To 2010 or Not To 2010....

[Alco_P-A]

That seems to be the question around here. All and all I think 2010 is the best so far as Trainz goes and the price is fair. The only thing that kind of bugs me is the sound problem but I have found that depending on which locomotive I pick will depend on how good of sound I get. On a scale of 1-10 I think an 7 is good for 2010. I've really had no problems running the game and older stuff installs and works with no problems. So go ahead and buy a HARD COPY and enjoy the game. In the end I think you'll be happy.

 

[xinrobbie]

That seems to be the question around here. All and all I think 2010 is the best so far as Trainz goes and the price is fair. The only thing that kind of bugs me is the sound problem but I have found that depending on which locomotive I pick will depend on how good of sound I get. On a scale of 1-10 I think an 7 is good for 2010. I've really had no problems running the game and older stuff installs and works with no problems. So go ahead and buy a HARD COPY and enjoy the game. In the end I think you'll be happy.

I don't think anyone can argue about it being the best version. It has the most improvements being the latest version so of course its the best version. If you dont own an earlier copy of Trainz, its most certainly worth purchasing 2010 over any other version, no argument from me there.

I do think however, if you own 2006 or 09 then 2010 is just not worth the purchase, unless of course you happen to be in the position of having money to burn and therefore don't care in which case it really does not matter.

It's already been mentioned a few times that micro payments for Trainz updates would be a better way forward and I have to agree.

2010 just does not offer anywhere near enough overall improvement, or new content for that matter, to justify the price tag attached to it. It is in fact probably worth only half that at best.

This should have been released as a significant update to the 2009 version and had a price attached to it that reflected that fact.

When there was a significant jump forward in the overall technology and content, then call it an actual new version, tagged with which ever year is appropriate and charge for it accordingly.

Its academic now really as I have purchased it, but I am still very angry about it and will treat any future version with major scepticism before purchasing again.

Don't get me wrong, I am not trying to say Trainz sucks or anything, I have loved Auran Trainz for many many years. There's very little else around that can do what Trainz is capable of, if anything at all. I just wish that when new versions are released they would be just that, or be sold as an update and charged for appropriately.

 

[pisaacs]

I'm waiting for Trainz 2012, or maybe 2011 if it seems really advanced. Can't keep spending on a new version every year (Running Trainz 2009, and using Trainz since before UTC).

 

[GaryP]

xinrobbie, what do you think of the new Speed tree?
Do you work in Surveyor, or just drive? I'm trying to get a feel for this upgrade, as I have 2009.

the layers seem neat and with the voucher, it's pretty cheap as games go.
Oh sorry. Sim. But I was comparing it to the video games we spend $59 for, here in the States.

Gary

 

[xinrobbie]

xinrobbie, what do you think of the new Speed tree?
Do you work in Surveyor, or just drive? I'm trying to get a feel for this upgrade, as I have 2009.

the layers seem neat and with the voucher, it's pretty cheap as games go.
Oh sorry. Sim. But I was comparing it to the video games we spend $59 for, here in the States.

Gary

My main area of interest is route creation really.

The speed trees are quite nice, although I have to say I think they blow around in the wind just a little too much to be honest, nevertheless they are certainly an improvement over the trees of the past.

But, and there always seems to be a but, here is the problem as far as I can see.

Rendering too many speed trees will result in a major impact as far as performance is concerned. So even though they are nice, even an uber system will have problems when rendering too many of them. This leaves you in the position of having to be quite selective in their use.

I would have been happy to see trees that did not move in the wind, for example the trees in RailWorks, sorry to keep referring to RailWorks all the time, are perfect. They are rendered at high quality, look great and without any major impact on the performance side.

Most of the other content remains the same, the existing routes have had a few speed trees dropped on top, so in other words a fresh lick of paint.

The locos seem to render a little better, but still the same old locos.

The rest of the built in content consists of the 2009 track and its predecessors and all the houses, buildings, trees, cars etc. are the same as before.

If as you say, you are already running 2009, then I would advise against upgrading to 2010. Speed trees are the main focus of the upgrade as far as I'm concerned, I also believe that the bulk of load has been shifted to the GPU as opposed to the CPU, or was that in the 2009 version? Maybe I stand to be corrected.

Nevertheless its as simple as this, if you can justify spending 49$ and not be too bothered that you find have got pretty much the same program you already have, bar the speed trees and I think the ECML route that's been added then I would say go for it.

If your on a tighter budget and really expect your 49$ to offer you a lot more then stick with what you've got.

I think a wiser choice would be to spend that 49$ on some pay-ware for your 2009 version, at least your actually getting something new that way.

 

[EdrickV]

The speed trees are quite nice, although I have to say I think they blow around in the wind just a little too much to be honest, nevertheless they are certainly an improvement over the trees of the past.

Hopefully SP2 will fix that, among other things:
Added environmental slider for SpeedTree wind
http://online.ts2009.com/mediaWiki/index.php5/TS2010_SP2

 

[xinrobbie]

Hopefully SP2 will fix that, among other things:
Added environmental slider for SpeedTree wind
http://online.ts2009.com/mediaWiki/index.php5/TS2010_SP2

That's all good to know, but I don't think that will alter the fact that they are a major drain on overall performance, even on a very powerful rig.

Moving trees, at least in my opinion, are not particularly that important in a piece of software like this, especially when your going to have to be extremely selective in their use.

Static objects, with significant rendering improvement would have been sufficient and would not have had such a performance hit.

It's one extreme or the other as far as I can see, you either opt for the old school trees, which are pretty poor looking by today's standards, or have to go all out and use trees that are too detailed in comparison to everything else and additionally have physics to calculate. Where's the happy medium?

When a lot of the content is looking quite aged anyway, having such spectacular trees sat next to a much poorer object simply does nothing but make them look even worse.

It's like redecorating a room in your house and only bothering to repaint one wall white, just makes the rest stand out as being in need of serious attention, a white filling in a mouth full of yellow teeth.

Anyway that's just my view, if others are having giddy fits over the speed trees who am I to **** on their cornflakes.

 

[Smileyman]

TS2010 is great value for me because I didn't buy TS2009.

I was using TRS2004 mainly until TS2010, and it's definitely worth having.

I do have TRS2006 (I actually beta tested it), and I have Trainz Classics 3 (Settle & Carlisle), but I went back to TRS2004 soon after each of them.

Now I've got all the Trainz Classics 3 locos and rolling stock installed into TS2010, I'm very happy with the setup I have.

It's about time Trainz was fun again.

Smiley.

Edit: I don't use Speedtrees, and probably wont even if they fix them in SP2.
I love the speedtrees in Far Cry 2 on the Xbox360 (especially as they can catch fire!), but I think that they're a little bit of overkill for Trainz.

 

[xinrobbie]

TS2010 is great value for me because I didn't buy TS2009.

I was using TRS2004 mainly until TS2010, and it's definitely worth having.

I do have TRS2006 (I actually beta tested it), and I have Trainz Classics 3 (Settle & Carlisle), but I went back to TRS2004 soon after each of them.

Now I've got all the Trainz Classics 3 locos and rolling stock installed into TS2010, I'm very happy with the setup I have.

It's about time Trainz was fun again.

Smiley.

Edit: I don't use Speedtrees, and probably wont even if they fix them in SP2.
I love the speedtrees in Far Cry 2 on the Xbox360 (especially as they can catch fire!), but I think that they're a little bit of overkill for Trainz.

Yup, pretty much underlining everything I have said so far.