Trainz - No longer casual user nor community focused?

[Vern]

Could it be N3V are looking at TSW and considering going down that road? A high level tool set that is either too complex for the average user and ultimately only available to selected "associates"?

Well newsflash, until Trainz incorporates the ability to set up a complex 24 hour timetable including trains that automatically roll on to the next scheduled working plus an autonomous signaller that doesn't involve the player having to set the route for their own train, you ain't competing with Jack and... Jill.

In the meantime us plebs on the owned outright version of TRS22 still have to contend with all the low level issues that have never improved in 22 years of the title, such as trying to disguise the oversize dighole every time we need to place a tunnel.

 

[afe_uy]

Any web marketer will tell you that the people who are most likely to post their opinions about a product are those who have complaints, legitimate or otherwise. Customers who are happy with a product or who simply just "get on with using it" will rarely post. How often do you respond to those endless emails from online suppliers asking you to give a star rating for their product/service? I rarely do unless it is to point out (politely) a problem. Mostly I just delete the email and get on with using the product/service.

Not counting this one there are 37 posts in this thread with 839 views (so far). Roughly 6 or so different individuals have made a complaint - with varying levels of "annoyance". How many have viewed this thread and decided - not interested in this?

I'm not belittling those who have a complaint to make but you did ask for an analysis of the numbers of those who are "happy".

And you would also be right on that point...
I wouldn't exactly call it a "complaint", but clearly there have been problems...
But you could also take into account how many of the "somewhat annoying" are regular content creators (I consider myself one of them no matter how ugly my things are) and how many of the 839 who have only read are users who only play for a while over the weekend and they have not had -so far- any problem.
For my part, I decided not to update until I see what happened - I've had enough before - and I was right... and I'll stay here, if necessary.
Luckily, I don't have common problems with my routes... but I only use my own stuff, and very, very little from the DS, so I don't suffer due to "missing kuids" but I do have to deal with adjusting some things for changes that I discover on the fly between one version and another... (I still haven't been able to make my loco lights work again, for example)

Also this "old fart" sees with concern that many new people are more interested in "Kitbash" or in making reskin... or others want to create a "Big Boy" in 15 days... good luck with that.
I think that everything is part of the same thing, the enthusiasm no longer seems the same - it is not my case, nor do I think it will be for a long time, after all, I entered TRS22 after saying for years that I stayed with TRS19 - .. .
Old men are like that, they say...

 

[capdiamont]

How do I know most people are happy? Because they are doing well with subscriptions, etc and it really isn’t that many people complaining. Yes things need to get fixed, but unless there is a massive increase of programmers or third party software, asset creation will always be complicated. You can whine as much as you want but it doesn’t actually help anything or anyone. Telling someone to fix it, doesn’t fix anything. How should it be fixed while paying the bills? What seems simple to you is actually a very complex problem and will require thinking of how to fix, without breaking things, plus programming and testing. Have you ever listened to the list of what people want done? Fact is if you want something done, do what you can do. Produce some documentation on the WiKi or create tutorials. You have access to change the wiki as you have access to the forums. You will wait year for a tutorial, whine about not having it and yet if you go through what is there, you can probably create your own tutorial.

I didn’t say report an asset, I said report a bug. Different processes. If this version messed up a bunch of assets, then it isn’t the assets. If it is a current supported version then report the problems. They ran a beta open to anyone and yet many problems that cropped up were not submitted. How do you expect them to fix things? Yes there is long standing problems.

 

[martinvk]

Yeah, They work fine, except that 2019 constantly doesn't save work, placed a consist in game this week, saved it twice to be careful and when I opened it , the consist had disappeared! This is a regular occurrence, and I can also assure you that certain industries will not perform as intended , due to scripting issues.

Without further data, I would guess that you opened the route for editing which automatically creates a new session. The consist you placed will be in the session that was open the last time.
When you place objects in a session and you want to continue using those objects it is important to re-open that same session. The strength of Trainz is that a single route can have many different sessions associated with it so that the same route can be used to do different things. If you name the sessions appropriately then it is easy to find and run a morning session, an evening session, an historic session, a what if session, etc.

 

[johnwhelan]

I didn’t say report an asset, I said report a bug. Different processes. If this version messed up a bunch of assets, then it isn’t the assets. If it is a current supported version then report the problems. They ran a beta open to anyone and yet many problems that cropped up were not submitted. How do you expect them to fix things? Yes there is long standing problems.

