[FS.E652 091]

Hi Guys, well, i have to send some suggestions to the OR Development team...

in order to improve esthetically and technically the Open Rails platform in order to make the perfect game as esthetics

1) have a depth effect similar to Railworks 2014 effect made that feels real, like say .. a sort of blur of the landscape ...

2) the rails inclined, I notice that there is no ballast on the base, and it seems that the rail is to be lifted from the ground, because of some natural disaster .. and what is a bad effect if it were to be implemented .. a ballast in 3D for all the tracks in the curve, the latter would make better!

3) Have the wake of the headlights on the rails, just like in real life, which is in the queue in the head!

4) have weather effects and realistic sky, and you can choose from a variety of weather situations, if not the current weather in real time, as in the flight simulator.

5) give the rain effect to the objects and landscape, including even the convoy that is used in rain mode, I note that it has not been implemented anywhere, and it would be spectacular!

6) find a way to better manage the activity in scenarios long .. for example, I thought that developers could implement a new selection method convoy scenarios during the activity .. for example, if I choose to do an Activity on my scenario that will soon be published, and represents Sicily in full, and in this scenario I decided to create a service that takes place on Agrigento - Palermo, Palermo - Messina, Messina - Siracusa, Siracusa - Ragusa .. this service includes changes of train, as you switch from diesel to electric traction .. well, to avoid creating more activity broken for the scenario, you could do that, you select from a new editor of activity a stock, you square in the track where you want to place, and not just arriving at the terminal where the change will take place, instead of going out and change activity, directly, with the change of view, I mean a clear view, will "walk" towards the chosen rolling stock, and you select ... using a drop-down menu that appears above the stock, you can choose the service activity in which it carries the rolling stock (that in our case), and is part directly, saving time, space, and creating in this way a sort of park machinery living within the simulator.

Iv'e noticed that in the newer experimental releases there are still many bugs and problems ... for example the compatibility with the activities of train simulator ... because I find really strange that I end up in the track when a IA train is stopped , despite I have a set path ...

we would have to also implement new 3D functions in the 3D cabviews... at the time i have the photos to make a 3D Cab for the class Aln 668, diesel railcar Italian, but I would wait your new implementations.

with the hope that you will welcome these recommendations, I offer my best wishes for this great project!

[disc]

No need for compatibility with the broken MSTS acts, the goal is a good dispatcher AI that does not need invisible locomotives, and other tricks. If an activity have problems, then the activity needs to be fixed, modernised.

Ballasts are 3d already... just the modeller makes a simple plane as ballast. It's the fault of the route builder, not the game developers.

Depth of field effect isn't worth it if it takes more than a day to implement, for most of the people in games, the first task in options is to disable depth of field effect and motion blur.

[FS.E652 091]

For the tracks, it's possible to make a new tsection.dat and replace all msts tracks???

[R H Steele]

disc, on 21 July 2014 - 03:14 AM, said:

No need for compatibility with the broken MSTS acts, the goal is a good dispatcher AI that does not need invisible locomotives, and other tricks. If an activity have problems, then the activity needs to be fixed, modernised.

Amen, Brother. Disclaimer for following statement - this is just an observation, nothing else.

:huh: All the problems, real and supposed, would disappear (probably in the 90+ % range) if we immediately cease developing Open Rails and intensely go to work on bringing Microsoft Train Simulator up to date and error free. Now what I propose is to get some venture capital and get a team of 100 or so world class programers that are also extremely well-versed in all things railroading and put them to work recrafting this slipshod program that was released before being ready just to make a buck for Microsoft. I can hear screaming, cursing, and frothing at the mouth, but your dear baby train simulator is just that - a baby - it never progressed past infancy. There was a promised version two, never released, just a series of patches (well meaning though they were - Bin among the best) from many people - representing an unplanned, uncoordinated effort to keep something from dying. Tricks, work arounds, obscure code, misunderstood, misinterpreted code, --- fanatastic routes and activities built with tools never supported or well designed. Geeze it's amazing anything even half-way decent was made in the last decade. At this point Open Rails does EVERYTHING better than MSTS . New Rule, if you encounter something wrong, assume it is wrong in MSTS. Always a safer bet -- (boy will that get some disagreement!)

For a minute quit turning purple and imagine an alternate world that never saw the existence of MSTS but only had Open Rails (FREE) and all the content (FREE - for the most part) we have. Boy-O-Boy would I be a happy camper. Come to think of it - I am a happy camper.

Maybe most of you cannot understand what I'm talking about. Granted compared to 99% of the readers of this post I know nothing about train simulators, modeling, route building, activity making, and railroading in general. MSTS is probably the worst train simulator in use today. It's old, out of date, its slow, its cranky, its got crummy visuals, laughable camera options, and it's been placed on a friggin' altar out of reach of mere mortals. I may love a model T but I would not want to use it daily or compare it with a modern car.
Oh, what the heck, sometimes, I wish everyone would just stop comparing Open Rails with MSTS, talk about an albatross. I imagine the Ancient Engineer walking down the tracks with two MSTS CDs hanging 'round his neck.

