Review by Casey
 

Review--NEOW 100-01A and 01B by GaryH (Garry Hoffman, of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada)

For those NERR engineers who are already familiar with his work, this pair of activities will only further delight you in typical GaryH fashion.  But for those who’ve yet to experience Garry’s magic with the Activity Editor, you’re in for a real treat!  Set in Rich Garber’s beautiful Ohio Rail route, you’re first assembling part of a logging train, bound for the yard in Mount Ephraim and in the second, you’re hauling the completed train down to a sawmill in distant Dale.

While the second act, 01B, is a delightful pick-up, road trip and setout – a simple-yet-satisfying romp, the first act, 01A, has generated a fairly good deal of discussion on NERR’s Forums, and for good reason:  although its “Difficulty Level” in TrainSim is shown as “Easy”, there’s a bit of a trick to successfully completing this activity. There’s definitely a right and a wrong way to go about it!

The “problem” with 01A lies in your goal of hauling a heavy logging train up a rather steep hill and then onto an up-hill mainline, with only limited power available. Turns out you cannot just assemble the train, willy-nilly, according to your first logical approach, then open the throttle and hope for the best.  Oh, you can – but it’s highly unlikely you’ll be successful.

Just keep in mind that there’s very likely nothing wrong with your installation of MSTS, nor the route, nor with the activity itself. As indicated in the carefully-crafted briefing notes, you must enter the mainline “at a speed of at least 29 mph”, or you’ll stall-out on the grade.  So give it your best, logical shot, and see what happens.  Likely, you’ll fail!  But that’s when the real fun starts, as you scratch your head and begin considering your options. 

Just stay with it, and join the legions of NERR engineers who’ve finished the activity with smiles on their faces. Don’t take this knotty little poser as some sort of nasty impediment to completing this one-of-a-kind activity, but rather, view it as a delightfully stimulating challenge leading to enormous satisfaction, once you achieve ultimate success.  01A is quite definitely an enjoyable – and certainly memorable – activity. Trust me on this.

-Casey