Purchasing MSTS for Open Rail

[dphorton]

Moved to a different drive same issue. MSTS will not run. Great, still trying to find the answer.

[baldwin]

Have you also installed the version 1.4 update?.

Also Run as administrator. Located near the bottom of the exe properties/compatibility page.

[dphorton]

I haven't applied the update but set to run as administrator. That should stop the program from running. I wouldn't think. I used to have this installed but then had a HD Crash. I miss Otto he would know exactly what is wrong, RIP.

[R. Steele]

I'm a little puzzled, if as you stated in the first post, you are installing MSTS to use the content, when needed for OR, then why do you expend time and energy in getting MSTS to run.

You've posted that MSTS is installed, then simply copy the default routes ( and any other MSTS content you need ) to a directory that you will use to install any routes for OR, that way the install bat files will find them, and then you can move those routes to your OR installation, or where you want your OR profiles to reside.

After copying all the needed MSTS content, uninstall it...you'll never need it to run OR, unless you are contemplating using the RE ( then you should really be spending time learning about TSRE ) or the AE (which I still use from time to time ) but then Goku's TSRE also has a functioning AE. So there you go.

Am I missing something here?

[dphorton]

Some of the Routes require MSTS Bin and I can't that to install. I think it is because, if I remember correctly when you start MSTS it decompresses some of the files. I am not for sure.
For instance Blackfoot V3 Route.

[commec61]

Again, if you are only going to run OR, MSTS Bin is not required. As for the files decompressing, as you call it, those are just the terrain buffers generating. None of these things are needed for OR.

[geepster775]

The only reason you would need (to buy, in your case) MSTS discs is to have access to the 6 default routes for those historical freeware routes in the library here that had batch files that copy some assets over to routes that are incomplete without them. Once you run those batch files, and your downloaded freeware routes are made complete on your local desktop, it behooves a smart person to zip those completed routes up and save them in a safe offline location, so you wont need anything off the MSTS discs regardless of hard drive crashes in the future. Some people will zip up the 6 default routes, too, so if the one-off need for batch files comes again, then all you need to do then is uncompress the 6 defaults, run the batch file, and then delete the unzipped copies of the defaults. But this should be needed less and less as route authors get with the program and stop relying upon old disc assets. The goal here is to take routes dependent upon disc assets and make them freestanding under your own initiative, so you never have to rush out and buy discs of 18 year old software from some dubious foreign purveyor just to run 15 year old freeware routes ever again.

Everything else like terrain buffers and MSTS Bin from your MSTS history is just that - history.

[R. Steele]

Some of the Routes require MSTS Bin and I can't that to install. I think it is because, if I remember correctly when you start MSTS it decompresses some of the files. I am not for sure.
For instance Blackfoot V3 Route.

Yep, as has already been posted...Bin is an addition to the MSTS executable and not used by OR.

Also, OR only uses the y & f raw files in the Tiles folder, you can delete all the e & n raw files, to make more room.

If you can access the installed MSTS directories ( ROUTES, TRAINS, etc. ) you are set. Just copy everything to a folder named for whatever makes sense to you and uninstall MSTS.

Or leave it where it is and install any routes to that location, run the install bat, if needed, and then move them to your OR location.
Here's what the directory of all my routes on the F drive,
bandicam 2018-08-04 14-50-28-328.jpg

What a specific OR profile looks like
bandicam 2018-08-04 14-53-07-173.jpg

And the OR program directory, also on the F drive. Separate folders for different testing versions
bandicam 2018-08-04 14-53-32-779.jpg

[dphorton]

Thank you all. I get the picture now. A big thank you for your patience and sage advice.

[peanutsQR]

Reading the OR Manual helped me to setup OR without MSTS!!
As I came to know about this game in late 2016, Open Rails was only the choice left.