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2nd June 2005 Trainz Railroad Simulator 2006 Announced! Trainz Railroad Simulator 2006 (TRS2006) is the next in the series of award winning railroad simulators developed by Auran. Previously known as Engineers Edition, TRS2006 is being released as a full product later this year and sets new standards of realism and immersion in operating a virtual railroad. TRS2006 ships with fully realized routes that include a wide range of activities users can immediately enjoy. Run long haul freight services, high-speed passenger runs or challenging yard operations as you service a huge variety of interactive stations and industries. TRS2006 significantly enhances the driving experience with improvements to the physics engine, adding to the challenge of keeping your train performing efficiently. TRS2006 includes a new asset management utility, making it easier for users to access and organize their content, download new content from the Download Station, and even edit existing content. The Trainz tools and rules systems have also been greatly improved to give you more flexibility than ever before in creating your own railroad experience. Over the coming weeks more and more information will be shared with the community via the Trainz Discussion Forms. TRS2006 is the most complete railroad simulator ever developed! TRS 2006! Testers Speak Out! Auran caught up with some of the community members who have graciously volunteered their free time to help test TRS2006: Auran: How long have you been using / playing Trainz. DH2K3: I've been using TRS2004 since December 31, 2003. Since a certain other company is not planning on releasing a sequel to their Train Simulation product I thought I'd try something new. Since then I haven't looked back. Peter8: I can't remember when I started watching the development of the Trainz project on the web site, but I know it was well before I ordered Trainz 1.0 on 17 October 2001. It took a little time to arrive. I was a bit stingy, I only paid for "Standard Mail" shipping, but once it was here I remember being immediately impressed by it, especially Surveyor. I was a fan, and have bought each Trainz product since then. AJ_Fox: I've been a Trainzer for about ten months now. Having always been a rail fan and after hearing good things about TRS 2004, I decided it was the one for me. The thing that impressed me the most about TRS were the many different features built into it and the ability to make your own layouts without going through a bunch of contortions and gyrations. Auran: How has the testing experience been so far? DH2K3: The testing experience has been a blast so far. I am actually learning things that I thought I'd never learn before. Peter8: Beta testing for Auran has always been good (I started just after TRS2004 was released), but I have to say that I have been very impressed with the testing process for TRS2006. The current development team at Auran is really working together well, and I think Proby is making much more effective use of his external testing team than I have experienced in the past. AJ_Fox: Beta testing is a new experience for me and I've thoroughly enjoyed it. It's really cool to see the metamorphosis of the next version of Trainz and feel like you're a part of it. It does require a certain amount of perseverance but that's part of the challenge of being a beta tester. Auran: What feature most excites you about TRS2006? DH2K3: Content Manager Plus. The reason I like this is because not only does it replace TDH, but it also has similar features to TrainzObjectz in it as well. Peter8: Well, there are a lot of enhancements to the existing platform (which shows yet again that Auran do listen to their Community). One in particular that I noticed in the initial feature list is an interesting extension to the Portal. I don't want to spoil the surprise, but it will go a lot further towards making a route feel like a region of a larger network, and it will give the Trainzer fresh management challenges. I'm looking forward to seeing what our talented creators can do with it. AJ_Fox: At this point in time, I'd have to say the new Content Manager Plus has me impressed the most. It completely rewrites the book on how content is downloaded and maintained. This is going to be a big hit. We'll have more information available for you in the coming weeks, along with more interviews with our beta testers. "Make Us A Movie" Trainz Competition - Winners Announced! The latest Trainz competition "Make Us A Movie" has been judged and the winning entries have been selected :- First Place - DaveW. His winning entry is titled "Steam Age Britain" It was filmed on a map made especially for this competition. Second Place - chuffchuff The Auranshire County Railway layout for TRS2004 was the setting for this entry. Third Place - jmorty used his Pichi Richi Railway to give us an insight to a working railway set in 20th century South Australia. Congratulations to our winners and thanks go to everyone who entered. The Make Us a Movie competition entries will be available for download soon. Stay tuned for more information on where to get them. New Faces on the Brew Crew! The Brew Crew area expanded recently to accommodate the arrival of Francois Coulombe. "Franky_c" joins the team as a Junior Programmer after spending 3 months working at Auran as part of his course at QANTM College. Franky's first job involves coding a new utility to help content creators make better, error-free content for TRS2006. Joining our Quality Assurance team is Scott Cameron and Adair Bricknell. As testing for TRS2006 gets down to serious business you may see them lurking in the chat or making strange posts to the forum. Join us in welcoming them all aboard. Euro / U.K Service Pack 4 Now On Auran's Server! Service Pack 4 for TRS2004 Euro / UK Edition is now available to download from the Auran website, then visit the Service Packs page. If you require one of these patches but don't want to download it they are now available on CD and you can order it through the Auran Shop for the cost of postage and handling. Forum Thread Spotlight! TRS2006 in PC PowerPlay Magazine! This thread says it all. http://forums.auran.com/TRS2004/forum/showthread.php?threadid=87285 "Quote" of the week! What happened at Trainz Exchange? http://forums.auran.com/TRS2004/forum/showthread.php?threadid=86925 It may pay you to check back there at least once a week. 15th December 2004 TRS2004 December Christmas Giveaway Extended! TRS2004 December Christmas Giveaway has been extended until December 20th, 2004! Due to popular demand, we have extended our special Christmas offers for 1 extra week. Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Edition (Australia) is now AUD59.95. Just in time for Christmas come two very special offers for all Trainz fans.
