Little_Boy921
Route Building Rocks
So......hey guys! Holy crap its been a long time since I regularly posted in this thread, but it wont stay dead for long because Im going to be resuming work on this project. I know its been well over a year since I last gave any substantial update but I feel like I really needed a break to explore other routes I was interested in making. Also, if anyone is wondering, this does not mean I was able to save up the 1200 dollars needed to recover the data from the faulty drive that had my trainz 2019 saves on it since it failed in May. Im now working on that save on a different (and newer) drive, just because I dont think I can go too long without playing Trainz. I guess I should also clarify that my saves from 2019 are on a separate drive, and I didnt want to use that save exact folder for Trainz 22 so basically, I was (and still am) working off a duplicate. So the original folder still exists, its just that the new routes I made within that folder and other edits done prior to May are not gone, but effectively blocked behind a $1k paywall (also if you would like to help me reach that goal....eventually, you can help through art commissions. So if you want me to draw a pet dog or cat, feel free to comment or pm me!).
As a heads up, a majority of my focus this year will be on building scenery and other things that I had neglected on initially. Most of this is to give me more time to think about something thats been on my mind regarding this project. I said in the past that I would ultimately link up both my NEC North and South routes to form the entire Northeast Corridor in Trainz. But recently, Ive been playing around the idea of building to Boston within NEC South and having NEC North as just a one off. The reason is just because I dont feel like that route has held up as well as NEC South has, due to the amount of inaccuracies and faults I found when adding catenary wire along the route. I know this is hard to imagine given none of you guys have played it (until today that is...more info at the end) but imagine you start drawing a comic when you're a kid, with art and storylines that are okay for the standards of someone whose 10, but you continue to work on it as you get older, improving on your artistic and storytelling skills as you go along. So when you look back at those earlier stories within the same series, you feel like redrawing or rewriting them because the standards they were made at don't match up with your current standards. Now I get how ridiculous this might sound and if this was before I had gotten Trainz 2022 PE, I dont think I would've seriously entertained this idea. I've always had issues with the quality of NEC North, but in the past, I had to just deal with it because of how long and how much of an effort it took into making it. Surveyor 2.0 has really changed everything for me, blowing away every limitation that Surveyor Classic imposed like long straight sections of track that go well beyond the 5 to 6 mile limit. I can remember the tediousness of building the 150mph sections, trying to copy and paste a long ahh piece of track so that it could line up with the piece I had copied it from. In Trainz 2022, Ive been building the Santa Fe's Eastern Division between Chicago and Kansas City (I might make a thread about it idk), and in it there is a near 15 mile stretch of straight track with no curves. And making it was as simple as making a 5 to 6 mile long section of track, making 4 copies of it, and dragging them into place like they're layers in a drawing program! And this extends to the act of making routes in general! Surveyor 2.0 is one of the greatest things this franchise has introduced and its the main reason why Ive been entertaining the idea of not merging NEC South with NEC North and being more open to it. And its not like it would be too hard, as I can use that route as a reference for when I remake that section in NEC South and just use the bits that I liked. But I should emphasize that this is just an idea Ive been floating. Im not entirely sure if I fully onboard with it yet! I could definitely use some third party opinions here, especially after you give both routes a try.
Speaking off, I probably mentioned that I would make both routes available as betas. And as of posting this, that day has come! Below is a link to a google drive containing both NEC North and South routes with some modified assets made by yours truly that you'll need to play these routes to their fullest! Of course, I should put a disclaimer that both routes are not even close to being in a finished state. So dont go in expecting stuff like scenery and yards to be fully rendered and in the game. I'm still working on those.
drive.google.com
You shouldn't have to worry about missing assets since I've gone out of my way to use existing stuff that can be easily found on the trainz download station or in official content on steam. As someone who has had the experience of finding a cool route, downloading it only find that it has hundreds upon hundreds of missing assets, I don't want anyone else to go through that pain. But if anything does happen to be missing, please let me know!
As a heads up, a majority of my focus this year will be on building scenery and other things that I had neglected on initially. Most of this is to give me more time to think about something thats been on my mind regarding this project. I said in the past that I would ultimately link up both my NEC North and South routes to form the entire Northeast Corridor in Trainz. But recently, Ive been playing around the idea of building to Boston within NEC South and having NEC North as just a one off. The reason is just because I dont feel like that route has held up as well as NEC South has, due to the amount of inaccuracies and faults I found when adding catenary wire along the route. I know this is hard to imagine given none of you guys have played it (until today that is...more info at the end) but imagine you start drawing a comic when you're a kid, with art and storylines that are okay for the standards of someone whose 10, but you continue to work on it as you get older, improving on your artistic and storytelling skills as you go along. So when you look back at those earlier stories within the same series, you feel like redrawing or rewriting them because the standards they were made at don't match up with your current standards. Now I get how ridiculous this might sound and if this was before I had gotten Trainz 2022 PE, I dont think I would've seriously entertained this idea. I've always had issues with the quality of NEC North, but in the past, I had to just deal with it because of how long and how much of an effort it took into making it. Surveyor 2.0 has really changed everything for me, blowing away every limitation that Surveyor Classic imposed like long straight sections of track that go well beyond the 5 to 6 mile limit. I can remember the tediousness of building the 150mph sections, trying to copy and paste a long ahh piece of track so that it could line up with the piece I had copied it from. In Trainz 2022, Ive been building the Santa Fe's Eastern Division between Chicago and Kansas City (I might make a thread about it idk), and in it there is a near 15 mile stretch of straight track with no curves. And making it was as simple as making a 5 to 6 mile long section of track, making 4 copies of it, and dragging them into place like they're layers in a drawing program! And this extends to the act of making routes in general! Surveyor 2.0 is one of the greatest things this franchise has introduced and its the main reason why Ive been entertaining the idea of not merging NEC South with NEC North and being more open to it. And its not like it would be too hard, as I can use that route as a reference for when I remake that section in NEC South and just use the bits that I liked. But I should emphasize that this is just an idea Ive been floating. Im not entirely sure if I fully onboard with it yet! I could definitely use some third party opinions here, especially after you give both routes a try.
Speaking off, I probably mentioned that I would make both routes available as betas. And as of posting this, that day has come! Below is a link to a google drive containing both NEC North and South routes with some modified assets made by yours truly that you'll need to play these routes to their fullest! Of course, I should put a disclaimer that both routes are not even close to being in a finished state. So dont go in expecting stuff like scenery and yards to be fully rendered and in the game. I'm still working on those.
Trainz Northeast Corridor (BETA) – Google Drive
drive.google.com
You shouldn't have to worry about missing assets since I've gone out of my way to use existing stuff that can be easily found on the trainz download station or in official content on steam. As someone who has had the experience of finding a cool route, downloading it only find that it has hundreds upon hundreds of missing assets, I don't want anyone else to go through that pain. But if anything does happen to be missing, please let me know!