Early versions of trainz you could use :cull on an attachment point. The latest version you just omit the attachment point on the LOD. Fine but for someone who likes to make their models available to a wide range of users does this mean I need two versions?

Scripting wants cleaning up. Each version of trainz seems to alter what works. Fine but unfortunately many script writers are no longer active in Trainz for one reason or another. COVID didn't help.

What would be nice is a set of standard robust scripts that work, ACS coupling is a basic requirement certainly for UK stock. JAG is fairly robust, Superscript less so.

We still have people running TS12 and earlier versions thinking that they are suited to less powerful machines. Middleton for laptops was built for less powerful machines (Intel integrated graphics) and TANE normally gives better frame rates than TS12 for a variety of reasons. We need a bit of education around what performance people can expect with different versions of software.

From a hardware point of view I think most would be better off running a stable version of TS22, but it would be nice to see some benchmarks. Same content, same viewing distances.

Then we get to LOD, if the asset is less than 500 polys do we really need the overhead of lm.txt file? I have just changed to .lm for a couple of hundred assets. The lm.txt file only has one mesh, and I think I have another 800 or so to go.

If I upload something to the DLS at version 3.5 then it will work in TS12 until N3V comes along and packages it. Then the texture files won't load in TS12 or TANE. Note they don't upload a new kuid2 version leaving the old one on the DLS they basically change the asset so it will no longer run in the version it was designed to run in or TANE for that matter.

Yes new and exciting are wonderful but sometimes it would be nice to just be able to run existing systems.

Cheerio John

 

[capdiamont]

I have yet to see a list of what changes are needed between the asset versions. Same with scripting. I have been looking through the forums to figure things out but it is here and there.

 

[johnwhelan]

I have yet to see a list of what changes are needed between the asset versions. Same with scripting. I have been looking through the forums to figure things out but it is here and there.

Precisely,

It's the weekend so new version of trainz out the door and dump the problems on the content creators including writing the documentation..

Cheerio John

 

[capdiamont]

Precisely,

It's the weekend so new version of trainz out the door and dump the problems on the content creators including writing the documentation..

Cheerio John

text files are pretty easy to figure out, unless they have weird characters or encoding. A computer program can be done up without their approval. It comes down to knowing what changes are needed. Scripting would be harder as the object names need to be pulled from somewhere. As my Dad says, “You can crap in one hand and wish in the other. See which one fills up first.” What changes needs to be done? You complain about having to do changes on hundreds of assets, but what are the changes?

 

[johnwhelan]

text files are pretty easy to figure out, unless they have weird characters or encoding. A computer program can be done up without their approval. It comes down to knowing what changes are needed. Scripting would be harder as the object names need to be pulled from somewhere. As my Dad says, “You can crap in one hand and wish in the other. See which one fills up first.” What changes needs to be done? You complain about having to do changes on hundreds of assets, but what are the changes?

To clear the roughly dozen warnings from the script the script needs to be replaced which means a dozen lines of config.txt file need to be added or changed. The original scripts worked fine in the original version of trainz. Second references to kuid2:101839:60002:1 need to be replaced with kuid2:101839:60002:3, this happens in about five places per config,txt file, Next all references to 3link_hanging.im need to be changed to 3link_hanging.lm. Note the associated lm.txt file only has the one .im entry. Same for 3link_coupled.im, and a few other .im files.

certain tags need to be removed such as shadow and light. The build number needs to be changed. Yes it is only a 430 line text file but you need to know your way around it.

Then you get to the reskins. I've spotted a dozen that need the same changes but I'm unable to make them as they aren't under my kuid and I doubt if the reskinners have ever touched the config.txt file in such depth before.

Doing one takes a few minutes then you need to check them for errors. Multiply that by a few hundred assets and swamp my beta tester with updated assets and you get an idea of the size of the problem.

Cheerio John

 

[johnwhelan]

text files are pretty easy to figure out, unless they have weird characters or encoding. A computer program can be done up without their approval. It comes down to knowing what changes are needed. Scripting would be harder as the object names need to be pulled from somewhere. As my Dad says, “You can crap in one hand and wish in the other. See which one fills up first.” What changes needs to be done? You complain about having to do changes on hundreds of assets, but what are the changes?

