Mears Railroads by tftlmt

[RidderDansk]

I recently downloaded via the Download Station the "Mears Railroads - Silverton, Red Mountain, Lake City" by tftlmt (KUID_680673_100806) which installed 986 Assets, with a total of 101 Missing Assets. The Download Station indicates that 400 downloads of this Layout has taken place. Has anyone been able to locate any missing assets for this layout?

What resources are available to assist in locating missing assets?

I can compile a list of Missing Assets if that would be helpful.

Any help will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

 

[JCitron]

I would contact the route creator and ask him for the list of dependencies and where to get them. To be honest, I wouldn't put much time into that route if it has that many missing assets.

 

[RidderDansk]

Thank you, John.

"I wouldn't put much time into that route if it has that many missing assets".

I subscribe solely because of the potential that Trainz represents in what interests me in Railroad History, not the tens of thousands of Assets (which include missing assets every time I download packaged content).

Missing assets seems to be the general rule for most things on the Download Station. This is what a Gold Subscription garners: content that contains "missing" components. Then I do a search for missing assets, download a CDP file from a third-party web-site, only to discover that it also contains "missing assets". This is Trainz in a nutshell: "Missing".

"I would contact the route creator and ask him (or her) for the list of dependencies and where to get them."

The list of dependencies and where to download them (if not included in the Download) should be included in the download documentation. Download Documentation? Many content creators can't even be bothered to provide a thumbnail of their creations, so that is a huge ask.

But thank you for your suggestion. I will certainly contact the creator of Mears Railroads.

Imagine what Trainz could be if what is submitted to the Download Station were actually fully present and complete and contained no "Missing Assets".

Maybe my Gold Subscription will go "missing".

 

[Frank_Dean]

I understand your anger at the lack of kuids, but this problem dates back to the early days of Trainz, and has nothing to do with different types of Trainz or N3V subscriptions.
I've been using Trainz since 2004, and in a copy of Trainz 2022, to which I add everything I download from around the world, I can assure you I have several thousand unknown objects. I use this copy only as a database from which I transfer content to other copies of Trainz to play.
The main problem arises from some authors who open websites for their creations without uploading them to the DLS, for various reasons, and over time, due to economic costs, illness, and death, these websites are closed and all the content disappears. During the time these defunct websites were open, many downloaded their content and added it to their routes and later uploaded it to the DLS.
That's why there are thousands of routes and objects in the DLS that have missing assets.
Then there's another issue on this forum where sharing files, even older ones, is frowned upon or illegal.
Main advice: If you find routes or objects with unknown dependencies, delete them and look for others that are complete.

 

[RidderDansk]

Thank you for your comment, Frank_Dean.

I have yet to Download anything from the Download Station and from N3V, other than Trainz itself, which is installed with hundreds and thousands of Assets which are absolutely of no interest to me. Other Railroad "games" are of an era that is, also, of no interest to me. Or the environment is nowhere near as customizable as Trainz.

Diesel does not interest me. I grew up in Colorado and I spent my younger years reading about the early days of Narrow Gauge Railroads and exploring the San Juan Mountains. I spend more time sifting through Assets that I never use and hunting for Missing Assets for packages I download from N3V that I pay a Subscription to than I ever spend enjoying Trainz, which is why I Subscribe to Trainz, to enjoy Trainz, and as yet Trainz has not delivered. Which is my fault for not being interested in the modern era of Diesel.

"Century of Steam" is promising, but it is in development, and has been in development for years, and appears it will be in development for years. And the developers seem to be of the mindset not to release anything until they are completely satisfied that they have a completely "finished" product. And there has been little to no indication from "Century of Steam" how, or even if, that environment will be customizable.

As I understand it, the problem of Missing Assets has to do with a lack of standards and oversight on N3V's part. Granted, curating submissions would be a next to impossible task, but N3V should have thought of that when N3V opened their platform to their community. Assets don't simply disappear, unless the creator of the Asset removes it from circulation. Missing Assets are a direct result of poor forethought and management. N3V needed to have taken responsibility for Assets submitted to N3V, while the creator of the Asset retained "ownership" of his or her creation, as any Artist does.

My heart goes out to the families of those talented creators who have passed on. Human Beings are not immortal. That should have been thought of when the platform was opened to the community. What is the point of submitting Assets to N3V if those submissions are not archived by N3V and made available as long as N3V is in "business". What are we investing in with our Subscriptions. These are not questions. Where was the planning.

N3V has created a stellar environment. That environment would be far more appealing without all the Missing Assets. Assets were created and submitted. The Environment has matured and evolved. Where was the consideration as that maturing and evolving was taking place. Not a question.

Missing Assets has everything to do with different versions of Trainz and Subscription levels, if N3V is actually a "Professional" organization.

Create the problem and endeavor to ignore the issue and pretend it doesn't exist is not a viable or responsible solution.

My "Missing" Subscription is becoming more viable with every download accompanied by additional Missing Assets.

