Am I a Traitor

[ex-railwayman]

Personally I don't regard Trainz as a game - "Far Cry" and "Call of Duty" are games.

Hello Alan,

Glad to see another veteran still here....

Oh, I don't know, Dick makes a very valid point, the CEO's of these simulators come from a gaming background, not a railway background, and to them the profit and loss balance sheets are all that they seem to be bothered about. I've just read a suggestion on another thread on this forum that Trainz may be going multiplayer, that to me points more towards gaming and the financial reward it may bring is more important than catering for all railway/train enthusiasts who want a more realistic authentic simulator. RW has already got Career Mode scenarios up and running to cater for the kids and those who just want to drive trains at unrealistic speeds to obtain points so they can see their name up in lights on the appropriate websites.
Sorry, matey, but, I think in a while a lot of folks may be deciding on whether to carry on accepting the way these simulators are heading or drifting away altogether to spend their spare time doing other things, and then most of the talented creators and veterans won't be around anymore to build stuff and help folk out for the new breed.

Cheerz. Steve, take care matey. :wave:

 

[clam1952]

Hello Alan,

Glad to see another veteran still here....

I've just read a suggestion on another thread on this forum that Trainz may be going multiplayer, that to me points more towards gaming and the financial reward it may bring is more important than catering for all railway/train enthusiasts who want a more realistic authentic simulator.

It's just a sugestion by a few users not an N3V idea, OK there are a lot of posts but they are mainly from the same few people.

One of the supporters of the idea did a poll on it and it got very little response, I can't see much financial reward from a handfull of people. Doubt it would happen anyway without a major rewrite or replacement of the Jet Engine.

 

[boleyd]

AI Breeds Profit

If I may interject once again - My point is that some attention to the so-called "veterans" breeds rewards for the "other" customers.

If the customer has a meaningful interaction with decent AI (as scenario'd by a veteran) it should improve their playing experience. This in-turn adds to the probability that more addon purchases will be forthcoming. A win-win with both camps gaining and RS profiting. There is a need to market the new reality and without that the added investment will fail. As has been pointed out most customers do not have the background to appreciate (read-spend addon $$$) running a real railroad. Thus without "telling them" about the features the attraction will not be there.

The same philosophy holds true for Trainz. The objective is to improve the simulation and the "game" while selling more addons or updates. This takes product management.

 

[Evgeni01]

Hello,

I too own a copy of Railworks. I saw the screenshots and the fancy cover, paid £34 and installed it. It is no longer installed however. When I was on RW, the game still required time spent on it in term of creation, since all the goods yards are empty and every train is hauled by a 47 (York to newcastle 70s line).

I expected it to be, buy the sim hop in a train, and off you go into a pretty, realistic world and no hours spent messing with stuff like in trainz - but no.

Also in trainz - empty goods yard, need an 08 shunter in there, download it for free.

Railworks - do you have £20 for that shunter you wanted sir? Or better still the stock you want hasn't been made. The sounds didn't impress me much or the models that come with the game (tta looks terrible and the 47 ain't great), I started to get the feeling that RW would require a lot of time because the tools are hard to use and money - definitely a lot of money.

I then remembered the days of trainz 2004 when I had a 101 leaving the station and a 37 coming in, followed by a 20 with some tta's and an 08 growling in a siding, whilst I observed from the second deck of a stagecoach Leyland olympian RH - it was fun, everything was how I wanted, and did not require a wad of cash and a month for it to be that way. Like this community; it felt alive.

So I have bought myself a copy of Trainz 2009 for £7.50 and have just patched it now. I have yet to register it with auran, nV3 or whoever runs the show these days.

