The territories now available from SCC number in the HUNDREDS, with RR lines in many Earth-countries that have operating railroads. You can even create your own territory, Prototype, Fictional or Freelance, and all of them offer many levels and/or avenues of enjoyment. Signal Computer Consultants (SCC), those who designed this game, also provide the car-ID tags for prototype railroad rolling stock, and this particular Dispatcher Simulation game was, I understand, originally created as a BNSF panel teaching aid. I RECCOMMEND THIS GAME FOR ANYONE AND EVERYONE who has EVER wondered what it might be like to be a RR dispatcher. BOTH Views are productive, depending on "your level of realism." Whichever "View" you choose is yours, and yours alone, to choose. Besides, it's also somewhat similar to the MODEL RR panels, except in this variation, the game is more of a GAME - thus you don't have the real-life pressure that dispatchers have on their shoulders - with peoples' lives.
Personally, I have become hooked on the NON-classic View, since it is far easier (for ME) to follow the Train Icons, than just a line across the screen that lights up red or green (no matter how unrealistic that may be to the purists). There are TWO variations for viewing the sims: "Classic" (black screen with colored lines & "signals"), and NON-classic (white background, with all lines and signals/switches seen as graphics - with "trains" also seen traveling across each line, where those trains are operating within the sim. And, just as in real life, THAT is where the frustration can begin - and where your individual creativity comes into play. you get those through as soon as you can. AMTRAK and Commuter Trains would have priority, along with all Intermodal traffic. Pre-planning helps ("signal stacking" & other options), however as I have found from PRACTICE, sometimes happens - and when that monkey wrench clogs up the gears, creativity helps. VERSION 3.5, I'm informed, allows mulitple users (at different locations) to run simulations that are actually "joined" from end-point to end-point, similar to what the actual RR dispatchers do: they don't just dispatch their own, individual territories, but CO-OPERATE with other dispatchers on other territories to get various trains through AS THEY APPEAR/DISAPPEAR into/out of their areas. to Rocky Mount NC), and how THAT was accomplished, I think gave me a few gray hairs! But it was a challenge that I gladly accepted - and as stated, it became VERY addictive. With VRE commuter traffic during the weekday parts of the sim, it became a nightmare to clear the MASSIVE logjam that afternoon (all the way from downtown 'D.C. I had been running Fred Frailey's Year-2000 RF&P/North End sim, which I also co-wrote with a friend for Fred, and which was based on REAL CSXT traffic over that double-desk territory, and with the many FRA-imposted track warrants that were occuring during that time-period, after the Washington Post newspaper story, written by none other than Don Phillips, broke the story about CSXT's deteriorating track. Even Amtrak was stuck between the freights, far more than normal (.LOL). I awoke about 4 hours later, stiff neck & all from snoozing while still sitting up, and the sim was still going - in "Run-2", and so many trains had backed up that it took the entire rest of the day (between "quick snacks & bathroom breaks") to clear up the mess! It was as if a hurricane had come through, and did moderate damage to the line in question. This sim runs for a good week (continuous, 7-days), and you can do a LOT to keep things moving - or flood the whole RR if you fall asleep, as I did one rainy Saturday afternoon. Using the 3.0 version, one ends up wanting to complete a day's dispatching (all shifts!) if at all possible, even knowing that one can 'Save the Simulation' where/when-ever you stop it - and return later (after a good night's sleep!) to finish out. But be careful: it is (-and I can't stress this enough-) VERY ADDICTIVE. It isn't hard to grasp, once you get the hang of it. > to master at first, or is it relatively easy to > the past, do you guys think this is a hard program I have been really intereasted in this program in