 

[Sek_Hakuna]

Hey there ridderdansk,

Just curious how you installed the Mears route. I downloaded the route today, from the DLS, to find it looks like it was created about 20 years ago in Trainz 2006. It was missing quite a bit of assets including the train track. Expecting assets from that long ago to be readily available is beyond realistic...IMHO.

I have created a route called Durango to Silverton. I started the route in 2010 and have been upgrading it with every new version of Trainz since. It was created with Digital Elevation Maps and is very accurate in the depiction of the terrain. The limits of Trainz makes the historical accuracy very challenging. I did the best I could with what was available. It is available on the DLS. Here is the KUID:429080:100045. It should work okay in your Gold version of Trainz.

There is a session available as well but don't expect much from it as I'm not a session developer. It is functional however. There will be a few steam engine and boxcar downloads from 3rd party websites. The main one is https://trainz-forge.com/ You will need to get all the NG stuff. It is all in the Freeware sections. Read the descriptions carefully as there are additional "dependencies" needed for some items. It is a bit of work but that is the nature of Trainz.

Anything else you need just post the kuid here and several of us will surely help locate them.

Randall

 

[RidderDansk]

Randall,

Thank you for your comment and advise. I downloaded "Mears Railroads - Silverton, Red Mountain and Lake City" (KUID_680673_100806) from the Download Station. The download is dated 6 July 2024, and from everything that I can determine, this download should be more recent than twenty years ago, as it contains PBR Textures and other Assets that were not available twenty years in the past. I first discovered Trainz in 2009 and became disenchanted with missing assets and deleted everything and forgot my login information and "recently" created this account after I retired. I am quite familiar with how TRS 2006 and later versions looked and the version of Mears Railroad that I downloaded recently is nothing like Trainz was twenty years ago.

tftlmt created a beautiful representation of the San Juan Mountains and the Silverton Railroads, it just tasted bitter to discover that it too suffers from the fatal Missing Assets curse that is at the heart of every download I have ever downloaded from the N3V Download Station. If I deleted every download I ever downloaded from the Download Station, there would be absolutely no point in being a Gold Subscriber, because what N3V offers, other than Surveyor 2.0 and the environment itself, massively large Railroad Empires and Diesel Locomotives holds absolutely no interest for me.

On a happier note, I have downloaded your Silverton to Durango and enjoy that route very much, thank you. While it is an excellent and beautifully crafted route, my passion is for the Mears Railroads, not the D&RG. My hopes were high when I saw that the Three Silverton Railroads (Silverton, Silverton Northern, and Silverton Gladstone & Northerly) created by Otto Mears were available. Discovering that this download also came with the ubiquitous Missing Assets was more than disappointing, considering the download was only a year old.

N3V seems to care nothing about managing their Download Station professionally and responsibly, even for Gold Subscribers, so what is the benefit of being a Gold Subscriber. Again, not a question.

Unless one is perfectly content with what N3V provides, there is no point in being a Gold Subscriber. As a Pisces and an INFJ and a Sigma Male, I have never been content with what interests the public or society in general. While Surveyor 2.0 is an exceptionally beautiful set of tools, Diesel and anything more recent than 1900 is simply not of interest to me as it relates to Railroading. Simply put, Colorado Narrow Gauge Railroading pre-1900 was my passion when I was young enough to be out exploring and living a full and healthy life. Age and health have taken that gift and blessing from me and that is why Trainz has become an outlet for me in my twilight years.

Until "Century of Steam" is released, if it ever will be released, Trainz is the most viable candidate, but then, Missing Assets is destroying that.

Apologies for the rant. Trainz is a beautiful game and has great potential. Missing Assets just kills the fun.

Thank you again for your thoughts.

James

 

[Forester1]

I downloaded it and had about 69 unknowns. The first two I checked were nowhere to be found.

 

[Sek_Hakuna]

This is getting interesting. I went to the "white pages" DLS rather than the Content Manager to do some investigating. I was able to get a bit more file data about versions and dates. I was surprised to find many assets I use in my own Durango to Silverton route date back to 2005. I knew they were older assets when I used them but to keep things more accurate for the route I opted to use them anyway.

Back to Mears route. I checked a few of the Textures used on his route and found dates back to 2005 so I was fairly close on guessing. I also found one PBR texture for grass. This would indicate he updated the route and submitted. However, it is my understanding that when the route is upgraded then the KUID last digit will be a 1 or 2 and so on. It also shows most of TFTLMT's routes were uploaded at the same date. There are trees from st_rmn that were introduced during the T:ane days. JVC trees and grass is very old. I wonder why, if the author updated the route , he only did a limited amount? The last time the author made a post on the forum was in 2021.

Things that make ya go hmmmmmmmmm....

Randall

 

[RidderDansk]

Randall, thank you for researching this further. I have tried, but my health limits my time, which adds to my frustration when there are missing assets. I don't understand why creators keep using older Assets when there is updated content that looks so much better. I can understand staying with original Assets when there is no new content available. Textures is a different category if using PBR Textures. I would go exclusively with PBR Textures. And TurFX and Clutter is an exceptional addition to Trainz.

All things considered, there is a lot about Trainz that causes me to go hmmmmmm...