is NOT a simulator, it is a puzzle game. You do NOT drive trains and you can't make layouts or even build your own puzzles from what I can see. Each puzzle seems to play out the same too I think, so once you've beaten it once and/or got a strategy for it you shouldn't have any problem again - this obviously causes concern for replayability later on though.
There are a number of game modes such as Time Attack (get up to a particular score, losing points all the time, so you have to get enough completed quickly enough to beat it). Time Attack Unlimited just get as much score as you can, no limit. Checkpoint mode gives you a set amount of time to start, when you get a train through you get one more minute added to the clock, keep going until you run out of time.
There is a tutorial but tbh it's so basic it just gives you the operation instructions and no clue about strategy.
There's nothing you can do about trains appearing before another train trying to depart, you just have to reverse the departing train out of the way, set the other train going and then when it's clear bring your departing train back again... I got stung twice in a row before I finally got one train out!
You can either set it to Czech or US locos.
Matt