 

[lewisner]

There are several videos of Railworks on YouTube especially of the new Flying Scotsman and they are quite nice BUT....it shows FS leaving Newcastle and I KNOW I shouldn't do it BUT.... I know the place better than the back of my hand and my eyes are running over it like an electron microscope thinking "urgh, that signal is wrong", "oohh that bridge doesn't look like that". And what the hell are those animated people like? They sound like they should be a good idea but watching them striding along an empty platform with that odd gait just made me laugh. :hehe:

 

[sniper297]

Like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXeCGBnTQq8

:hehe:

 

[lewisner]

HA HA HA! I was going to make the Moonwalk comment but somebody already did! That's just weird "expects bad dreams tonight".

 

[meatloaf747]

Hello Mac, Give us a shout if you require anything else, I can give anyone a shopping list of websites to visit for both free stuff and Payware material, it all depends on what you all like to play with. Cheerz. Steve. :wave:

Steve,
Many thanks for your long and detailed reply. I'll try and have a look at the two routes that are your favourites. I should be able to get a better idea of whether or not it is worth while downloading some of the bigger routes and loco's/rolling stock.
I want to get a better understanding of which one of the two sims is better, or where they are very simular, or whether one of them is miles ahead of the other...
Thanks again for the many links in your post. It will save me a lot of time when I go looking for what is current available. At this stage I'm only interested in looking at Railworks 2 freeware content. If it's up to par with TS2010 (or better) then I would consider buying some of the payware...
Happy Trainz.
Cheers, Mac...

 

[RiscaStation]

Hi,


Nice video you made there sniper, happy days:hehe:

Kind regards
Mike

Like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXeCGBnTQq8

:hehe:

 

[ex-railwayman]

Steve,
Many thanks for your long and detailed reply. I'll try and have a look at the two routes that are your favourites. I should be able to get a better idea of whether or not it is worth while downloading some of the bigger routes and loco's/rolling stock.
I want to get a better understanding of which one of the two sims is better, or where they are very simular, or whether one of them is miles ahead of the other...
Thanks again for the many links in your post. It will save me a lot of time when I go looking for what is current available. At this stage I'm only interested in looking at Railworks 2 freeware content. If it's up to par with TS2010 (or better) then I would consider buying some of the payware...
Happy Trainz.
Cheers, Mac...

Hi Mac,

It would be unfair to suggest that one simulator is miles ahead of another, both, have their good and bad points. Obviously, as Trainz has been going for 10 years, it has far more content to choose from, which is only natural. As I already stated their is virtually no content from down under for Railworks2, unlike Trainz of course, so you can't compare any routes. The 2 major markets are Britain and North America, however, there are a lot of European layouts available, with scenic items to match, and I think they are all free, our continental cousins haven't caught on to this Payware marketplace yet, so, you can get tons of assets for nothing at present. And like Trainz, our European friends create some fabulous content.
Sorry, I should have already asked you, but, I'm unsure if you are personally more into steam than diesel, and do North American layouts appeal to you mostly, what is your preference ??

I can suggest better areas to explore if I have some idea of what you really like.

I would honestly say that due to the lack of scenic content and textures, etc, a lot of the very, very long routes may look a bit monotonous mile after mile, I think to obtain a better understanding of what the game holds you should stick to the small and medium sized routes to start with.

Cheerz. Steve.

 

[IsambardKingdomBrunel]

Trainz AI Shunting = Yes
RW = No

Trainz Extensive freeware = Yes
RW = No

Trainz Extensive Interactive Industries = Yes
RW = Very Limited

Trainz High Res graphics on Locos\Stock & Scenery = Yes
RW = High Res graphics on Locos\Stock. But scenery Low Res

Trainz AI = Very flexible and Proto Operations are possible
RW = Next to useless and AI acts as moving scenery.

 

[Davie_UCF]

I love Trainz for how flexiable AI is. For example i've got a train which drops off coal, then a local shunter drops it off to the coal station while the train previous picks up the empties.. once the shunters done it puts the empties in the empties siding for the whole process to repeat an hour later!

