Back in the joyful days of hopping freights to Port Jervis, I became familiar with the Erie-Lackawanna's boxcar fleet. The other cars are equally well-made and appealing. They were money well-spent. Since their rolling stock is passing muster, we need to aim higher. The set itself looked nice enough in the box, but things are never what they seem.
Packaging is but a form of propaganda.
Rather than box each car separately, MTH used a vacuformed plastic sheet to hold the loco and rolling stock. The train looked nice enough, even if some aspects aren't totally prototypical. I don't remember the CNJ having round-roofed boxcars. Steam was long gone before they used the Red Baron paint scheme found on the boxcar. That said, the paint schemes themselves were done well, and the cars featured nice detail and diecast trucks.