Well where do I begin...
Before I state my conclusion, let me list below the things that are annoying to me right now, but hopefully will be addressed in the future. They're all small thing considering the complextity of the product an this is the initialy release in the first place.
I have to say that the install went smooth as silk. The new version installed like a dream and then the SP1 went in right on top of it without a problem. I did this before I imported my content because I knew I had a lot and didn't want to slow down the SP1 install too much. I allowed CM2 to immediately repair the database before I did anything else.
At no time did I start Trainz at all other than to run CM2. After the SP1 and repair, my machine spent close 36 hours importing my 2004/2006 content in. This was nearly 20GB worth (I couldn't believe how much it was myself until the process started!) My computer cranked Friday late afternoon until Sunday morning (early sometime) crunching away. Periodically I'd turn on my display and take a look at the progress. Once the process completed, I gave my machine some fresh brains before I ran the program. There were no warnings or errors on the data import process.
After the import checked out okay, I then fixed a few errors with some content. There were more, but they were stupid things like extra quotes in the config files, etc. that I was tired of chasing. This probably came back to bite me, but I'll deal with them more when I have more time. I had some issues where CM2 didn't recognize my changes, but a full DB Repair fixed that. Once that was done, I actually opened TRS2009.
In TRS2009, I went directly into Surveyor and opened up my veneralble route that I've worked on since the beginning of 2004. To my horror, TS2009 replaced the rusty track I was using with the new Auran track. Now if this had happened to my mainline track it wouldn't have been so bad, but this replaced my rusty sidings and old scrappy yard track that I have all over the place. At this time, I'm replacing the track a section at a time. I'm also using the oppoprtunity to rebuild some sections I didn't like so in reality this is no big deal for me. It was more of a shock to see bright shiny rails where the old dirt and rust were before.
The Alpha-channel issues with trees and telegraph wires. This is something that still exists from BETA1 I know it was mentioned to be fixed, maybe sooner than not, because it is annoying.
The continuous jumping back to the top of the list of tracks and other objects no matter what is picked. This is a carryover from TRS2006 and I was hoping this could have been resolved with this version. This is probably harder to explain than to observe... I found a relacement track for my sidings and yards. This is the old HU Trainz dark grey ballast track. This is low-poly track and has a nice profile to it. I would choose the track place some, go in and find my signals and speed signs, etc. Go back to the track list, and the list defaulted back to the top with Auran track as the first choice. This became a pain because I kept selecting the wrong track. The same thing happened in the trackside objects. Instead of staying with the last switchstand that I chose, the list jumped right up to the top on concrete abutments. Spline object, buildings and industries do this as well. Very annoying and very time consuming.
The textures changed to weird blocks when updating the mesh from 10x grid to 5x grid. There are areas now that look like I have different colored parking lots all over the place. These textures were originally spun around and needed to be brushed out again. Now I'm not sure how this looks in compatability mode because I didn't try it.
Missing buildings and other objects. They appear fine in CM2 and without errors, but do not appear in Surveyor on the route. They are listed in red on the list which probably means they're kaput.
Some of my rolling stock did this too with the red listing and are dead. These items had no errors in them and worked fine in TRS2006. A lot of these were older progressive meshed Paintshed items. This also happened in the BETA 1 as well, but being BETA I expected it. Maybe the handling of older content such as this can be taken care of in a future release if not, I'll move these to thes scrap yard.
My overall feelings and conclusion so far:
So after poking around so far, I've come to the conclusion that TS2009 is a fairly decent product that has a lot of potential to go places. All that is needed is some fixes for the different bugs as they've been showing up. I have probably not even come close to finding many of the bugs in the program. What I've listed are the ones that were blatently obvious to me. All in all it deserves a 4/5 stars.
When I get a chance, I'll give Driver a try. This won't be with a single train over the route, but multiple AI drivers, active portals, etc. to test my signal setup. In Beta 1, my signaling worked fine so this will be an interesting test to see if they continue to work like before.
The small annoyances are something I can live with for now with the hopes of them being fixed in future versions. For the newcomer, this program is quite the bargain because of all of the installed content. A lot of the items that I had downloaded over the nearly 5 years since I've used Trainz, are now built in. This alone is worth the package as it is because of the amount of time and FCTs saved.
Anyway, I'm open for feedback of course and I'm sure there's will be plenty.
