Trainz

Trainz
A screenshot of Trainz 2004 in Driver mode, showing third-party British rolling stock.
Developer(s)	Auran
Platform(s)	Windows
Genre(s)	Simulation

Trainz, fully Trainz Railroad Simulator or (in Britain) Trainz Railway Simulator, is a 3D computer game and train simulator created by Australian games developer Auran. The game was rated well by the gaming community. It received a rating of 8.7 from GameSpot and a user score of 8.0

Concept

The game is divided into four modules: Driver, Surveyor, Scenarios, and Railyard.

Modules

• Surveyor is the route editor. Here, the user can shape and 'paint' the landscape, lay tracks, and place buildings, scenery and trains. Users can create their own routes as well.
• Driver takes the scene created in Surveyor and allows the user to operate the trains. There are two methods of manual control: DCC mode which simulates the simple stop-and-go of a model railway, or Cabin mode, which simulates real-world physics (especially in TRS 2006). Alternatively, the trains can be given instructions and driven by the computer, or known as "scheduling".
• Scenarios ( available in UTC and newer versions) are pre-scripted activities which let you go through a specific set of challenges, such as getting your passengers to their destinations on schedule, or switching rail cars in a rail yard without damaging the cargo. In TRS 2006 and Trainz Driver Edition scenario-like activities called sessions can be run in the Driver module.
• Railyard (known as My Collection in UTC and earlier versions of the game) is a virtual trainshed where the user can view locomotives and rolling stock, toot horns, toggle pantographs and lights, and sometimes view their description.

An additional 'module' is the external program Paintshed, which is a simple program for recolouring Trainz locomotives and other rolling stock. Paintshed has been included with Trainz since version 1.5.

Trainz has a large content creation community who use modelling software such as Gmax to create additional scenery and rolling stock models for use in the game. The more recent versions of Trainz include a lot of third-party content; registered owners of the game can download third-party content and upload their own creations via the Trainz website.

Trainz controls and commands may be intimidating, but are worth learning in order to fully enjoy the game.

Community Involvement

Auran have, on a number of occasions, involved community members in the development of Trainz, via their online forums. Some of the community initiatives have included:

• File:Trainz LBTG icon.png The Language Beta Translation Group was set up in 2003 to translate Trainz 2004 into the many versions it was going to be released as. The lengthy translation were never used.
• File:Trainz CCG icon.png The Content Creation Group (part of the beta testing group) was created for Trainz 2004 so that more regional content was to be included in the game. The group was a success with much of the new content in TRS 2004 and TRS 2006 having been created by the CCG.
• File:Trainz TotR icon.png Trainz on the Road was a program to demonstrate and sell Trainz at model railway and computer shows. The TotR concept is a success in the way that the community itself organised shows to promote the game. Auran rewarded demonstrators with premium access to its DLS facilities.
• File:Trainz FCT icon.png The First Class Ticket is an option of paying for a DLS service that operates at a faster speed (much faster downloads).It also removes the daily 100MB download limit.

Download station

File:Tacs.png

The Trainz Asset Creation Studio, an addon for Gmax used to export content into Trainz format.

Auran's Download Station, or DLS, offers a huge number of additional items for the various versions of Trainz created by users. This facility is free of charge to purchasers of the program (unless an FCT is activated, see above). It is where community members can upload their creations and where members can download them for their game.

Content creation

Content creation is supported since the first version and using third party modelling programs such as Gmax and 3D Studio Max, community members are able to model their own item and import it into Trainz.

A large number of third-party web sites have been created which offer additional items for Trainz created by groups of enthusiasts, together with a wealth of technical information and assistance. Many of these web sites have discussion fora. Some sites offer their creations free of charge, some suggest that a voluntary donation is made while others sell items commercially.

Hardware

A desktop cab controller called RailDriver is available, which is compatible with Trainz.

Version History

• Trainz Beta version 0.9 was released in November 2001.
• Trainz version 1.0 (Community Edition) was released in December 2001.

Trainz 1.0 had four service packs released during 2002, the last of which was for non-English versions only. Thus the original version is commonly known as Trainz 1.3.

• Trainz version 1.1.1 (Retail Edition) was released in January 2002.

Trainz 1.1.1 had two service packs released during 2002, the last of which was for non-English versions only. Thus the original version is commonly known as Trainz 1.3.

• Ultimate Trainz Collection (UTC or Trainz 1.5) was released in November 2002.
• Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 (or Railway in the UK, TRS 2004 or Trainz 2.0) was released in September 2003.

TRS 2004 had four service packs released throughout 2004 and 2005.

• Trainz Railroad Simulator 2006 (TRS 2006, Trainz 2.5) is the main version available and was released in September 2005. In Germany, it was published by Bluesky-Interactive, and called ProTrain Perfect, instead of TRS 2006.
• Trainz Railroad Simulator 2007 (TRS 2007) is available in France, Belgium, Switzerland and Canada and is distributed by Anuman Interactive. There are two versions, Standard which consists of Trainz 2006 with SP1 (Service Pack 1) applied and Gold which also includes some French regional add-on items. However there is now a version of Trainz 2007 published by Halycon Media GmbH&Co.KG available in Germany, Austria and Switzerland with additional German regional content instead of French content as with the "other" Trainz 2007.

• Trainz Classics (Trainz Railways in the UK) (first installment of the series was released on July 9, 2007) is a series of releases based on Trainz 2006 but with some improvements to the coding and instead of having a lot of built in content like Trainz 2006, each release instead has only one or two routes with some rolling stock and locomotives made for that route. The series attempts to focus on a particular region and point in time of the region's railway infrastructure history, for example the current release is focused on the line of Settle-Carlisle in Great Britain in the 1960's. Trainz Classics 3 was released on July 23 2008.

• Trainz Simulator 2009 will support many new features. Its first version, Trainz Simulator 2009: World Builder Edition has been released for digital download, on 27th of November and boxed copy orders will be shipped in approximately after release of the Downloadable Versions,in December 2008. The second edition, Trainz Simulator 2009: Engineers Edition is planned for Q1 2009..

Regional versions

• Trainz Railway Simulator is a re-release of Trainz UTC for the British market. It was however promoted as being a new game.
• Trainz Driver (called Trainz Driver Edition in the USA) is a cut-down version of TRS 2006 with the Surveyor layout creation module omitted. A review is available on V-Scaler. The UK release date was 24-Feb-06.

Future of the series

In June 2008 Auran announced the next installment in the Trainz series: Trainz Simulator 2009 and also Trainz Simulator X. Little information is currently available but there are plans to release these versions within the next two years.

On November, 27, 2008, Auran released via download, Trainz Simulator 2009: World builder edition, with DVD copies to be delivered within the following week.

External links

• Trainz 2009 website
• Trainz 2006 website
• Trainz 2004 website
• Trainz website
• Trainz Classics website
• Screenshots of Trainz 2006 Including a small route building tutorial.