You might be interested in this thread.

https://forums.auran.com/trainz/sho...ons-for-TRS19-and-TRS22&p=1930667#post1930667

Payware DLC and the sessions don't work because the scripting rules have changed. N3V sell this for TS22.

There is a lot of frustration lying around.

Cheerio John

 

[capdiamont]

I'm not saying the scale of the work isn't there, nor that it isn't complicated. I'm saying we are stuck in a rut, where complaining and waiting is not working. The scale of the problem, needs to be automated as much as possible. I suspect there is a lot more to it, than what you have said. One thing is I suspect every asset is going to have different kids, and file names. How do you know to increase the kid by two? How do you know what scripting changes to do? What build #, etc? I've done automated config.txt files for the displacement hight maps I have done. I think I can help, but there is a lot of information I need. No idea about how to help the beta tester, except for more people.

 

[dangavel]

Any web marketer will tell you that the people who are most likely to post their opinions about a product are those who have complaints, legitimate or otherwise. Customers who are happy with a product or who simply just "get on with using it" will rarely post. How often do you respond to those endless emails from online suppliers asking you to give a star rating for their product/service? I rarely do unless it is to point out (politely) a problem. Mostly I just delete the email and get on with using the product/service.

Not counting this one there are 37 posts in this thread with 839 views (so far). Roughly 6 or so different individuals have made a complaint - with varying levels of "annoyance". How many have viewed this thread and decided - not interested in this?

I'm not belittling those who have a complaint to make but you did ask for an analysis of the numbers of those who are "happy".

Which you haven't supplied any actual data, just your own anecdotal perusal of the forum.do you know what percentage of users actually use the forum? Do you know how many people have bought the app and them walked away due to frustration ? No you don't , unless you have access to NV3s user information , none of us do, we just make observations that we base on our own experiences, mine are based on what I read in the CRG , and on my attempts to help pitkin create sessions for several of my own routes which are freeware .
I actually think you ARE belittling others views Peter, as you constantly remind us that you have a wonderful experience with trainz , and I'm glad that you do, but MY experience of it is as a person who is mostly making freeware routes for several versions of trainz, attempting to navigate the asset waters and to use assets that look good, that work and which aren't constantly becoming unknown or unable to be found by users . If I wasn't bothering to make things for others t9 use, I could just merrily go on my own way, use and modify any assets I wanted to use and ( apart from when NV3 refuse to support version of 2019 that are only a couple of years old ) keep on using older versions of the game that don't break things all the time . I have more or less been forced to use newer versions for various reasons when I would have been quite happy to stay with sp1 2019, when collaborating with others so use different version of the program it's very difficult to ensure that both users have the same install, due to changes in built ins and payware routes bundled with the program, Pitkin can confirm the hours of frustrating kuid lists we scrolled through trying to find out which payware route they belonged to because DLC routes don't have content lists it's insane.

 

[dangavel]

How do I know most people are happy? Because they are doing well with subscriptions, etc and it really isn’t that many people complaining. Yes things need to get fixed, but unless there is a massive increase of programmers or third party software, asset creation will always be complicated. You can whine as much as you want but it doesn’t actually help anything or anyone. Telling someone to fix it, doesn’t fix anything. How should it be fixed while paying the bills? What seems simple to you is actually a very complex problem and will require thinking of how to fix, without breaking things, plus programming and testing. Have you ever listened to the list of what people want done? Fact is if you want something done, do what you can do. Produce some documentation on the WiKi or create tutorials. You have access to change the wiki as you have access to the forums. You will wait year for a tutorial, whine about not having it and yet if you go through what is there, you can probably create your own tutorial.

I didn’t say report an asset, I said report a bug. Different processes. If this version messed up a bunch of assets, then it isn’t the assets. If it is a current supported version then report the problems. They ran a beta open to anyone and yet many problems that cropped up were not submitted. How do you expect them to fix things? Yes there is long standing problems.