So hurry to the online store. These offers wont last! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays To You All! Auran will be closing for the Christmas holiday period from Thursday December 23rd, 2004 until Monday, January 10th, 2005. During this time there will be no custom content approved for uploading to the Download Station, and Helpdesk will be closed. On our return in January we will be approving all custom content uploaded during this period, and then be working hard to clear the backlog of Helpdesk inquiries. Please be patient with your requests. If you need to contact Helpdesk during this time please note that once your message has been auto acknowledged, you do not need to resend the request. During the break we will be monitoring the Forum and Chat and our Community Moderators will be around to help out. We would like to express our thanks to you all for a great Trainz Year. We thank you for your support, your challenges, and above all your participation as a part of this community. We wish you and your families a safe and happy time, and a prosperous new year and we look forward to seeing you all again soon. Toronto Trainz and Tom Rawlinson Announce Virtua! This just in from the team at TorontoTrainz... "Tom Rawlinson is the man behind Toronto Trainz. In 2002 Tom asked 3rd party content creators to help him create some special content. When everything started coming together VTPR was born. It proved not to be an easy job as Tom wanted to build something special for all Trainz Users. In 2003 Tom encouraged content creators from all over the world to participate on his LH4T project. Tom worked very hard to realize all different versions of LH4T. He had a live radio broadcast show to announce his route/layout and it is all done for the Trainz Community for free. Like many Trainz Community members, Tom does not charge for the packages he creates or for his fast support. In 2004 TT's project's included Century City and Dry Gulch. Tom has his own visions of what Trainz can be and his newest is The Virtua Series, a 1280 baseboard route package. Tom once again joined content creators from all over the world to realize this next masterpiece for Trainz. He and all members of the TT gang are working extremely hard for the Trainz Community to get the best package out to you, and once again all is for free. Tom is proud that he can work together with so many Content Creators who helped him the last 2 1/2 Years. Now enjoy The Virtua Series and have fun with the gift from Tom Rawlinson, and Toronto Trainz." Check out the TorontoTrainz website. Content Creation Guide (CCG) Updated! With the release of a number of updates that added many new features to the original TRS2004, we decided it was time to revise the CCG with the new capabilities available to content creators in Service Pack 4. We put out a call for feedback, suggestions and criticisms 6 weeks ago and received many email responses. Thanks to those that took time out to contribute their constructive feedback. Your comments and examples greatly assisted us in making sure that the update is comprehensive. Thanks also to the wider Trainz community for your forum posts on content creation issues and suggestions. The project took nearly 6 weeks and the man that took on the task was Ian Manion (aka Vulcan). Ian worked tirelessly through the feedback emails, forum posts and the original CCG. After checking the technical issues with the relevant team members here at Auran and adding Ian’s own expertise to the project, we can now bring you the updated CCG. Great job Ian! You can get the new Content Creation Guide (Zipped PDF file, file size: 5mb) here. We hope you have plenty of fun using the new CCG to make all that wonderful Trainz content, and we look forward to you sharing it with us on the Download Station. Forum Thread Spotlight! CONGRATULATIONS! to all who have kept their posts below 365 posts a year! This anti-waffle post turned out to be the best waffle thread of the year! Why not add your favourite topping to all the waffle in there, too. "Quote" of the week! This thread by cwhitedog says it all: Best Quotes of 2004! The Year That Was! WOW! What a great year 2004 has turned out to be. Lance_Jago, Proby and Cafe joined the team, GardenGnome took a well earned extended leave of absence, and we saw the Content Creation Art Source CD and service packs galore for TRS2004. Let's take a quick look back at the Trainz year of 2004.
We hope you have enjoyed 2004 as much as we have. We are looking forward to sharing the journey that lies ahead of us in 2005 with you. 3rd December 2004 TRS2004 Price Drop and December Christmas Giveaway! Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Edition (Australia) is now just AUD 59.95 and just in time for Christmas come two very special offers for all Trainz fans.
Make Us a Movie Competition Winners Announced! We are pleased to announce the winners of stage 1 of the Make Us a Movie competition! The 10 finalists are:
Congratulations again to the winners. We will keep you posted on stage 2 of the competition progress here. Content Creation Guide Being Updated! We are in the process of updating the Content Creation Guide by revising, editing and adding sections to bring it up to date with all the latest features introduced since TRS2004 was originally released. The CCG is being updated with the help of the community and our aim is to release it before Xmas. If you would like to check out the progress so far and perhaps give us some constructive feedback on errors, omissions, typos or comments then get the CCG document here. We'd welcome your feedback at this email address: ccg@auran.com Community Member Profile! David "dmdrake" Drake, User ID (KUID) 33404, was born in Virginia, last century ;) David is known to many as "The Tree Guy" having made many, many trees for Trainz. He started out making trees for his own use, later sharing them via the Download Station with the Trainz community and that's how the "World Tree Project" started. His idea was to produce specific trees just as there were specific rail cars and engines. Modelers David admires have honored him by asking him for specific trees, which has encouraged him to learn more, and produce better content. David has moved on to creating detailed structures now under his Tall Treez banner. At this point there are over 3500 dmdrake and TallTreez models available at the Download Station and the number of downloads is somewhere near 2 million. In November David's talents were rewarded when Auran asked him to include a selection of his content in the United States release of TRS2004 Deluxe Edition. David recently joined Trainz Pro Routes and his Tall Trees and Boardwalk RR has become a TPR project. David is a disabled Vietnam war veteran and lives in the beach community of Santa Cruz on the north edge of the Monterey Bay, 75 miles south of San Francisco. He is married and the proud father of 2 children and 3 grandchildren. Forum Thread Spotlight! In the thread "Your First Layout" netvideo tells us, "I remember my first layout was set in the desert and was only 1 baseboard." Tell us about the first layout or route you made with Trainz by posting to this thread. Share your story with the community. We' d love to hear all about it! "Quote" of the week! Get in now on the Christmas Trainz sale! Only until December 15th. 3rd November 2004 Service Pack 4 Announced! The extensive public testing of Service Pack 4 for TRS2004 (also known as SP4) has now concluded. The Brew Crew has been working to resolve outstanding issues for TRS2004. The open beta testing uncovered some minor issues that the Brew Crew has addressed. A huge thanks goes out to all the beta testers and those who have been involved in publicly testing Service Pack 4. We would also like to thank the following community members for their behind the scenes involvement working on SP4: Coerni, dh2k3, Hentis, Lars_LLJ, Lost_Soul, Magicland, Martinvk, MrMom, Natvander, Robin.Hoods, SirGibby, Wolf22 and Wulf_9. SP4 for TRS2004 is a recommended service pack update. If you are experiencing any technical difficulties with earlier Trainz builds we strongly encourage you to update to SP4. A complete set of patches will be made available over the coming weeks to cover all TRS2004 builds and the Brew Crew have now turned their attention to building patches required for various other international and language packs. For further details about Service Pack 4s, please see the following topics:
Helpdesk Upgrade! Due to the incredible amount of spam email received at our official technical support address we are closing down the helpdesk@auran.com email address as from 5.00 PM Wednesday November 3rd 2004 AEST. We have been testing the new Auran support system built around web-based forms, and the trials have been deemed a success. From now on should you need to contact Helpdesk, please do so at www.auran.com/helpdesk. Over time we will be changing all references to the helpdesk email address across our website and redirecting any new email received to the new web form. Discount Voucher Extended to Deluxe Edition! The 20% discount applicable to TRS2004 for registered owners of previous Trainz products has been extended to include the new Deluxe Edition (Australia). Simply apply the voucher when placing your order at the online store. If you cannot access your voucher during this procedure please contact us at www.auran.com/helpdesk for assistance. In addition to your discount, register your TRS2004 Deluxe Edition serial number in your Planet Auran profile and we'll give you a 3 month First Class Ticket for free! Community Member Profile! Yojimbo, one of our hardworking community moderators, announced he is the proud owner of some outstanding new content. Specifications:
