Concerned about DLC

nathanmallard

Well-known member
Hi all,
In the last couple of months I've been a tad disturbed at the additional focus N3V have been putting on their DLC. They are ads and promotions all over the place, even appearing in the main menu of TS2010 despite the fact said DLC won't work in versions below SP1! Now, the question is, why should I be disturbed?
Now, I also play TS2015. It's a decent sim, the two big downsides compared to Trainz are 1. the sorry excuse it has for a "surveyor" and 2. is of course Steam's DLC system. Steam have effectively monopolised all content creation, even people and groups independent and separate from Steam seem to have been coerced in to selling there wares through there shop. This brings me on to my first major gripe with this, in that I'm not sure that all that money spent goes back to the creators in question. I wouldn't have imagined that Steam would have recruited content creators without there being some sort of financial benefit for them, whilst with the common "Trainz system" of payware all the sites are completely non-affiliated with N3V so all the money you spend goes to the creator who deserves it. My second gripe with the Steam DLC system is that it's bloody expensive. I remember reading that the total value of all the DLC was somewhere around $2000 US Dollars, about £1700. Although obviously you won't buy everything, to get everything I would want personally I think I would have to spend in the region of £300-£400. And that, quite frankly, for a computer game, is ridiculous. They've got a "Workshop" now where you can download scenarios and routes for free, but of course they require payware packs for dependencies so really it's just another incentive for you to keep lining Steam's pockets. Anyway, enough ranting about Railworks, back to N3V.

With T:ANE, life is becoming increasingly difficult for creators. Stuff like LOD which requires a lot of messing about is now required in the latest built for example. I've noticed freeware creators have not been as active recently, jayholland and Skipper1945 to name just two examples. I can't help wondering if that has something to do with T:ANE and the new restrictions on uploading to the DLS. Combined with the increase in DLC promotion, it looks increasingly like N3V is using T:ANE as an excuse to "do a Steam" and monopolise content creation for themselves. I sincerely hope they are not doing this, as one of the major attractions of Trainz is the vast and ever growing range of free (free!) content available, something that is becoming increasingly rare in the simulation, and indeed gaming, world. I would urge N3V to take a step back from content creation, and update the Trainz Wiki page so new and potential creators (like me!) have somewhere to find tutorials, tips and guides, and also publicise the free, community-developed content just as much, if not more, than the official DLC as I suspect the promise of free content will draw people away from other sims such as Railworks and Run8. Basically, if Trainz adopted a Steam-like DLC system N3V would be shooting themselves in the foot.
Finally, I would also like to suggest that N3V allow people to upload content for ALL build numbers on the DLS, so that the TS2006/04/09 holdouts can continue to contribute should they wish to, and perhaps add a link to the DLS on the T:ANE Main Menu if they haven't already (I don't have T:ANE yet, I don't know!).
 
As it stands, steam's involvement is simply as a distribution platform, they will take their percentage cut as expected, and I wouldn't expect availability through a system as popular or functional as Steam to be free regardless. As for their pricing, it is steep, but judging them, the quality of the products do seem to make the price somewhat justifiable. Not completely given the digital distribution system however.

Stuff like LOD which requires a lot of messing about is now required in the latest built for example. I've noticed freeware creators have not been as active recently, jayholland and Skipper1945 to name just two examples.

I believe George is a tad too busy for Trainz presently, I'm unsure about JayHolland. As for the increasing requirements, all I can say is good. Many people, myself included at times, have been critical of Trainz performance on mid to high end hardware, half the reason probably being Trainz itself in reality, the other half however is inefficient assets that simply make the situation worse. Always people expect better graphics, more details, so on and so forth. The only way to achieve this is to produce better content. This requires time and skill in software such as 3DSMAX or Blender which some people might not particularly want to get involved with, and that's okay, just don't expect the platform to cater to inferior content into the future in the face of strong competition from Dovetail.

allow people to upload content for ALL build numbers on the DLS, so that the TS2006/04/09 holdouts can continue to contribute should they wish to

I'm one for unpopular opinions. I believe people should be running TS12 with SP1HF4 applied and that continuing support for aging software is nonsensical for a company the size of N3V. As it stands, the holdouts have their solutions in third party sources, which is perfectly fine. I however believe that N3V should be focusing their efforts on maintaining software still within its support life cycle, rather than catering to holdouts.

