Microsoft Train Simulator brings the excitement of some of the world's most famous trains to your home. Harness the engines' power as an engineer, using the fully functional gauges and working controls. Sit back and enjoy the ride as a passenger, taking in the scenery as you rumble through the realistic settings. Or take on the responsibility of a railroad designer, using Train Simulator's open architecture and tools to customize and extend the game. Written with the full support of the game's developer, Microsoft Train Simulator: Sybex Official Strategies & Secrets gives you everything you'll need to stay on track. Inside you'll find: * Expert advice on operating everything from the Orient Express to The Flying Scotsman * Essential strategies for handling the game's challenging operating strategies * Hands-on tutorials covering Train Simulator's extensive track and activity building tools
Get ready to take flight as two certified flight instructors guide you through the pilot ratings as it is done in the real world, starting with Sport Pilot training, then Private Pilot, followed by the Instrument Rating, Commercial Pilot, and Air Transport Pilot. They cover the skills of flight, how to master Flight Simulator, and how to use the software as a learning tool towards your pilot’s license. More advanced topics demonstrate how Flight Simulator X can be used as a continuing learning tool and how to simulate real-world emergencies.
The first comprehensive integration of industry and academic audience research in Australia, this book introduces new directions in method and analysis. It is a contemporary probe into 'audience-making' and illustrates the ways marketers, producers and governments mobilise an audience. Case studies of Gen X, computer gaming, child audiences.
Whether you pine for the romantic age of the steam engine, thrill at the speeds of today’s superfast trains, this book offers a fantastic, whistle-stop tour of train travel.
Microsoft Train Simulator brings the excitement of some of the world's most famous trains to your home. Harness the engines' power as an engineer, using the fully functional gauges and working controls. Sit back and enjoy the ride as a passenger, taking in the scenery as you rumble through the realistic settings. Or take on the responsibility of a railroad designer, using Train Simulator's open architecture and tools to customize and extend the game. Written with the full support of the game's developer, Microsoft Train Simulator: Sybex Official Strategies & Secrets gives you everything you'll need to stay on track. Inside you'll find: * Expert advice on operating everything from the Orient Express to The Flying Scotsman * Essential strategies for handling the game's challenging operating strategies * Hands-on tutorials covering Train Simulator's extensive track and activity building tools
This expanded and revised second edition of Understanding Video Games provides a comprehensive introduction to the growing field of game studies. Understanding Video Games, 2nd Edition is an essential read for newcomers to video game studies and experienced game scholars alike. This follow-up to the pioneering first edition takes video game studies into the next decade of the twenty-first century, highlighting changes in the game business, advances in video game scholarship, and recent trends in game design and development—including mobile, social, and casual gaming. In Understanding Video Games, 2nd Edition students will: Assess the major theories used to analyze games, such as ludology and narratology Gain familiarity with the commercial and organizational aspects of the game industry Trace the history of video games from Pong to Playstation 3 and beyond Explore the aesthetics of game design Evaluate the cultural position of video games Consider the potential effects of both violent and "serious" games. Extensively illustrated, and featuring discussion questions, a glossary of key terms, and a detailed video game history timeline (including an interactive online version), Understanding Video Games, 2nd Edition is an indispensable resource for anyone interested in examining the ways video games are reshaping entertainment and society.
Why do grown men play with trains? Is it a primal attachment to childhood, nostalgia for the lost age of rail travel, or the stuff of flat-out obsession? In this delightful and unprecedented book, Grand Prix legend Sam Posey tracks those who share his “passion beyond scale” and discovers a wonderfully strange and vital culture. Posey’s first layout, wired by his mother in the years just after the Second World War, was, as he writes in his Introduction, “a miniature universe which I could operate on my own. Speed and control: I was fascinated by both, as well as by the way they were inextricably bound together.” Eventually, when Posey’s son was born, he was convinced that building him a basement layout would be the highest expression of fatherhood. Sixteen years and thousands of hours later, this project, “the outgrowth of chance meetings, unexpected friendships, mistakes, illness, latent ambitions, and sheer luck” was completed. But for Posey, the creation of his HO-scale masterpiece based on the historic Colorado Midland, was just the beginning. In Playing with Trains, Sam Posey ventures well beyond the borders of his layout in northwestern Connecticut, to find out what makes the top modelers tick. He expects to find men “engaged in a genial hobby, happy to spend a few hours a week escaping the pressures of contemporary life.” Instead he uncovers a world of extremes–extreme commitment, extreme passion, and extreme differences of approach. For instance, Malcolm Furlow, holed up on his ranch in the wilderness of New Mexico, insists that model railroading is defined by scenery and artistic self-expression. On the other hand, Tony Koester, a New Jersey modeler, believes his “mission” is to replicate, with fanatical precision and authenticity, the way a real railroad operates. Going to extremes himself, Posey actually “test drives” a real steam engine in Strasburg, Pennsylvania, in an attempt to understand the great machines that inspired the models and connect us to a time when “the railroad was inventing America.” Timeless and original, Playing with Trains reveals a classic, questing American world.
Simulation continues to be a growth area in transportation human factors. From empirical studies in the laboratory to the latest training techniques in the field, simulators offer myriad benefits for the experimenter and the practitioner. This book draws together current trends in research and training simulators for the road, rail, air and sea sectors to inform the reader how to maximize both validity and cost-effectiveness in each case. Simulators for Transportation Human Factors provides a valuable resource for both researchers and practitioners in transportation human factors on the use of simulators, giving readers concrete examples and case studies of how simulators have been developed and used in empirical research as well as training applications. It offers useful and usable information on the functional requirements of simulators without the need for any background knowledge on the technical aspects, focusing on the state of the art of research and applications in transport simulators rather than the state of the art of simulation technology. The book covers simulators in operational terms instead of task simulation/modelling and provides a useful balance between a bottom-up, academic approach and a top-down, practical perspective.
The Best of SlashNOT is a collection of short satirical stories ranging from true observations of humorous events to hilarious absurdity that any true geek will love. The Best of SlashNOT takes the most humorous stories from posted on SlashNOT.com and presents them in the order that the SlashNOT community ranked them. You won't find Geek humor funnier or more laser focused on technology than The Best of SlashNOT. Articles include all the community favorites, like: . Einstein returns from grave to bitch-slap dark matter . Quaker: The non-violent first person shooter . Microsoft seeking two letters cooler than X and P . Science reverts to mad science Universe even darker and scarier than previously thought . Google arrested while dumping body . Gates and Torvalds to finally settle this thing . Schrodinger arrested on cruelty, weapons charges . IBM developing Artificial Stupidity . Microsoft releases Windows XP Homeless edition SlashNOT is a satirical website that parodies Slashnot.com, the ridiculously popular open-source advocacy website. In addition to the stories and comments from SlashNOT.com, The Best of SlashNOT includes exclusive commentary and insights from the author and editor of the website.
This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Entertainment Computing, ICEC 2015, held in Trondheim, Norway, in September/October 2015. The 26 full papers, 6 short papers, 16 posters, 6 demos and 6 workshops/tutorial descriptions presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 106 submissions. The multidisciplinary nature of Entertainment Computing is reflected by the papers. They focus on computer games; serious games for learning; interactive games; design and evaluation methods for Entertainment Computing; digital storytelling; games for health and well-being; digital art and installations; artificial intelligence and machine learning for entertainment; interactive television and entertainment.