Also working on a shunter that properly disects a consist and puts into different sidings and then makes a new train ready for a loco

So rewarding with near realistic results! If only Trainz looked more realistic aswell

 

[Vern]

Not forgetting of course that if you just want to chill for half an hour as a passenger and let the AI drive, Trainz lets you do that RW doesn't.

 

[wholbr]

Hi Everybody.

Trainz AI = Very flexible and Proto Operations Are possible
RW = Next to useless and AI acts as moving scenery.

I love Trainz for how flexiable AI is. For example i've got a train which drops off coal, then a local shunter drops it off to the coal station while the train previous picks up the empties.. once the shunters done it puts the empties in the empties siding.
So rewarding with near realistic results! aswell

Not forgetting of course that if you just want to chill for half an hour as a passenger and let the AI drive, Trainz lets you do that RW doesn't.

I believe the above three quotes sums up exactly what I have found At the end of the first full week of owning Railworks. Trainz is so far in front of Railworks when it comes to AI operations that you could not even say that RW is in the same league. What is soul destroying is that you spend a lot of time setting up your AI Trains and then you only see them as you pass by with the consist you are driving or at a station. I have found that the foregoing is for me an absolute 100% killer when it comes to Railworks.

With Trainz your AI consists become very much part of your of your your session or scenario as it is known in RW. You can jump from consist to consist of all different types and take control of any one of them with no problem at all. With Railworks you are stuck with one train from beginning to the end of your run and if you want to change to anything else you have to go into session editor change the driver train and start the program all over again

To add to the above as Vern states you can chill out in Trainz with your evening glass of wine by just placing yourself in a carriage on your favorite route and allow trainz to do all the driving while you just watch the scenery go by. You can also change to different seats in the carriage to get the best view of the scenery you've created. Now that's what I consider as heaven at the end of the evening and what I shall be doing tonight at the end of a busy week.

You can't do that in Railworks and it cost me 50 quid to find out, so my advice to others take heed before you buy because as I have found AI operations is a big ticket item and one I did not appreciate until I purchased Railworks.

Bill

 

[NikkiA]

Trainz High Res graphics on Locos\Stock & Scenery = Yes
RW = High Res graphics on Locos\Stock. But scenery Low Res

Actually, IKB, RW doesn't really have that much hi-res graphics for locos/stock either.

The whole thing falls over if you have more than a couple of 2048x2048 textures, as Mike Round's WD 2-8-0 and ROD 2-8-0 models showed. At first he used 2048x2048 textures for both the loco and the tender, and it would cause railworks to crash on about 80% of installs, regardless of how much video or system ram was present. He had to drop the tender resolution to 1024x1024 to fix it.

So I'd say, for all practical purposes, RW is limited to 1024x1024 textures except in extremely rare situations, whereas trainz will run reasonably OK with 2048x2048 textures used reasonably frequently (it'll all fall over too if *everything* has them, but for locos and carriages it'd probably be ok).

So there you go, one thing RW appears to have going for it, it doesn't

 

[IsambardKingdomBrunel]

Actually, IKB, RW doesn't really have that much hi-res graphics for locos/stock either.

The whole thing falls over if you have more than a couple of 2048x2048 textures, as Mike Round's WD 2-8-0 and ROD 2-8-0 models showed. At first he used 2048x2048 textures for both the loco and the tender, and it would cause railworks to crash on about 80% of installs, regardless of how much video or system ram was present. He had to drop the tender resolution to 1024x1024 to fix it.

So I'd say, for all practical purposes, RW is limited to 1024x1024 textures except in extremely rare situations, whereas trainz will run reasonably OK with 2048x2048 textures used reasonably frequently (it'll all fall over too if *everything* has them, but for locos and carriages it'd probably be ok).

So there you go, one thing RW appears to have going for it, it doesn't

I stand corrected then Nikki, gladly of course.

I do know that i hate the amount of LOD that is applied to RW models. Details like wheels etc seem to only come into view when right on top of you.

