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Trainz Railroad Simulator 2006
One of the first things
one has to take into consideration when playing this title is that if
you are not into trains then you might as well back off right now. This
is a game that caters to the real fans of all things locomotive, not
just for casual gamers to pick up and play.
All aspects of life on the rails is catered for in
this title, from passenger trains to freight carriers. Every detail is
accounted for (that I could see) in setting up your engine and even to
the point of putting together tracks and other bits and pieces to get
through the game.
Have patience young Padawan, this game is slow until
you actually get the train moving through the countryside. Graphically
the title does not impress too much; it’s rather simple looking and
possibly some more polish could have been added to make this game a bit
more forgivable to the casual gamer who was giving the title a shot out
of boredom or what have you.
This game has scored poorly with a lot of other
review sites out there, and whilst I am not saying my colleagues from
other publications are wrong, I do believe that they have not taken on
the task of reviewing the title as someone honestly interested in the
genre. My approach is from that perspective, let’s face it, there is no
way in hell you would just buy this game unless you had an interest in
trains.
There is nothing exciting in this title, although I
can say with confidence that it is the most fully featured train game I
have seen on the market in a heck of a long time.
One thing that I really liked about this game was
that the developers have fully looked after the punters with this title
with such a swag of downloadable extras of the likes that I have never
seen before. With the Auran site being located at
http://www.auran.com/TRS2006/ they are currently boasting there are
almost 60,000 objects that users have uploaded for the benefit of other
fans of the game. That is just massive and sure to make any who
purchases this game a very happy camper.
Other bonuses are the built in chat feature added to
the game that will let you chat to other players online when your train
is enroute to a location. As anyone who has played knows, this is a
godsend as some of those trips are pretty slow!
The final word? If you are a train nut, you are going
to go wild over this and have even less of a life than you most likely
already have. Make sure you are up to speed with all your jargon however
as there is a lot of it featured in the game and not a lot of explaining
done as to what it all means. I think that Auran have take (possibly
quite rightly) the position that if you are buying this game, there is a
great chance that you are going to know a fair bit about trains.
I fully recommend this title to anyone interested and
put up big warning signs to anyone else who might not be committed to
the extent that you will have to be to play this game and get anything
out of it. There has been a great deal of care and attention given to
the title and our friends at Auran are to be applauded for their efforts
along with the enthusiasts who so readily give of their time and provide
assets for others to download and integrate into their games. |