Jack
 
Actually, in T:ANE, there is a direct link to the DLS in the list of assets in Content Manager. And anything downloaded while a route is being edited is available for use as soon as it is installed.

As for creating, the state of the art has advanced quite a bit since the halcyon days of UTC and TRS2004 when just getting something into Trainz was considered an accomplishment. The more recent versions and now especially T:ANE need objects to be made to a higher standard. Just adding LOD is more work but the results, when well done, are worth it in increased efficiency. And then there is modern texturing. When you look at the objects made by people like Ocemy and others of that caliber, the results are wow. A far cry from what we used to get. If the consequences are fewer but better vs more but worse objects, I'll go for fewer.
 
George is decorating his house I believe under instructions from his other half. Nathan you need to appreciate that we are not all young kids and have real world commitments that take precedence over a computer game. Just because someone hasn't released anything for a couple of weeks doesn't mean they have given up or left. Plenty of UK activity elsewhere........ members only.
DLC? N3V are a business and need to sell stuff if they don't advertise it, no one is going to flipping buy it and goodbye Trainz.

New restrictions? 2010 should have been blocked last October as it was they gave you a few months longer and you are moaning about it?

I'm one for unpopular opinions. I believe people should be running TS12 with SP1HF4 applied and that continuing support for aging software is nonsensical for a company the size of N3V. As it stands, the holdouts have their solutions in third party sources, which is perfectly fine. I however believe that N3V should be focusing their efforts on maintaining software still within its support life cycle, rather than catering to holdouts.

Agree 100% Jack
This forum would be a far better place if people stopped all this paranoid speculation based on nothing more than over active imaginations. ;)
 
George is decorating his house I believe under instructions from his other half.

That's good to hear. He hasn't posted on here for ages, I know he's getting on a bit so I feared he had an illness or something.

I'm one for unpopular opinions. I believe people should be running TS12 with SP1HF4 applied

Interesting opinion...I literally can't, my computer is uber-slow and the SP1 patch won't download. I use TS2010, but I know the older versions have a bit of a following hence the initial comment. Will get TANE soon, just hope it runs better than TS12. :o

As it stands, steam's involvement is simply as a distribution platform, they will take their percentage cut as expected

I understand that, but how much quality freeware, and indeed none-Steam payware, do you see for Railworks? I think there's something dodgy going on there personally.

New restrictions? 2010 should have been blocked last October as it was they gave you a few months longer and you are moaning about it?

Not moaning at all, just suggesting that they let everyone upload to the DLS, no matter which version they have.

This post seems to have been more controversial than I intended. I did ramble a bit, perhaps I should have worded it differently. Basically I was saying how much of a huge marketing boost that N3V could get by heavily publicising freeware content, and pointing out that this would sway many prospective buyers away from Railworks and other sims.
 
Basically I was saying how much of a huge marketing boost that N3V could get by heavily publicising freeware content, and pointing out that this would sway many prospective buyers away from Railworks and other sims.

Would it be practical though. I'm assuming you're essentially asking for freeware from N3V that matches of exceeds TS2015 payware, which to be honest is not reasonable in many aspects. Namely costs, as I'm sure people with the abilities to produce the content of the quality required won't come cheaply. At this point you look at a model which compensates for the time and resources placed into creating content, perhaps charging roughly £10-15 per item... Whoops, we've just hit Dovetails model, and look how well they're making it work...

You could then argue that the high quality freeware could come from the community, and you know what, it can. However, as stated earlier, the complexities behind producing efficient, visually appealing content are solid hurdles that will limit the quantity of people making this content to a small handful. This is just an educated guess however, we might simply all catch on and become masters of the craft for all I know, how likely is this however.

I see what you're saying, but it's time, money and man power that will solve every issue we could have here. Not something we all have a lot of.

As for the DLS, keep it as it is and raise the build numbers accordingly as time and revisions progress. This is one of a few ways to ensure that the content becoming available is guaranteed to meet the standards required that will see Trainz improve into the future.

Jack
 
I'm not asking for freeware from N3V, just for them to take a step back and let the community create content.

There's nothing stopping us from creating content in the first place. Admittedly the available documentation is not the best, but it's good enough when combined with the wealth of knowledge available here and in external groups.