Congratulations to you and your family, yojimbo. Forum Thread Spotlight! The possibility of Auran attending a European symposium was highlighted in this thread by Trainz Designer Henk "Café" Plaggemars. Henk points out the need to collect expressions of interest so necessary planning can be arranged. Without your input, it will be difficult to proceed. Thanks to those of you who have already replied with your feedback. Please feel free to contribute your thoughts and suggestions to this thread. "Quote" of the week! "How about that, Huh? 115,000 registered members." Indeed AJ-Fox, how about that! The Trainz registered community is now over 115,000 and growing. If you aren't sure of something or want to pass on information to others, please feel free to use the Trainz forum. It is great to see the community is still actively sharing support and offering advice to fellow members in a friendly and helpful way. Commissioner's Report! Welcome to the first ever edition of the Commissioner's Report! This Report will update you on the progress of the Brew Crew and the many projects they're working on. We hope to make this a regular addition in the Trainz Gazette. TRS Service Pack 4 After a 2 week beta release which saw the release of 3 different versions we can finally declare build 2365 as the final SP4. Any problems reported on SP4 (Build 2365) will be logged and will be addressed during the development of Engineers Edition. SP4 is currently available for the US (International), UK, French, German and Spanish editions of TRS. I would like to thank the community and the following members for their efforts in helping us release a very solid update: Hentis, Magicland, Martinvk, Lost_Soul, MrMom, dh2k3, Wolf22, Robin.Hoods, SirGibby, Wulf_9, Lars_LLJ, Coerni, and Natvander. Recent Releases The TRS2004 Deluxe Edition collection is growing! In addition to the Australian and German Editions, October 14th saw the release of the French Edition. Coming soon are the Swiss, US, Spanish, and Chinese editions. The UK edition is in development and will be released through Just Trains later in the year. What is the Deluxe Edition I hear you ask...the Deluxe Edition contains TRS2004, Paint Shed and a CD containing a selection of region specific content from the Download Station. It contains nothing that an existing TRS2004 owner doesn't already have access to in the Download Station. A complete list of assets contained in the various Deluxe Editions can be found at the Auran Announcements forum. Beta Tester Recruitment The deadline for receiving applications for Beta Testers has now passed. A lot of applications have been received and successful applicants will be notified in late October / early November. GardenGnome departs the station It's a sad day that sees the departure of GardenGnome (aka David Walsh) who has decided to take some time off from the Brew Crew. David has been instrumental in the areas of Trainz Script, Scenarios, Rule Creation and Installation Art, mainly around JB's desk, taking any opportunity he can to display those V cans. We wish him good luck and safe travels. Brew Crew Job openings The Brew Crew is looking for a Senior Software Engineer and a Web Programmer to join the group. If you're looking for a new challenge and you're willing to relocate to sunny Brisbane, check out the careers section at www.auran.com 7th October 2004 Service Pack 4 Public Beta Announced! This week it was announced that a round of Public Beta testing of Service Pack 4 for TRS2004 (also known as SP4) was underway. The Brew Crew has been working to resolve outstanding issues for TRS2004. This open beta testing has uncovered some minor issues that the Brew Crew are addressing. Thanks to all those who have been involved in testing so far. For further details about Service Pack 4, please see this forum post here. Discount Voucher Extended to Deluxe Edition! The 20% discount applicable to TRS2004 for registered owners of previous Trainz products has been extended to include the new Deluxe Edition (Australia). Simply apply the voucher when placing your order at the online store. In addition, register your TRS2004 serial number in your Planet Auran profile and receieve a 3 month First Class Ticket free. Helpdesk Upgrade! Due to the incredible amount of spam received at our official technical support address we will be closing down the helpdesk@auran.com email address very soon. We are now about to commence a new Auran support system built around web-based forms, and will be trialing it over the coming weeks. Should you need to contact Helpdesk, you can now go to www.auran.com/helpdesk During the trial period, we will be changing all references to the email address across our website. The helpdesk email address will still be active while we phase in the new form-based system. Call for Beta Testers! With the Engineers Edition Expansion Pack well underway, the call for beta testers has been announced. Do you have what it takes? Find out about it here. "Make Us A Movie" Trainz Competition! The latest Trainz competition, "Make Us A Movie", is now underway with plenty of time left to submit entries for the first round of judging, so get filming with Fraps now: available from http://www.fraps.com. Checkout the details at http://www.auran.com/TRS2004/competition.htm for your chance to win some great prizes, including: 1 of ten fully registered copies of FRAPS valued at USD39.95 each from http://www.fraps.com; Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Edition (Australia) Software; a RailDriver Desktop Train Cab Controller from http://www.raildriver.com; and more! Community Member Profile! Yojimbo, one of our hardworking community moderators, announced he is the proud owner of some outstanding new content. Specifications:
Mother, daughter and Dad are all well. Congratulations to you and your family, yojimbo. Forum Thread Spotlight! The possibility of Auran attending a European symposium was highlighted in this thread by Trainz Designer Henk "Café" Plaggemars. Henk points out the need to collect expressions of interest so necessary planning can be arranged. Without your input, it will be difficult to proceed. Thanks to those of you who have already replied with your feedback. Please feel free to contribute your thoughts and suggestions to this thread. "Quote" of the week! "An Enigma - Only Trainz seems to provide my areas of Maritime Interest." From Barry, our resident maritime lobbyist  This just goes to show how flexible and configurable Trainz is, as it appeals to many various hobbyists that the team never envisaged when it all began.
23rd September 2004 U.K and International Demos Released! The long awaited Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Demos are now available for download. You can get them here:
For those of you with limited download ability, we will have the International Version available on CD in the coming weeks. You will be able to order it through the online store for the cost of postage and handling as soon as it becomes available. Hot Off the Press! The latest news from RAZORBACK RAILWAYS is the release of their Version 6 Route…. RAZORBACK RAILWAY RELEASES V6 ROUTE The latest version of the route has seen a massive expansion! An extra 75 km of track is now available for you to explore and test your driving skills with our new v6 scenarios for The Living Railway. The Razorback now covers over 230km! Mainline electric traction on the 43km long Port Hunter Line will see you running inter-urban electric services with plenty of passenger action! High-speed sections where you can really open the throttle will have the scenery blur as you try and keep to challenging timetables! For a more sedate experience, you can head into dairy and cattle country on the 32km long Norris Green Branchline. Rural passenger operations, dairy facilities, forestry and logging operations will keep you busy for hours on end. Razorback 6 has taken nearly a year of work, and we hope you enjoy many hours of driving pleasure as you traverse the route. Available now at www.razorbackrailway.com The Razorback Team The RAZORBACK Routes are very popular and showcase some of the outstanding talent we have in the Trainz Community. You can find out more at http://www.razorbackrailway.com "Make Us A Movie" Trainz Competition! The latest Trainz competition "Make Us A Movie" is now underway with plenty of time left to submit entries for the first round of judging, so get filming with Fraps now, available from http://www.fraps.com. Checkout the details at http://www.auran.com/TRS2004/competition.htm for your chance to win some great prizes, including 1 of ten fully registered copies of FRAPS valued at USD39.95 each from http://www.fraps.com, Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Edition (Australia) Software, a RailDriver Desktop Train Cab Controller from http://www.raildriver.com, and more! Auran Post Modern Art Installation! When the legendary John_Banks took a short leave of absence to put the finishing touches on his PhD, the Trainz Crew donated the remains of the rocket fuel that keeps them programming through the late nights. "V" is the energy drink of choice at Auran, and comes from New Zealand, Just like JB. As you can see, we drink a lot of it. There is a lot of programming going on. 