Mike.

 

[ex-railwayman]

Hi Everybody.
Trainz is so far in front of Railworks when it comes to AI operations that you could not even say that RW is in the same league. What is soul destroying is that you spend a lot of time setting up your AI Trains and then you only see them as you pass by with the consist you are driving or at a station. I have found that the foregoing is for me an absolute 100% killer when it comes to Railworks.

With Trainz your AI consists become very much part of your session or scenario as it is known in RW. You can jump from consist to consist of all different types and take control of any one of them with no problem at all. With Railworks you are stuck with one train from beginning to the end of your run and if you want to change to anything else you have to go into session editor change the driver train and start the program all over again

To add to the above as Vern states you can chill out in Trainz with your evening glass of wine by just placing yourself in a carriage on your favorite route and allow trainz to do all the driving while you just watch the scenery go by. You can also change to different seats in the carriage to get the best view of the scenery you've created. Now that's what I consider as heaven at the end of the evening and what I shall be doing tonight at the end of a busy week.

You can't do that in Railworks and it cost me 50 quid to find out, so my advice to others take heed before you buy because as I have found AI operations is a big ticket item and one I did not appreciate until I purchased Railworks.

Bill

Hello Bill,

Sorry, there seems to be some misconception here, you can jump from one AI train consist to another in Railworks, I've just done it on a couple of freight trains on the Newcastle to York layout. I don't know about travelling in a passenger coach though on an AI, I've never tried doing it, I'll have to have a go this weekend. You can travel in passenger trains if you are actually driving them, many of the coaches and I think the DMU's allow it. Some of the coaching stock will tell you if they are passenger view enabled anyway, so, you'll know if you can't sit in them. I can't quite understand why you'd want to jump backwards and forwards all the time between trains, you wouldn't know where you are on the map......:hehe: I think it's all down to personal preference, but, I also enjoy sitting as a passenger in Railworks enjoying the scenery as you fly along. You need to have a look at some of the videos on youtube for Railworks passenger views from coaches, there are a few good ones about.

Cheerz. Steve.

 

[wholbr]

Hi Steve and Everybody.
Thanks for the reply Steve as I certainly hope you are right regarding being able to drive or ride in more than one consist during a Railworks scenario. If it's correct you have definitely made my weekend and a few other posters on this thread.

Having said that, I have just had another look through the scenario building material that came with Railworks and it does definitely state that only one driver train can be placed in any single scenario. You have to nominate that that by ticking the box in the driver setup instructions. From then on the consists has to be driven by the player and you cannot move to any other AI train that is in the scenario without changing the start setup.

The above is hugely different from Trainz where as I said you can move from consist to consist while the session is running or even leave the train at a station, wait and then board another train as it arrives either as driver or as passenger in a carriage letting the AI do the rest.

I hope I'm wrong and you are right but at the moment as far as I can work out that seems to be it.

Bill

 

[Vern]

I have encountered a couple of scenarios in RW where you move between trains, these were created by Sly for his 9F release so it must work after a fashion. However I can confirm once you "click" on a train to take it over, you *must* do the driving even if sat in the passenger view, the AI will not do it for you.

 

[Mike10]

You can also change to different seats in the carriage to get the best view of the scenery you've created.

The whole thing falls over if you have more than a couple of 2048x2048 textures, as Mike Round's WD 2-8-0 and ROD 2-8-0 models showed.

I do know that i hate the amount of LOD that is applied to RW models. Details like wheels etc seem to only come into view when right on top of you.

It all depends how you make things. My coaches and wagons have all of those.

You can change seats in the coaches (and the brake vans). They use 2048 textures and yet I've had 80 of them in one scene without problems. As for things popping into view, that just menas you have to setup the LOD carefully.

My website is here: www.rail-sim.net

Won't cost anything to see what I mean as there's a "try before you buy" version available to download.

Mike.