Microsoft to make new Train Simulator

It's actually quite likely to be partially backwards compatible due to the various formats.

I do hope this new sim will be better than the old one. I loved driving the Scotsman on the old one but despite doing only 2/3 the speed limits, no hard acceleration or braking, the damn coupler kept breaking!

Hope we get more accuracy of scenery as well - the Tokyo-Hakone line was atrocious, with super-long platforms or platforms not long enough (and I've been on it many times in RL) and the adventures being next to useless - why would they neglect to include the full length of the express run?

Last comment, I hope they adapt the interface from Flightsim. Flightsim is far more flexible in terms of saving files or creating new flights (or in the case of trainsim, trip? ;D)

The best thing I find on BVE is the sounds. The good freeware developers do such a good job with them! Default sounds on MSTS was rather bland...

I'm probably the minority who prefers BVE2 over 4...

I personally prefer the game features. BVE4 saw the addition of the clock activated by F2 which was awesome.

However, we lost the comfort meter, the G-force and stop-mark meter.
One cannot "feel" the train behind the PC, let alone turn their heads to look the stop mark from the train cab so I really miss those features (wait I don't, because I hardly ever play BVE4! ;D)

I haven't tried many routes in BVE4 as a result but I have found the Northern Line 95TS* sounds to be rather bland. My BVE2 route sounds are better! However, on the preview video of the Jubilee for BVE4, they seem to have captured the "gearchange" sounds of the 96TS* rather well.

*Don't bash me if they're the wrong way round!

I have to argue that, you can *feel* the Gs in real life, but not behind the PC, nor can you peer your head at the stop marker and that, the those features in BVE2 effectively provided what you would get in RL, but lost behind the PC. I've found the ELL on BVE4 to be hell when it came to stopping!

As for the 1995TS, I've found the high pitched whine missing! I've driven other stock (albeit Japanese) on BVE2 with similar sound characteristics so it is possible to include the initial motor whine at low speed, which then changes into the louder, lower motor sound as the train gathers speed.

(By the way, I've turned my head as well on the Northern, trying to gauge how fast I was closing in onto the marker - kills my eyes staring at something 10 pixels wide though ;D)

I always thought that these green stop markers with the black arrows on them exist only in BVE. I never saw such a sign in the real world.

As Pacific says - those markers do indeed exist on the Northern

And I believe that there is no high pitched whine as the 95 pulls away - on the *96* yes, but not the 95 ... that's what I think anyway

And with the ELL, you do get used to it eventually. I always usually manage to stop in either B1 or B2, but shove it straight into B5 as soon as I see the platform ahead, 'fanning' the brake in order to get it down to the desired speed