Community Member Profile! Vulcan. Ian "vulcan" Manion is a high quality model builder, host to the SEQ Trainzers, and general all around nice guy. Apart from Ian's excellent models, his contributions to the community include a great tutorial outlining how to post screenshots, that now resides permanently at the top of the Screenshots forum. He entertains a motley crew of Trainz fans in his own home twice a month, and still keeps inviting them back :) Ian was recently invited to submit a selection of his content to the newly released Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Australian Deluxe Edition, something he did in his usual selfless way. Over 300 items of custom content made by Ian are available on the Download Station and he is still going strong. Some of his latest work carries a nautical theme and includes a working Ship Lock Ian is a semi retired structural engineer from Queensland Main Roads where he designed bridges. He lives in the Brisbane suburb of Graceville, on the Brisbane - Ipswich line, with his wife Ann. They have two grown children, 3 cats, and an HO scale model railroad that has not been used often since Trainz arrived. Forum Thread Spotlight! What is the Trainz Community about? It means many different things to many people from all walks of life and from many varied backgrounds. Here at Auran, we like to read about the experiences put forward by the community, and in this thread, Geoff_McDougall enlightens us with his positive perspective on the Trainz community. You can read Geoff's thread here. "Quote" of the week! "Deluxe Edition What a Lame idea" Deluxe Edition sold in 20,000 units in the first 2 weeks, and that was before the official announcement. It's been suggested we have a few more ideas just like it ;) Until next time, The Trainz Team. 9th September 2004 Trainz Newsletter 9th September 2004. Trainz Newsletter - Back on track. Welcome back to the Trainz Gazette. It has been a long time between drinks, as they say, but we are back on track with lots of news and a great new competition to celebrate the release of Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Editions. We have more details on these items later on. Goodbye Tim Carter - Welcome Paul Olsen! Our resident newsletter writer and marketing assistant Tim (yeoland) Carter has departed and headed off to Canada to follow his heart. While Tim is irreplaceable, or so he tells us, Paul (Paulie_O) Olsen has stepped up to the challenge and is fitting in quite nicely. Please join us in welcoming Paul to the Trainz Team. Proby Joins the Brew Crew. We also welcome to the Trainz Team Scott (Proby) Probin, who joins us in the role of Trainz Producer. Scott's experience and enthusiasm have already made a positive impact on the future direction of Trainz, and you will get to meet him when he publishes his "Commissioners Report" a little further down the track. Service Pack 2: Passenger Pack and Service Pack 3 for TRS2004. The long awaited Service Pack 2: Passenger Pack was released in May which added extra functionality to the operation of Trainz and introduced Passenger's and Industries along with the Portal. Visit Trainz Exchange Online from within TRS2004 or go to http://forums.auran.com/TRS2004/forum/showthread.php?threadid=61059 and SP2 release notes for more details. A small percentage of TRS2004 owners reported that SP2 created a stuttering effect on their PC's so in conjunction with community members this issue was addressed with SP3 for TRS2004. If you are happy with the performance of SP2 you do not need to install SP3 for TRS2004. Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Edition hit the shelves! Over the next few months some countries will be seeing a Deluxe Edition of TRS2004. We asked Henk (café) Plaggemars what "Deluxe Edition" is all about? What is the Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Edition? Well it's the latest patched version of TRS2004, with some extra goodies including Paintshed, Trainz Fan pack and a Content CD containing a sampler from the Download Station relevant to the country or region it is being sold in. It comes on 4 CDs and is displayed in new packaging. What's on the Content CD? The models contained on the CD are local assets, country specific to the area of release, and usually made by local content creators who have generously allowed us to include them in the Deluxe Editions. These assets are freely available to all registered users of TRS2004 from the Download Station and some fan sites. I already have TRS, should I get the Deluxe Edition? No, unless you are a Trainz collector, and we know some of our customers are like that ;). As an existing TRS2004 owner there is nothing in the Deluxe Edition content-wise that you can't download for free from the Internet. Will it cost more? No! The Deluxe Edition costs no more than the original TRS2004. Why did you release a Deluxe Edition? It was mainly on the request of our publishers. Some of them approached us about localizing TRS2004 even more for their markets and we thought it was a great idea. It fits in well with our research - people like to see their own trains, and with the recent Service Packs it seemed prudent to bundle it all into a "Deluxe" version. Will every country be getting its own Deluxe Edition? No, we are limited to those countries where the publisher is prepared to accept, or has requested a Deluxe Edition. Currently we will be releasing Deluxe Editions for the Australian, German, French, English and Spanish markets. What about countries that don't have a Deluxe Edition planned? These countries will be getting the standard TRS2004 as released last year. Of course as stated above these users will be able to update their TRS2004 to the equivalent of the deluxe version. What version will we be getting if we order through Auran's website shop? You will receive the Australian Deluxe Edition. If you take away the content CD the remaining 3 CD's represent the core of the TRS2004 version, including Trainz Paint Shed, and the Fan pack goodies. So there it is. If you have any more questions in relation to Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Edition, please contact Auran at helpdesk@auran.com New Trainz Competition Announced! The latest Trainz competition "Make Us A Movie" has been announced on the Competitions Page. Check out the details for your chance to win great prizes, including 1 of 10 fully registered copies of FRAPS, Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 Deluxe Edition (Australia) Software, a RailDriver Desktop Train Cab Controller and more! Welcome to the newest Trainz fan. Long time Trainz Community member, and all around funny guy, Euphod and his wife, Mrs Euphod, welcomes their second child, McKenna Marie Euphod. We would like to take this opportunity to congratulate Euphod and his family on the wonderful new addition to their family. Mother and baby are doing well and you can congratulate her Dad and welcome her to the Trainz world here.... The Trainz Team. 20th August 2004 Service Pack 3 for TRS2004 arrives at the Station! This is the latest upgrade to TRS2004 and is principally an optimization pack. Read more about SP3 for TRS2004 here. Service Pack 3 for TRS2004 contains optimizations that were implemented to reduce the amount of stuttering being experienced when a large amount of scenery objects are being loaded at one time whilst moving around the map. The large number of features that were added in SP2 is continued within SP3. For more information on the features contained within SP2, please read the SP2 Release Notes here. 4th May 2004 Service Pack 2 has arrived at the Station Brisbane, Australia. April 30 , 2004. Service Pack 2 - Passenger Pack, the latest update to the long running Trainz franchise, has been released and is now available for download from the official Auran website, plus many mirror sites around the world. SP2, which is the second free update to Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004, brings a huge number of new features and a host of improvements and bug fixes. Read the full press release here... Here are some of the comments posted by our fans to the Trainz forums about SP2:
What are your favourite new features? Make sure you vote in the latest Poll to let us know which of the new features in SP2 is your favourite. Currently the new train "portal" has 21% of the votes which is just behind "Loading and unloading Passengers" with 24%. Content Creation CD now available Auran have released a two CD set that contains all the original artwork (Studio Max files, texture files, etc.) for every model created since the beginning of the Trainz project. This includes models never released to the public such as the Budd Railcar and German VT11, as well as all your favourites from in-game. These CDs are designed for content creators and require either Gmax or 3D Studio Max to open the files. The majority of the content is created in 3DSM and therefore these files are not compatible with Gmax (since Discreet would rather that you purchased a license to their 3DSM software). Content Creators should also stay tuned to upcoming announcements regarding how to become involved in helping create future Expansion Packs for TRS2004. Order your copy of the Content Creators CD from the Auran online shop. Fansites: One of the strengths of Trainz is the amazing online community that supports this product in a variety of ways. As we near 100,000 registered members, the huge number of fansites listed on our website also keeps on growing. There are now 140 sites listed, many with their own unique flavour. For example, we have content creation sites such as Trainzluvr, country specific sites such as TrainzItalia, sites about a specific route or collection of routes such as TrainProRoutes, and even magazine type sites such as vmrj. If you haven't visited many of these fan sites, you're missing out on one of the best aspects of Trainz - namely seeing what other people are doing with their hobby. If you have a website and want to have it listed on the fansites page, please send us info and a link to helpdesk@auran.com. 30th April 2004 Service Pack 2 has arrived at the Station Brisbane, Australia. April 30 , 2004. Service Pack 2 - Passenger Pack, the latest update to the long running Trainz franchise, has been released as in now available for download from the official Auran website plus many mirror sites around the world. SP2, which is the second free update to Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004, brings a huge number of new features and a host of improvements and bug fixes. "With SP2 our fans can now really experience some of the many challenges in operating a real railroad", said Greg Lane, Auran CEO and creator of the original concept of Trainz. "Users can set up a variety of trains, each with their own set of orders, and watch as their railroad springs to life," continued Lane. "Of course they can also take over control of any one of the locos and experience first hand life behind the throttle of one of the many diesel, electric or steam locos." SP2 delivers new animated passenger stations, timetables, new flexibility with issuing and saving Driver Commands, and an overhaul of the minimap. The Drivers have been given extra training by way of tweaking their "artificial intelligence" and the signalling systems have been improved to more closely mimic real world systems. There are also several new assets such as "portals" that can spawn or consume trains and a new "multi-industry" which lets users create their own interactive industry quickly and simply. With the continued success of the Trainz various products throughout the world and the recently announced end to the Microsoft Train Simulator product line, Auran hope that their latest offering will see an increase in the number of 3rd party content creators coming on board. "We're putting together a new team to focus our support efforts on helping content creators get the most out of Trainz Railroad Simulator," said Tony Hilliam, Executive Producer of Trainz. 'We've learnt that our audience has an insatiable appetite for new content and the only way we are going to service those needs is by developing and nurturing a network of creative talent. This commitment begins with support, but extends to helping market and sell new products to our rapidly growing customer base. We've been going just over 3 years and have almost 100,000 registered users. This number is steadily increasing and we can only see the pace increasing in the future." 16th April 2004 TRS2004 Service Pack 2 - Passenger Pack update (SP2) We have put an enormous amount of work into SP2 and we can confirm that there is definitely light at the end of the tunnel. (That would be a portal tunnel of course :) ). Our progress over the past few weeks has been very good indeed and we are releasing Release Candidate 3 (RC3) to our beta testers tonight. That should give you a good idea as to just how close we are to release. The testers are even saying we're very close to release - so that's always a good sign! At this moment in time it's looking like SP2 will be a 50mb patch if you're updating from SP1 and a 100mb patch if you're updating from the retail edition of TRS. We will have a number of sites mirror the download and you can also pre-order the CD from our online Shop. SP2 public beta Since SP2 is such a significant upgrade it is our belief that one final round of testing using a much larger test group would be a very worthwhile exercise. As such we will make our final release candidate available as a public download. The timing on this release will depend upon the outcome of this weekends testing with SP2 RC3. As soon as we have a Release Candidate that we are happy with it will be made available. Our intention with a public RC is to catch any showstopper problems that may not have surfaced during our beta testing phase. It is likely that this test will last only a couple of days, but will ensure that the final build does not have any flaws that will reduce your enjoyment of the product. SP2 Language editions SP2 when released will initially be available as an English patch. This patch can be applied to any version of TRS, including retail, SP1 or any one of the languages released to date. If you install this patch you will end up with an English version of TRS. Once SP2 is released we will send the build to our overseas publishers for local translations. Once translated we will produce a language specific version of SP2 for Trainz users in Germany, France, Italy and Spain followed by Poland, Czech Republic and Russia. Auran Content CD's Well, at long last the Auran content CD's are ready to go. The disks will be available to order from our Online Shop next week. Given that these disks are only useful for people with 3D Studio Max, we expect the production run to be quite low. Therefore we are charging just A$19.95 plus postage and packing of A$9.95 for the 2 Cd's. These disks contain every model (locos, rolling stock, scenery, etc...) that has ever been produced at Auran. This includes both released and unreleased content. The content totals a little over 5gb. However, after some hefty compression, we've got that down to about 1gb . There are three primary legal requirements for the use of these CD's. The first is that content produced using the models can only be made available for Trainz. The second is that content can only be available from the download station. Finally should you choose to update one of the objects that shipped with either TRS, TRS/SP1 or TRS/SP2 Auran may, at it's discretion, choose to repackage the said content under an Auran kuid. If Auran chooses to do this it will because we are so impressed with the quality of your creation that we would like to obsolete the older Auran object with your new version. In this instance Auran would make sure that all credit for the object remained with yourself and would be happy for the new CDP file to carry your website info or any other Trainz related information that you feel appropriate. We do not wish to take credit for your updates but rather make them available for all Trainz users to enjoy. The content on the disks is in various versions of 3DS Max or gMax and will need work. Let us be very clear that unless you are a creator you will find little use for these disks. Although they will make great Trainz drink coasters :) 8th April 2004 Meet the Brew Crew Evening On Wednesday 7th April, Auran opened their doors to the Trainz community for an exclusive "Meet the Brew Crew" evening. It was a fabulous turnout as 80 guests packed the entertainment room. Greg Lane did the introductions, followed by Tony Hilliam's preview of the upcoming Service Pack 2 on the big screen. Next we opened it up to the Trainz community locals with a Q&A session. The visitors then went on a tour of the Auran studios led by members of the Brew Crew and got to see what goes on inside a game development company. Finally, everyone got together for a little socializing in what turned out to be a great night. Below are some of the comments the Trainz community had to say about the preview of SP2.