Ok you think I whine, well, let's just end our association shall we , because I really am fed up to the back teeth with guys like you who have never actually ever contributed ANYTHING that can be used by anyone else in the actual game itself yet have the gall to tell me to stop expressing my opinions and to just praise NV3 no matter what stupid moves that make in game development, it's interesting that you appear to have extreme company loyalty, as we have had similar discussions like this over apple, you just will not accept that certain decisions made by companies whose products you use have serious flaws , why is that ?
I have tried to keep it civil, but it is clear you certainly don't appreciate the work that goes into making freeware routes for others or the difficulties that we have in getting our work onto the DLS for others to use . It's guys like you that will drive people like me out of this game, so I'm going to cut my losses and put you on my ignore list , I suggest you do the same.

 

[dangavel]

You might be interested in this thread.

https://forums.auran.com/trainz/sho...ons-for-TRS19-and-TRS22&p=1930667#post1930667

Payware DLC and the sessions don't work because the scripting rules have changed. N3V sell this for TS22.

There is a lot of frustration lying around.

Cheerio John

Thank you John for confirming the scale of the issue . I'm going to bow out here as the tone is getting unpleasant , but unless nv3 get a better strategy I can see them losing an awful lot of their most productive contributors , this conversation has definitely made me reconsider whether it's worth all the effort to try and make items for other to use for free when there is clearly little sympathy out there for the difficulties encountered in doing so, its seen as "rocking the boat ". Well I'm going to stop rocking the boat and making freeware routes after my present project , it just doesn't seem worth the hassle anymore .

 

[capdiamont]

Ok you think I whine, well, let's just end our association shall we , because I really am fed up to the back teeth with guys like you who have never actually ever contributed ANYTHING that can be used by anyone else in the actual game itself yet have the gall to tell me to stop expressing my opinions and to just praise NV3 no matter what stupid moves that make in game development, it's interesting that you appear to have extreme company loyalty, as we have had similar discussions like this over apple, you just will not accept that certain decisions made by companies whose products you use have serious flaws , why is that ?
I have tried to keep it civil, but it is clear you certainly don't appreciate the work that goes into making freeware routes for others or the difficulties that we have in getting our work onto the DLS for others to use . It's guys like you that will drive people like me out of this game, so I'm going to cut my losses and put you on my ignore list , I suggest you do the same.

excuse me, but you keep forgetting, missing or lying about me as I do complain. How does it help? You have this vendetta against me, not the other way around. The community has a wide range of opinions, skills etc and you will have to live with that wide range, even if you don’t like their opinions. Even in this thread people have posted how they like the changes. Oddly, you demand that people supply data yet you don’t supply data that supports your opinion. Once you get angry, you will not listen to the nuances of what people say.

They say they are doing well and increasing. Therefore most people are happy. General business says most people don’t says anything unless it is bad.

The thread statement that they don’t care about casual users or community opinion. I’m sorry but it is false. I have an opinion and I have a right to say it. Period. He mobile version are pretty much casual users. I can pick one of the built in routes and play it. That is casual playing. They are trying to add features and fix bugs per the community. Again it takes a lot of time and effort to do so. How do people propose to fix things?

As far as blocking me, it is not that you listened to anything I have really said anyway.

 

[johnwhelan]

excuse me, but you keep forgetting, missing or lying about me as I do complain. How does it help? You have this vendetta against me, not the other way around. The community has a wide range of opinions, skills etc and you will have to live with that wide range, even if you don’t like their opinions. Even in this thread people have posted how they like the changes. Oddly, you demand that people supply data yet you don’t supply data that supports your opinion. Once you get angry, you will not listen to the nuances of what people say.

They say they are doing well and increasing. Therefore most people are happy. General business says most people don’t says anything unless it is bad.

The thread statement that they don’t care about casual users or community opinion. I’m sorry but it is false. I have an opinion and I have a right to say it. Period. He mobile version are pretty much casual users. I can pick one of the built in routes and play it. That is casual playing. They are trying to add features and fix bugs per the community. Again it takes a lot of time and effort to do so. How do people propose to fix things?

As far as blocking me, it is not that you listened to anything I have really said anyway.

Try creating some content to get an idea of where people are coming from. The new stuff using PBR textures is fun but keeping the old stuff going is important as well.

I omitted having to create half a dozen new meshes as part of the process by the way.

Yes there is a mixture of people but the content creators are the people you really want to stay on side.

Cheerio John

 

[bloodtrain]

[/COLOR]

Its a "no-brainer". Until the size limit for .cdp file is increased (if that is possible) then I will only be using HD Terrain on smaller routes where it probably would be better suited - who wants to add that much detail on a larger route, who would have the time?

