Before I knew about A-Train I discovered another, pretty unique, Japanese train-themed game called Densha de Go!
The community for DDG was friendly and more established than it seems to be for our beloved A-Train (perhaps due, in part, to the pick-up-and-play-ability of the game – quite literally you can get the hang of it in minutes).
So I got hold of a copy, really, really enjoyed it, and lurked around the Densha de Go! forum occasionally. Then (I think this is what happened) some chancer bought the domain name that Butch had been using and made his own – completely crap – DDG site. Butch was rather irritated by this and disappeared in a cloud of red mist. The forum slowly died. Read more »
I’m gratified to announce my return to this blog (after an absence partly caused by the recent volcanic ash….) with a smile-inducing story involving a female train operator. Her name is Yukie Sakai.
Personally, the thought of which gender the driver of the train I was riding had never crossed my mind before. I suppose that, subconciously, I generally assumed the driver to be male and middle-aged.
JR East has appointed its first female bullet-train operator on the Tohoku Shinkansen line, it was announced on Tuesday, as Yukie Sakai boarded the Tokyo-bound “Hayate-Komachi” bullet-train at Sendai Station in front of reporters.
The 29-year-old Sakai was born in Minamisoma, Fukushima Prefecture. According to JR East, she joined the company in April of 2001 and gained experience as a conductor and a train operator on non-bullet train lines. In October of 2009 she began learning as an apprentice on the Tohoku Shinkansen line, and on March 23 of this year she obtained her bullet-train operating license. She began operating on the Tohoku line by herself on April 9.
Sakai joins about 400 male bullet-train operators in the company. JR Tokai and JR West already have women actively contributing as bullet-train operators.
Original Japanese lanuage story HERE plus image of a smiling Yukie.
I’ll be updating my fan site progress – such as it is – in the next few days so do call back if interested.
Every so often I consider the purchase of a Nintendo DS because I really like the quirky Japanese titles. Obviously anything that’s quirky and train-related really interests me. Last year I realised A-Train DS was available. This year, this month, in fact, there’s this new Boku wa Plarail Untenshi.
This is an example of a gaming staple in Japan: the train driving simulator. As you might have guessed from the title “Plarail” indicates this is a toy train simulator (“plarail” being an example of the of the Japanese tendency to create new “Japanese-English” words by combining elements of both languages into a new word that doesn’t exist in English. Other examples include: “remocon” remote control, and “persocon” personal computer. In this case “pla-” refers to “plastic”).
Anyway, I literally just discovered this game during a browsing session and have only the most basic of information at the moment. It has echoes of an old favourite of mine, Densha de Go! since you’re placed in the driver’s seat of either a toy shinkansen or steam locomotive and need to pick up little playmobile-like people. A second player can join in to deal with passenger boarding, run the windscreen wipers or use other controls.
Release schedualled for 05.01.2010 – that’s next Tuesday!
What do you think?
Snow was not only an issue for the Euro Star rail service here in the UK last month. This first news item details the collision of a single-carriage rapid service train and a snowplow in Furano, Hokkaido.
Fortunately no one was seriously hurt, although 12 people, including passengers and three snowplow operators were treated for mnor cuts and bruises.
It seems the snowplow, which was clearing snow in-between the passenger service, joined the tracks just before the train was due to arrive. Two investigators have been interviewing station staff.
Full story HERE
Read more »
East Japan Railway Co.’s next-generation E5-type bullet train, which will be launched in 2011, appeared for the first time at JR Tokyo Station in a test run early Wednesday evening, attracting railway buffs and commuters on their way home.
The new bullet train goes into service in March 2011, three months after the extension of the Tohoku Shinkansen Line to Shin-Aomori Station.
Read more HERE
Here’s an interesting series of videos focusing upon Japanese train technology, with a close look at the next-gen fastek train.
There are seven videos in total and each has been dubbed into English. Enjoy.
Read more »
Gaming | MarkE231 | 
29/07/2010 01:21 | 
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