If content creation is becoming too difficult as a result of trying to improve standards, and as a result we see a decline in freeware content production (unlikely), then perhaps it might not be a bad idea to fill the gaps with high quality payware that meets the standards we expect now. Personally I won't buy it as I can make what I need, but not everyone has the skills, time or even desire, which is fine by me. This is a win for people who would rather pay a small sum for what they want, whilst also ensuring N3V have another revenue option.
 
With T:ANE, life is becoming increasingly difficult for creators. Stuff like LOD which requires a lot of messing about is now required in the latest built for example.

One of the biggest complaints about Trainz has been performance, and the purpose of LoD is to remedy that.
 
I'm not asking for freeware from N3V, just for them to take a step back and let the community create content.


We already have a fair chunk of content these days, new content is being created but it takes time and its summer I think we are concentrating on TS12 but some things work very well with TANE.

jhchiigd.png


is something being worked on at the moment, the screenshot is in TANE.

Cheerio John
 
With that said, compliant uploads for pre-TS12 versions should be allowed on the DLS, provided they can pass T:ANE-level error-checking. Better to bring more creators and users under the umbrella, rather than exclude them.
 
One of the biggest things is that the 'improved' standards brings us more in line with most game art.

Until TS2009, Trainz content was /well/ behind any other 'current' game in relation to the 'requirements' and functionality for art. For example, LOD was the exception, rather than the norm. Now it's becoming the norm, rather than the exception. And for TANE builds (build 3.9 and higher IIRC) it's now a requirement. If LOD remained remained the exception, Trainz would run like crap no matter what you do. Especially with the expectation of higher quality content, with more detail, etc.

From TS2009, many features were added to allow efficient content to be, well, efficient. TS2010 improved this further, as did TS12 (although by this point, the functions were basically there). They set the foundations for efficient content to be made.

Unfortunately, efficient content takes a long time to make. I've been working on LOD for my current steam loco for about a month. OTOH, it's now setup so that it is a grand total of 107 triangles when viewed from 1100m away. If everything were built to this sort of spec, I would expect performance in Trainz to be much much better. But it takes a long time to make the content, and is rather tedious. Traincars are definitely very important in this aspect though. But even more so, scenery needs lod, and to get it as low as possible.

There's a distinct advantage here though! :) We're now getting more in line with the rest of the gaming community. There is a very large number of video tutorials, and 'text' tutorials, available on the internet for creating high quality game art. Be it visual quality, or performance quality, or both. Not everything needs to look like the top professional game art, but it's not that hard to make efficient content IMO. The 'hard' bit is the LOD, but even this isn't too bad. The lowest LOD is quite easy, just take a few screenshots of the next highest LOD for the texture, and make a few boxes to put them on.

But, it will mean that content takes a little longer. Personally, I don't mind, although it does get painful with super complex models! :)

EDIT: Also, as to DLC. I've got 1 steamer on the go at the moment that'll be DLC. I've then got 2 more that will hopefully be worked on soon(tm) that will be freeware (and in quite a few variants!). Then from there, plans vary between free and pay. Same goes for rolling stock. I don't think freeware will stop, it'll just start appearing at much the same speed as payware. The great thing is, we have a very good selection of content to work with; so a slower speed shouldn't be as much of an issue, as compared to TANE making a 'clean' start (as you'd only have a very small amount of content then!).

Hope this makes sense, I'm a little tired at the moment :)

Regards
Zec
 
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Another thing I've noticed, is the large amount of videos there are, on TS2014/15. Many people make videos showcasing their new payware locomotives and the included sessions, as if they've won a prize. Apart from the ever-so-numerous Thomas Train videos, odd crash compilations, nonsensical 'humour' videos, N3V trailers and promos, we don't really cover much ground in terms of YouTube videos.

If I find the time, after I purchase T:ANE, I will try to make a small-but-stunning, beautiful little route, and showcase some of the brilliant UK stock we already have. Not reviewing, mind you, but a short, cute little 4-5 minute clip of a locomotive traversing through a realistic scene. I'll also try to make use of all the features, such as headcodes, ETH, working brakes, AWS, etc. that people like Tony Zayachkivsky have pulled their hair out to see work.

I've people like Philskene and TRam__ make good use of the simulator and upload promising videos. If I was an outsider, I would buy T:ANE immediately after watching one of TRam__'s videos on YouTube, as they are so well-done :) .
 
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