My Tomica World - Introductions

Diolch yn fawr, Chris! That's exactly it. Not only does it predate the Thomas version (as I thought), but it even looks to have more play value and doesn't look awful in station mode. I unironically like how the cab turns into a control tower and the orange tracks become the roof. They even made platforms in addition to the stop/go bars! It might even be passable as a central station (or maybe a railway museum entrance) in one of those large urban themed layouts. Again, thanks for the info.



So, the device makes more sense than what I imagined. It does have track connectors at both ends, but it uses a turntable and stop/go bar (along with levers and buttons) to detect what the engine is doing. I couldn't seem to find gameplay of the actual game, so I'm still holding out for Futaba's video. I even found a similar device for Tomica cars, (which must mean there was also another game for them.

Yeah, that's what I've got, although mine is missing the red section that sits in front of the turntable; I'm looking to get a 3D printer at some point [mainly for modelling purposes, Hornby and TOMY alike] so maybe could make a replacement?





Honestly, got no idea how this functions in practice, i'm stoked to get this running for real. Mine also comes with a 500 Series front car; I'd assumed this was a random Plarail piece thrown in by the seller, but that pic you've uploaded seems to indicate that was a part of the set from the get-go? Gotta wonder if that means it's got some kind of special function for this unit specifically, although it just looks like the unpowered end of a standard Plarail 500 Series so who knows 

Obviously got a Pico to run this thing on too, and I'm definitely going to test out the Plarail unit's compatibility with other games; I bought a hot pink Pico [which I honestly think looks way better than any of the regular Pico units] that came with a bunch of software, including one of the two 'Sailor Moon' games for Pico, good for me of course, being a massive Sailor Moon fanboy lol 




And yeah, not that I need to confirm it, but there is indeed a Tomica version, I was sorely tempted to pick it up as well, but when I saw what the shipping bill would be, I decided to go for the more interesting of the two [to me at least] which was naturally the Plarail version, not least since I still think there may be some means whereby the rollers on the turntable might act as an input, allowing there to be some kind of control driven by a train? As can probably be seen, this really does just connect straight in via regular tracks, apparently it would have come with some special ramps for rolling a train up to the unit from the floor, but I think my one comes with one of the manuals that literally demonstrates how to use regular Plarail supports and track to connect one of these into either an existing layout, or one built around the unit itself, which is kinda neat.

I think somehow the unit itself and the cartridge have to be connected, as there is a connector present on the cartridge, but then again, i've seen similar add-ons where the add-on connects via the pen input [since the Pico has a touch-panel with a wired stylus pen], so again, we'll see, i'll defo make a thread about it here on BPT you can be sure of that