John
Before I state my conclusion, let me list below the things that are annoying to me right now, but hopefully will be addressed in the future. They're all small thing considering the complextity of the product an this is the initialy release in the first place.
I have to say that the install went smooth as silk. The new version installed like a dream and then the SP1 went in right on top of it without a problem. I did this before I imported my content because I knew I had a lot and didn't want to slow down the SP1 install too much. I allowed CM2 to immediately repair the database before I did anything else.
At no time did I start Trainz at all other than to run CM2. After the SP1 and repair, my machine spent close 36 hours importing my 2004/2006 content in. This was nearly 20GB worth (I couldn't believe how much it was myself until the process started!) My computer cranked Friday late afternoon until Sunday morning (early sometime) crunching away. Periodically I'd turn on my display and take a look at the progress. Once the process completed, I gave my machine some fresh brains before I ran the program. There were no warnings or errors on the data import process.
After the import checked out okay, I then fixed a few errors with some content. There were more, but they were stupid things like extra quotes in the config files, etc. that I was tired of chasing. This probably came back to bite me, but I'll deal with them more when I have more time. I had some issues where CM2 didn't recognize my changes, but a full DB Repair fixed that. Once that was done, I actually opened TRS2009.
In TRS2009, I went directly into Surveyor and opened up my veneralble route that I've worked on since the beginning of 2004. To my horror, TS2009 replaced the rusty track I was using with the new Auran track. Now if this had happened to my mainline track it wouldn't have been so bad, but this replaced my rusty sidings and old scrappy yard track that I have all over the place. At this time, I'm replacing the track a section at a time. I'm also using the oppoprtunity to rebuild some sections I didn't like so in reality this is no big deal for me. It was more of a shock to see bright shiny rails where the old dirt and rust were before.
The Alpha-channel issues with trees and telegraph wires. This is something that still exists from BETA1 I know it was mentioned to be fixed, maybe sooner than not, because it is annoying.
The continuous jumping back to the top of the list of tracks and other objects no matter what is picked. This is a carryover from TRS2006 and I was hoping this could have been resolved with this version. This is probably harder to explain than to observe... I found a relacement track for my sidings and yards. This is the old HU Trainz dark grey ballast track. This is low-poly track and has a nice profile to it. I would choose the track place some, go in and find my signals and speed signs, etc. Go back to the track list, and the list defaulted back to the top with Auran track as the first choice. This became a pain because I kept selecting the wrong track. The same thing happened in the trackside objects. Instead of staying with the last switchstand that I chose, the list jumped right up to the top on concrete abutments. Spline object, buildings and industries do this as well. Very annoying and very time consuming.
The textures changed to weird blocks when updating the mesh from 10x grid to 5x grid. There are areas now that look like I have different colored parking lots all over the place. These textures were originally spun around and needed to be brushed out again. Now I'm not sure how this looks in compatability mode because I didn't try it.
Missing buildings and other objects. They appear fine in CM2 and without errors, but do not appear in Surveyor on the route. They are listed in red on the list which probably means they're kaput.
Some of my rolling stock did this too with the red listing and are dead. These items had no errors in them and worked fine in TRS2006. A lot of these were older progressive meshed Paintshed items. This also happened in the BETA 1 as well, but being BETA I expected it. Maybe the handling of older content such as this can be taken care of in a future release if not, I'll move these to thes scrap yard.
My overall feelings and conclusion so far:
So after poking around so far, I've come to the conclusion that TS2009 is a fairly decent product that has a lot of potential to go places. All that is needed is some fixes for the different bugs as they've been showing up. I have probably not even come close to finding many of the bugs in the program. What I've listed are the ones that were blatently obvious to me. All in all it deserves a 4/5 stars.
When I get a chance, I'll give Driver a try. This won't be with a single train over the route, but multiple AI drivers, active portals, etc. to test my signal setup. In Beta 1, my signaling worked fine so this will be an interesting test to see if they continue to work like before.
The small annoyances are something I can live with for now with the hopes of them being fixed in future versions. For the newcomer, this program is quite the bargain because of all of the installed content. A lot of the items that I had downloaded over the nearly 5 years since I've used Trainz, are now built in. This alone is worth the package as it is because of the amount of time and FCTs saved.
Anyway, I'm open for feedback of course and I'm sure there's will be plenty.
John