Check the website for photos from the event. SP2 Beta Testers Beta testers play a very important role in the development of Trainz. With Service Pack 2 about to be released the whole beta testing crew have been working overtime. We would like to send a big thanks to everyone who has helped make Trainz and SP2 possible. A few members of the beta testers have made these comments:
Visit the SP2 page for more comments from the beta testers. 2nd April 2004 Service Pack 2 - Passenger Pack Update The Trainz team have been working hard to finalize the upcoming Service Pack 2 - Passenger Pack and the good news is that it is now getting very close with just a few minor issues remaining. To keep you going until we release SP2, please check out the updated details page at http://www.auran.com/TRS2004/sp2.htm. Once you have read the updated list, please vote in our latest poll to let us know which feature you are waiting for most. In anticipation of the rush to order SP2 on CD, from today you can pre-order from the Auran online shop for the cost of P&H. We will also be making SP2 available for download - the file size looks like being less than 100mb. As you can imagine, our servers will be very busy for a few days whilst people download this pack, so please be patient and if unsuccessful try again later. If you would like to mirror this upload on your site please contact helpdesk@auran.com over the course of the next few days and we'll get you a copy of SP2 a little ahead of the release date. Some of the many features you can expect include the addition of timetables and passenger loading and unloading, plus improvements to AI/signalling, Driver HUD, Mini-Map, Driver Orders, Rules, loading optimizations, new interfaces + more. Don't forget to vote in the new Poll. Major improvement to Download Station Many members of the Trainz community have experienced slow connection speeds to the Trainz Download Station. Over the past 3 months Auran has been undertaking a significant upgrade to the Download Station systems in order to address a variety of problems that have been reported. Here's some background information on the upgrade. We've selected a server that is 5 times faster than our previous server, it is on an entirely new site and we've increased the available bandwidth from 11 meg per second to 100 meg per second. In addition, we've rewritten the entire permissions system for the download station and have installed the latest ftp and server management software. We are currently publicly testing the new systems and if you would like to participate please visit this forum post for further information. The results from the beta testing have been extremely positive as connection speeds are really reving up. Happy downloading days are ahead! Come and meet the Brew Crew! We have had a great response to our invitation to attend the "Meet the Brew Crew" evening to be held next Wednesday, 7th April at the Auran offices. Currently over 50 Trainz community members have secured their place for this highly anticipated event but there is plenty more room available. We will be demonstrating the latest SP2 features and giving tips on how to get the most out of your Trainz experience. If you would like to attend please send your RSVP email though to helpdesk@auran.com by April 6th. 25th March 2004 Come and meet the Brew Crew! We would like to extend an invitation to members of the Trainz Community to attend an evening with Auran to be held at our Brisbane headquarters.
Wednesday, April 7th, 2004 from 6.30PM
Auran headquarters Tilbrook Street NEW FARM QLD 4005 Australia The evening will be hosted by Greg Lane and attended by Tony Hilliam, John Banks, Lance Jago, Tim Carter, Henk Plaggemars and the Brew Crew. Come along and enjoy a special presentation by the creators of Trainz, Ultimate Trainz Collection and Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004. You will be able to hear about the future direction of Trainz and discuss any ideas you may have. Tea, coffee and biscuits will be provided, (International visitors will be given free orange juice, compliments of Greg Lane)and a specially signed copy of TRS2004 and a TRS2004 polo shirt will be given away as a lucky door prize. Please register your interest by emailing helpdesk@auran.com prior to the 6th of April, 2004. We look forward to your company on the night. As much as we would like to see all the members of the Trainz community at this event we realize that Brisbane is a fair distance to travel. Through the efforts of Henk "Cafe" Plaggemars our Trainz on the Road Global Coordinator, we are collaborating with the Trainz community through initiatives such as model train shows and hobby nights. If you are interested in getting involved in a Trainz event in your area please contact Henk. cafe@auran.com With nearly 90,000 registered members there are enough of us to fill a large stadium. What an event that would be! Things are really taking off as we're currently averaging just over 1000 new members each week joining the community. So a big welcome to all of the Trainz new comers. We hope to see you on the forums. http://forums.auran.com/TRS2004/forum/default.htm Feel free to introduce yourself and join in the discussions. SP2 Update The Brew Crew are hard at work on the upcoming free update for Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004, Service pack 2 (Passenger Pack). Work is progressing well on SP2 and it will be well worth the wait. Some of the many features you can expect include the addition of timetables and passenger loading and unloading, plus improvements to AI/signaling, Driver HUD, Mini-Map, Driver Orders, Rules, loading optimizations, new interfaces + more. Keep an eye on the forum for further information. We will confirm release date details at the appropriate stage of development. For the full list of features visit the SP2 page: http://www.auran.com/TRS2004/sp2.htm Screenshot Tutorial There have been a number of questions on how to manage screenshots and how to post them on the forum. Vulcan has kindly provided a great tutorial that may be of assistance to members of the Trainz community interested in making screenshots. The tutorial covers:
3rd March 2004 Beta Testers Working on the Rails Its been a busy time for our beta testers with the rigorous testing of Service Pack 2. Here are just some of the great things the beta testers have to say about the upcoming free release: "Seems like there's lots of stuff added and tweaked - a lot of big improvements" SimUK "I was also a bit overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of "new commands" that I noticed, GOOD JOB". Rik81 "This gets a great big initial thumps up!" Blehman Details on Service Pack 2 Service Pack 2 (Passenger Pack) is a free update for Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004. Some of the many features you can expect include the addition of timetables and passenger loading and unloading, plus improvements to AI/signaling, Driver HUD, Mini-Map, Driver Orders, Rules, loading optimizations, new interfaces + more. For the full list of features visit the SP2 page: http://www.auran.com/TRS2004/sp2.htm Service Pack 2 is currently scheduled for release later this month. New Learning Centre tutorials There are a number of new tutorials available now from the Trainz learning center. We have received a great response to the tutorials available on the Learning Centre. The learning Centre is your source for gaining a wide variety of information about getting the most out of Trainz. Be sure to check back often for new updates. If you have a tutorial you would like to share with the Trainz community please contact helpdesk@auran.com with the details. A huge thanks to the contributors of the current tutorials. What's coming up! Following the release of Service Pack 2, the Trainz team will be hard at work on the TRS2004 Demo. We hope to have this demo circulating the web shortly after the release of SP2. The long awaited Content Creator CDs will be also be released after SP2. These CDs feature working files from Auran's internal art department allowing creators to bring to the Trainz community even more great content. Busy Railyard needs more Drivers Trainz is growing and we need more drivers to help expand. If you would like the chance to feature as a driver in TRS2004 simply submit a digital portrait picture of yourself in your smartest driving uniform. The picture should be a minimum resolution of 640 x 480 and from the waist up on a white background. Please send applications to helpdesk@auran.com. 9th February 2004 The Track Plan for the Future: Today marks the 2nd anniversary of the first retail release of Trainz but more importantly it is time to lay out the track plan for the future direction of the whole Trainz franchise. Before we explain our plans, let's look back