Sneak Peek - Early In-Development In-game Video

Published on November 18th, 2017 03:02 PM Number of Views: 5306

21 Comments

We've been hard at work on all fronts of Trainz development - code and content updates, new features, new functionality, and, as you've seen in the recent Dev Diaries, new materials and shaders.We just had to stop for a minute this week and capture this little bit of footage that caught our eye.

We hope you like the new visual direction Trainz is taking with such great technical terms as "PBR", "Parallax", "IBL" and more.

Click the image above to watch the video.

And yes, before someone asks, the video is all in-game footage, and there's still plenty of room for tweaking things yet. Probably the most noticeable difference is how the strong sunlight reflects differently based upon which surface it is reflecting off. For example, at around 0:14 you see how strong the reflection is on the right hand side of the benchtop which is in direct line with the sun, while the wood finish on the left side doesn't get hit by that reflection.For more information on future Trainz development be sure to keep up-to-date at http://trainzportal.com or see all the articles and have your say https://forums.auran.com/trainz/content.php

21 Comments

Vern - November 19th, 2017, 01:57 PM
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Looks interesting and much more lifelike than current Trainz appearance.

Of course much yet to be revealed and significant graphics improvements need to be complemented by good physics and sounds.

And it is also essential that the routes and train-sets selected as default in the new version of Trainz are carefully chosen or commissioned to do it justice, really should be a case of out with the old...

nicky9499 - November 19th, 2017, 10:43 PM
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Still a WIP I know but there aren't any shadows being cast on the floor which kind of throws off the whole realistic vibe.
Regardless, what's more interesting is the seemingly dynamically-generated sleepers in the background. Can you guys shed more light on this in the next dev post please?

WindWalkr - November 20th, 2017, 04:33 AM
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Originally Posted by nicky9499

Regardless, what's more interesting is the seemingly dynamically-generated sleepers in the background. Can you guys shed more light on this in the next dev post please?

Are you talking about the procedural track? Or something else?

chris

ish6 - November 20th, 2017, 06:30 AM
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Looks Interesting!
Ish

nicky9499 - November 20th, 2017, 06:55 AM
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Yes Chris that sounds like the right name for it.

Dinorius_Redundicus - November 20th, 2017, 08:12 AM
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Is that “volumetric light” that’s shining through the roof?

EverTrainz - November 20th, 2017, 08:53 AM
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Looks great, but shadows in interiors would be even better, like what Nicky has said above.

What does this mean for reflections? It looks like the sun is being reflected off the wood, but will we have more or less accurate reflections opposed to a cubemap?

JAGG - November 20th, 2017, 02:59 PM
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I would focus more on overall performance improvement instead. I see still strange jerking&twitching under certain angles while having not bad FPS (around 25-30) at the same time. And if I move point of sight into the steamer smoke, then my TANE gets totally lazy.

WindWalkr - November 21st, 2017, 01:14 AM
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Originally Posted by nicky9499

Yes Chris that sounds like the right name for it.

Procedural Track is one of the features that was added to T:ANE thanks to the kickstarter campaign. You can find a lot of info about it on our wiki and here on the forums, and there's an intro video here.

hth,

chris

WindWalkr - November 21st, 2017, 01:16 AM
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Originally Posted by Dinorius_Redundicus

Is that “volumetric light” that’s shining through the roof?

This effect is also present in T:ANE as long as you have your post-processing turned up. See this screenshot for example.

chris

Dinorius_Redundicus - November 21st, 2017, 02:44 AM
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By "turned up" do you mean set on Ultra?

When I use Ultra, things get fuzzy up close so I'm forced to back off to High. Hence I've never seen that light shining effect in my Trainz world.

Zeldaboy14 - November 21st, 2017, 11:31 AM
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Originally Posted by Dinorius_Redundicus

By "turned up" do you mean set on Ultra?

When I use Ultra, things get fuzzy up close so I'm forced to back off to High. Hence I've never seen that light shining effect in my Trainz world.

That's what he means. I have it disabled as well, because the first day i maxed out settings for T:ANE, i couldn't figure out what was causing that, and sadly couldn't use something that looked good

Also, to say the least, i'm at a loss of words over this. You guys are making Trainz better then the competitor in every way IMO.

WindWalkr - November 21st, 2017, 08:56 PM
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Originally Posted by Dinorius_Redundicus

By "turned up" do you mean set on Ultra?

When I use Ultra, things get fuzzy up close so I'm forced to back off to High. Hence I've never seen that light shining effect in my Trainz world.

Yes, ultra. The "fuzziness" up close is also deliberate. You can temporarily tune the effects via the post-process settings window, to get a better understanding for what's going on.

chris

RailFan500CA - December 3rd, 2017, 09:43 AM
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This looks fantastic! This might be a reason to get a better video card and install a 64-bit copy of windows 7 if windows 7 is supported. But there is just one thing it needs now. And that is shadows. Keep up the good work!

oknotsen - December 3rd, 2017, 10:00 AM
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Originally Posted by RailFan500CA

But there is just one thing it needs now. And that is shadows.

TANE (so the current latest version of the game) has that already.

RailFan500CA - December 3rd, 2017, 10:01 AM
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By shadows I mean shadows in the cab.

pdkoester - December 3rd, 2017, 10:58 PM
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So, let me get this straight, more is developing, extra effects added, but still nothing like the UP SD40-2 unit we saw introduced in 2015 preview? Or, am I jumping ahead, and this is to be coming soon?

ZecMurphy - December 3rd, 2017, 11:01 PM
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Originally Posted by RailFan500CA

By shadows I mean shadows in the cab.

Hi RailFan500CA
TANE does provide support for full shadows in the cab views. However it does require the asset to have the necessary tag added to it. Unfortunately, most cab views for Trainz do not have any of the outside of the cab/body modelled (unless seen through the windows), and as such are not suitable for shadows in Trainz. This tag allows creators to 'opt in' to the in-cab shadows if their cab view is setup to handle them.

Regards

trainmaster745 - December 5th, 2017, 12:37 PM
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Originally Posted by Vern

Looks interesting and much more lifelike than current Trainz appearance.

Of course much yet to be revealed and significant graphics improvements need to be complemented by good physics and sounds.

And it is also essential that the routes and train-sets selected as default in the new version of Trainz are carefully chosen or commissioned to do it justice, really should be a case of out with the old...

trainzrule2 - December 13th, 2017, 09:33 AM
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Will the German ET91 "Gläserner Zug" shown in the video be part of the new Trainz-version? I'm looking forward to interesting sessions featuring this piece of heritage. So here's my guess: Trainz:NEXT is going to include a German electrified route for this charter train. I hope it will be open for commercial duty too.