[/COLOR]

Yes, the official documentation is sparse and seems to be limited to the initial build release thread posts. But, as I and others have commented, creating "adequate" user documentation is a slow and difficult process. In the meantime the Trainz Wiki pages can often be a better source of "user readable" information. There is an old adage in the software development world that you never let the programmers write the user documentation - no offense intended to the hardworking programmers at N3V.

[/COLOR]

That is a frequent response in these forums after every new version or after an update. Users (us) frequently demand new features to be delivered "yesterday" and when they arrive "today" instead the posts often change to "released too soon". You can't win.

My thoughts and opinions.
[/COLOR]

I did not realize that building large routes & sessions would not convert successfully to the HD terrain. These routes & sessions were developed in TRS22 and not an earlier version of trainz, so I not importing any legacy assets (but I must be from the DLS).

I have tried to convert a small route & session (built-in route) to HD, and I get Legacy water when I reduce the height of the mountains (& land area), and I when I remove the Legacy water as layer, the water layer is removed, but I still have the sound of water if I move into those areas. I gather no one else has encountered this issue.

I have tried a database rebuild to no effect, several times.

I have a standard build 122411 on a Win 11 (2022) PC and I have tried to keep the assets to the latest releases.

Thanks for your thoughts.

 

[KotangaGirl]

You might be interested in this thread.

https://forums.auran.com/trainz/sho...ons-for-TRS19-and-TRS22&p=1930667#post1930667

Payware DLC and the sessions don't work because the scripting rules have changed. N3V sell this for TS22.

There is a lot of frustration lying around.

Cheerio John

When I pointed out the problems with PLL to the Trainz Team recently the blame was put squarely on the PLL team which I think is more than a little unfair.

Then you get to the reskins. I've spotted a dozen that need the same changes but I'm unable to make them as they aren't under my kuid and I doubt if the reskinners have ever touched the config.txt file in such depth before.

If you find any of mine that need fixing John please let me know and I'll have a look at them.

 

[capdiamont]

Try creating some content to get an idea of where people are coming from. The new stuff using PBR textures is fun but keeping the old stuff going is important as well.

I omitted having to create half a dozen new meshes as part of the process by the way.

Yes there is a mixture of people but the content creators are the people you really want to stay on side.

Cheerio John

I have been trying to make content. There is no Trainz utilities on the Mac side. I can run them virtually, though that isn’t easy. TransDEM is great but outputs using older file formats and certainly not HD Terrain because they don’t release any file formats, anymore. So I have been spending my time trying to decode the terrain file formats. I don’t have time to do all that content creation. The process needs to be automated as much as possible. I’m not sure how much can be automated, however it is too much time to have to figure it out but doing all the creation or going through dozens of different threads. The text files is easy, but meshes are a different level. Still in a rut, we have to think differently. Nothing changes by doing the same thing over and over.

Text files are easy, but knowing what to change is the key.

 

[SRKing783]

Despite having been on the Forums for six years (and having used Trainz for seven), I have only been on PC for four. And I'm as lost for content creation as ever. It just feels like there's way too much that needs to go into even a decent model, and while yes, technology gets better, technology gets more complex, I feel the bar at this point is so high it's difficult to make a beginner's guide without getting lost. And being a Mac user helps even less, as it can sometimes feel like we are forgotten. Sure, there's not as many of us, but Trainz Mac has existed for a decade at this point.

Will I keep Trainz? Absolutely. It's the only good train sim that works on Mac, and just as a driving experience it's pretty good. But honestly, with school getting more complicated and with all my free time about to be zapped away as September draws closer, I just won't be able to figure out how to make contenr for Trainz. And unfortunately if it's already pretty complex and difficult for me to work I don't see it getting better.

I really have no clue how this is gonna turn out, absolutely no idea at this point what's going to happen with content creation. I'd still love to learn, but the bar for even decent content by modern standards is too high for me to want to put the time in. I really would like to know how to make content for Trainz, but as life goes on and as I grow up I find I need to dedicate much more time away from Trainz. So I'll probably just be playing with old versions, just seeing what went on in Trainz before I joined, for now. I do wish that the process can be a bit easier, and I completely agree and support advancing technologies, but not if it comes at a significant cost to the content creators, which this software is built on.