at some of the highlights of where we've come from. Trainz Milestones: Some time in 1995 - Greg Lane has an idea to make a model railroad simulator when PC graphics become good enough November 1999 - Design & Research Phase begins Mar 2000 - Coding and artwork commences Aug 2000 - First Online Community Registration. Vern, Barney, CeeBee and Mr D all joined in the first week November 2001 - 10,000 Registered Members Trainz Community Edition - "model railroading on your PC". First release of Trainz to the online community. Introduced Surveyor, the user friendly world and track building editor, and "drive wherever you like" freedom. December 2001 - Download Station receives first layout - Sagatukett, by Diego Gallina February-Sept 2002 - 16,000 Registered Members Trainz V1.0 - "virtual railroading on your PC". Retail release throughout the world. July 2002 - 28,000 Registered Members Trainz V1.3 - Service Pack 3 released. A free upgrade which introduced the concept of scripted scenarios, added many new features and the first release of 3rd party content on the Trainz CD. November 2002 - 37,000 Registered Members Ultimate Trainz Collection. Released online to the world and in retail stores in USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Added new scenarios, loads of new Surveyor and Driver features, and was bundled with the Paint Shed utility and more 3rd party content November 2003 - 68,000 Registered Members Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 - "the most complete railroad experience ever created". Introduced steam engines, interactive industries, Rules and Driver Commands. Much of the new content and 5 new routes created by 3rd party contributors. December 2003 - 74,000 Registered Members TRS2004 Steam Pack - Service Pack 1 released. Added hotkeys for driving steam engines, new steam engine physics, encryption support for scripts. Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 - present day. This snapshot of the history of Trainz shows how the product has evolved over time and at each stage we have added features and functionality to broaden the railroad experience. Each product has improved upon the previous version and TRS2004 is the fastest selling Trainz product ever thanks to a wider audience awareness, more concentrated launch schedule and greater retail presence. Our immediate plans going forward involve the release of Passenger Pack - Service Pack 2, scheduled for March 2004. SP2 adds interactive passenger stations, driver timetables, improvements to the rules, commodities and commands systems, mini-map display toggle, tweaks to AI and many more features. Taking on board customer feedback, we won't be releasing SP2 until is complete and thoroughly tested, even if this means slight delays. This will be the last free upgrade for TRS2004. So, the big question remains, what do we plan to do next? Trainz - Down the Track... Our goal going forward is to continue to expand the product and enhance those areas that we believe will appeal most to our customers. In order to achieve this goal we also are presented with the challenge to generate sufficient revenue along the way to ensure we have an appropriate budget and market appeal for each of the products. The path ahead is therefore a careful balance between design and commercial realities. To leverage the solid foundations of TRS2004 and to build upon the platform already laid, the next product we have designed for release will be an "Engineers Edition - Expansion Pack" (EE). The aim of EE is to add to the overall realism of the simulation for budding (or retired) engineers. EE will include new prototypical routes, new locos, new cabs and a number of new features focussed on cabs, tracks, and the overall driving experience. The Expansion Pack will require a full version of TRS2004 and will be totally backwards compatible (with TRS). Pricing, full feature sets and release dates will be announced during the year. We also plan to release a TRS2004 "Gold Edition" which is effectively a stand-alone version of TRS2004 and EE combined. This product is targeted at new purchasers and will include an upgrade pricing model for owners of older versions of Trainz. We are also examining plans for other expansion packs for TRS2004 along the lines of our original plans for Brachline, Commuter and Network Packs. The most important decision we have had to make is what to do looking longer term. The decision we have made is to split the product and follow two diverging paths - one heading down the prototypical route, titled "Railroad Simulator Professional Edition", and the other down the management simulation path, titled "Tranzportation". Greg Lane, Auran CEO and original Trainz visionary, has prepared a detailed article explaining the direction of RSP. You will notice that the word Trainz has been dropped from the title indicating that this product will not be an updated version of Trainz, but rather a totally new project designed from the ground up. Tranzportation is aimed more at the casual gamer. Whilst still focussed on railroads, Tranzportation will introduce other elements of freight and passenger transport such as planes, ships and trucks. The gameplay is more about managing transport fleets and expanding your fleets to meet the needs of industry, towns and cities, and not driving vehicles. You will be able to zoom right in to see your reflection in the paint work, and also hop inside the cab or cockpit of the vehicles. We are in discussions with several leading publishers regarding plans for the Tranzportation product and will keep you informed regarding that project as more information comes to hand. 3rd Party Content One of the key aspects that has characterized Trainz has been the willingness of 3rd party content creators to donate their time and energies into proving additional content for our recent releases. Without their support, we simply could not afford to continue developing the product line. However, this process has not been without its pitfalls. Having almost 100 people in the 3rd party content group fording development of TRS meant that we were unable to provide each of these people with the level of support they deserved. We also simply couldn't provide sufficient time with a stable code base for the creators to work on, meaning that it was always difficult to meet deadlines. Learning from our past experiences, we are making a few changes for the upcoming future releases. We will be appointing a full-time 3rd party liaison officer whose primary role will be to co-ordinate 3rd party content efforts and help them in every way possible. This person will help to hand select several small teams to work on various mini-projects that fit into the overall design of the particular product. Volunteers will be invited to apply for positions on the various teams. We will also ensure that there is ample time in the development cycle for content to be designed, created and tested. This collaboration will ensure the highest possible quality of content ever produced for Trainz and will be a highlight of our upcoming products. Full details regarding the formation of the new groups will be published after we release Service Pack 2. Trainz Community We know that we already have a fantastic community and it is currently the fastest growing rail sim community in the world. The future success of Trainz and the other products we have outlined here is very much in your hands. The product is getting better and better, and we have created a new hobby for many thousands of train fans. We know that given the right development budget we can continue to improve and expand our product range to meet the wide range of tastes from all types of train fan. The challenge, however, is that our fan base needs to continue to grow, and even accelerate. Each of you, as a member of the Trainz community or as a new reader of this paper, can help to ensure the success of these new products by helping us to grow our customer base today. How? By simply employing the power of "word of mouth" testimonials to help spread the word about your favourite hobby. Here are some things you can to help make Trainz even better:
Forums To see what everyone is saying about these announcements, please visit our online forums and have your say too. 2nd February 2004 Countdown to what? For those of you who don't visit our busy online forums regularly, you've been missing out on a bit of fun and excitement being created by our CEO, Greg Lane. Over the past week or so, a countdown has begun. We can't say what it is all about yet, but something big is happening in 7 days time. There are pieces of a puzzle appearing each day to help you figure out what might be happening, so visit this thread for an update. TRS2004 Compatible Paint Shed Now Available
Learning Centre up and running!
Discount Offer Discounts are still on offer until February 28 so get in quick before they expire. Prior to the release of TRS2004, all registered Trainz users were allocated a 20% discount voucher. These vouchers expired on December 31st. We have renewed this offer and also issued 20% discount vouchers to all our TRS2004 customers as well. This offer includes a 3 Month First Class Ticket for FREE. There are also specials on purchasing both TRS2004 and Railroad Tycoon 3 so check out our online store for more details. New Poll This weeks poll asks: "As Trainz continues to evolve, which of these features or modules would you like to see most? For the choices make your way to the Trainz website and have your vote. Raildriver Service
Pack 2 Update The Service Pack 1: International edition is now available on CD for the cost of P&H. You can order this from our online store. Check out the Service Pack 1 page for more details. 9th January 2004 The Fastest Trainz Ever! It's official. With more than 5,000 new registrations in the month of December, Trainz is the fastest growing rail sim community in the world. With almost 80,000 total registrations, 50,000 on our mailing list and more than 100 new members every day, we should top the 100,000 mark sometime late this year. Welcome aboard to all our new members - we trust you will enjoy the ride. By country, USA edged out Germany for the number one slot in December, with UK, Australia and Canada rounding out the top 5. With Italian, Spanish, Polish and Czech versions to come early in 2004, our community is truly international. You may also be interested to know that whilst TRS2004 is the major product this month, the original Trainz version still generates more than 100 new members per week with Poland coming in at number 3 by country! Discount Offer Extended
Paint Shed - Free Download
Download Station upgrade As many of you have noted in the past month or so, not all content on the Download Station works with TRS2004. Whilst many of the problems have been related to Paint Shed incompatibility, missing or incorrect passwords or perhaps even errors in the 3rd party content, we're working on ways of improving our systems and error reporting to make this process painless. For those of you who have discovered the joys of the Trainz Download Helper in full swing, I'm sure you will agree that it is a fantastic system. We're now serving up around 10,000 items per day from our servers, plus those items people download from elsewhere. With the future enhancements and increase in availability of new items, this figure will continue to grow tremendously. Passenger Pack - Service Pack 2 As promised, we're working hard on the next major improvement to TRS2004 - the Passenger Pack upgrade (also called Service Pack 2). The goal of this update is to add the new passenger station features allowing for running to a timetable and to enhance a number of other systems such as driver orders, AI behaviour, 2D map view, sounds and more. One of the key new features will be the ability to issue commands to Drivers in Surveyor and save these within a session. You will also be able to issue orders to as many Drivers as you wish, and scroll through the list of orders, inserting or deleting orders as you go. A full feature set and time frame will announced in the next few weeks which will also include an announcement about a TRS2004 demo (which is due soon after the SP2 release). RailDriver Update
3rd Party Content The final note for this news is about our legion of 3rd party content creators. If you haven't visited the Content Creation forum lately, or the Download Station, please do so. The amount and quality of content that is being released or is about to be released is staggering. Some of the new Rules begin to unlock the power and flexibility of the Trainz Script code that hides behind the scenes. There really is a huge amount of development going on right now and this aspect of Trainz will ensure that this hobby continues to grow for many years to come. Become a content creator yourself! We've made available a small download that helps you import your own photo into TRS2004 so that you can see yourself in the cab as you thunder along the rails. If you have any troubles following the guidelines (Driver - Me), visit our forums for some friendly community assistance. 10th December 2003 Service Pack 1 Well, the definitive date for the eagerly awaited Service Pack 1 update can now be announced. It will be available on Tuesday, 16th December. You will be able to download SP1 from the Auran website or order a CD online for the cost of P&H. If you have a mirror site then please feel free to mirror this upload. As you can imagine, our servers will be very busy for a few days whilst people download this pack, so please be patient and if unsuccessful try again later. The main improvements in this Service Pack are to the steam physics. We have had several engineers helping us test all our engines and a special thanks must go out to Eric Whitmore who has been tireless in his efforts to help. There are now hot keys which let you drive without using your mouse and we've even tweaked the DCC controls to give you a better ride as well. We've given our AI drivers some more time in the training room and they no longer prefer the left route under the Drive Command. For further details on Service Pack 1 click here. TrainzObjectz As part of our commitment to showcasing Trainz 3rd Party Applications we are pleased to bring to you "TrainzObjectz", developed by TaFWeb. TrainzObjectz assists you with managing TRS2004 content in an easy and efficient manner. It is an ideal application for all Trainz users, from the casual Trainz user through to Content Creators. A big thanks to TaFWeb for developing this awesome application! You can read about TrainzObjectz features and download it here. Language Versions of Trainz Now Available in a Store near you The perfect gift for friends has arrived. The international versions of TRS2004 will be available throughout Europe in time for Christmas. These versions include German, Spanish, French and Italian. For further details on the publisher in your region visit our products page. If you are in the UK, you can now get your localised "Trainz Railway Simulator 2004" from Just Trains or Game store. USA and Canadian residents can visit EB or GameStop 20,000 unused discount vouchers Over the past 2 years, many thousands of people have registered their copies of Trainz or UTC. All these people were awarded a 20% discount voucher for being loyal customers, and there are still 20,000 of them who haven't taken advantage of their discount. Are you one of those people? Check your Planet Auran profile to see if you have a voucher. By buying online, you are supporting the developer directly, which means that we can make bigger and better editions of Trainz in the future. SPECIAL OFFER For the next few weeks, we are also offering FREE SHIPPING. So, if you order today, you may even get TRS in time for Christmas (orders are currently taking around 10 days to arrive). Remember, you can also choose to fax or mail your order to us. International Websites You may have already noticed the new regions menu on the top of the TRS2004 website. With the help of members of the Trainz community we aim to focus on region specific content and localized language support for TRS. Currently these include: Please check back regularly at these sites as they will be frequently updated. To get the ball rolling with this localized content, registered German users can now download the German manual here. Screenshot Competition Winners A big congratulations to Magicentro the winner of the TRS2004 screenshot competition. Magicentro wins a stylish new TRS2004 Polo shirt and a copy of TRS2004. Congratulations to the 10 runners up for their great entries. Grogstop65, Naikrd, Gasdoctor, Maxtac, Prowler901, Lightrail, Speedstream, Rox , Big_Boy4000UP & Zatovisualworks will all receive a cool Trainz t-shirt. You can check out the winning entries here. 28th October 2003 How hot is Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004? Copies are being installed, the user comments are beginning to flood in...and the news is good. Here's a few of the first comments on the TRS forums:
 HOT new movie
To celebrate the launch of TRS2004, a HOT new movie has been released showing the inside of one of the new steam cabs...and shows a hot and sweaty fireman shoveling coal. Railroad Tycoon 3 It really must be getting close to Christmas, with not one, but two railroad products being released in October. We've managed to get hold of some of the very first copies of the critically acclaimed Railroad Tycoon 3 and these are now available for purchase from our online store. Orders will be shipped out on October 29th. Pricing is AUD$89.95 (US$49.99, €49.99 and £29.99). If you have a registered copy of Trainz (any version) you receive a 15% discount. Double your Railroad Fun. We have also created a special double pack - Railroad Tycoon 3 & Trainz Railroad Simulator 2004 for the special price of AUD$159.99 - Save $20. (US$79.99, €89.99, £59.99).  TRS2004 Download Station - Grand Opening. We've been hard at work behind the scenes improving the Download Station to make things even easier to download. The biggest change is the new Trainz Download Helper which finds all dependant items and automatically downloads them for you - so no more missing bogeys. This application can also be placed as a link on other websites, allowing seamless downloading without even visiting our website. As long as the content is listed on the Trainz Download Station, TDH will find it. We've also added a new staging area for content creators to allow them to pre-test their content before making it "live". There's a new simplified interface and we've reduced the categories to 9 areas to make searching for content easier.  TRS2004 Screenshot competition So you have received your copy of TRS2004 and want to show the world what you have been up to? This is your chance to take your favorite screenshot and enter it into the TRS2004 screenshot competition. 1st place will receive a TRS2004 polo shirt and copy of TRS2004, there will also be prizes for 10 runner ups. Please email entries to screenshots@auran.com. For further details and requirements please refer to the competition page. 17th October 2003 17th October 2003 TRS2004 Ships 
Great news for all those who have ordered from the Auran Online Shop - your orders began shipping today! For US and UK residents, normal shipping times are around 5 days. For Europe, generally you need to add a few more days. For some early feedback and first impressions of TRS2004, please visit the online forums.
Not only is ordering online safe and easy, you also get a free First Class Ticket and, if you are a registered customer, a 20% discount. We also offer a fax or mail order option from the online shop page. Retail Dates confirmed For those of you who are still waiting for retail release, here are the dates that have been confirmed:
14th October 2003
26th September 2003
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