Okay, I'm through, get the rope, I'll go peacefully. ;) :clown: (ps - I got an email that Rob Roeterdink had left the OR Dev Team - that true? :shok: :sorry: if true - this rant times 10 would be sufficient! )

Edit: my abject apologies to FS.E652 091, who started this thread. :sign_thanks: about the bump. None is this, is in any way, shape or form, directed towards you. Suggestions to the OR team are laudable. I read a couple of other things here and at another site, got the email inquiring about Rob and read the portion quoted above and my boiler blew its stack.

[eric from trainsim]

FS.E652 091, on 21 July 2014 - 02:43 PM, said:

For the tracks, it's possible to make a new tsection.dat and replace all msts tracks???

Sticking with the standard tsection is simply a route developer's choice. There are already routes which have a custom tsection and custom tracks for some routes: they simply require being installed as a mini-route.

That said, I'm not sure why you'd want to start over. The tsection simply defines the geometry and ties individual track shapes to the geometry for the route developer's benefit.

[vermont204]

To add to this...

Is there any way to program in snow accumulation on the ground and on the tracks? And could that snow be flung away from the tracks as a train or snow plow goes through them? Ever since Nick Ozorak released his review of Donner Pass, I have wanted snow accumulation to exist.

[Metro4001]

R H Steele, on 21 July 2014 - 06:34 PM, said:

Amen, Brother. Disclaimer for following statement - this is just an observation, nothing else.

:huh: All the problems, real and supposed, would disappear (probably in the 90+ % range) if we immediately cease developing Open Rails and intensely go to work on bringing Microsoft Train Simulator up to date and error free. Now what I propose is to get some venture capital and get a team of 100 or so world class programers that are also extremely well-versed in all things railroading and put them to work recrafting this slipshod program that was released before being ready just to make a buck for Microsoft. I can hear screaming, cursing, and frothing at the mouth, but your dear baby train simulator is just that - a baby - it never progressed past infancy. There was a promised version two, never released, just a series of patches (well meaning though they were - Bin among the best) from many people - representing an unplanned, uncoordinated effort to keep something from dying. Tricks, work arounds, obscure code, misunderstood, misinterpreted code, --- fanatastic routes and activities built with tools never supported or well designed. Geeze it's amazing anything even half-way decent was made in the last decade. At this point Open Rails does EVERYTHING better than MSTS . New Rule, if you encounter something wrong, assume it is wrong in MSTS. Always a safer bet -- (boy will that get some disagreement!)

For a minute quit turning purple and imagine an alternate world that never saw the existence of MSTS but only had Open Rails (FREE) and all the content (FREE - for the most part) we have. Boy-O-Boy would I be a happy camper. Come to think of it - I am a happy camper.

Maybe most of you cannot understand what I'm talking about. Granted compared to 99% of the readers of this post I know nothing about train simulators, modeling, route building, activity making, and railroading in general. MSTS is probably the worst train simulator in use today. It's old, out of date, its slow, its cranky, its got crummy visuals, laughable camera options, and it's been placed on a friggin' altar out of reach of mere mortals. I may love a model T but I would not want to use it daily or compare it with a modern car.
Oh, what the heck, sometimes, I wish everyone would just stop comparing Open Rails with MSTS, talk about an albatross. I imagine the Ancient Engineer walking down the tracks with two MSTS CDs hanging 'round his neck.

Okay, I'm through, get the rope, I'll go peacefully. ;) :clown: (ps - I got an email that Rob Roeterdink had left the OR Dev Team - that true? :shok: :sorry: if true - this rant times 10 would be sufficient! )

Edit: my abject apologies to FS.E652 091, who started this thread. :sign_thanks: about the bump. None is this, is in any way, shape or form, directed towards you. Suggestions to the OR team are laudable. I read a couple of other things here and at another site, got the email inquiring about Rob and read the portion quoted above and my boiler blew its stack.

Beautiful, just beautiful. Most of the MSTS stalwarts reside at TS.com, constantly complaining about OR "not being ready for prime time," meanwhile they are clinging to a buggy, error prone and poorly optimized relic. OR has saved MSTS, without it I'd never play it again.

[jared2982]

FS.E652 091, on 21 July 2014 - 02:43 PM, said:

For the tracks, it's possible to make a new tsection.dat and replace all msts tracks???

You don't need a new Tsection just new track shapes to replace the original. This method would also update all the routes using the original track pieces. XTracks would need an update as well. That's a lot of track pieces to make.

[Lindsayts]

R H Steele, on 21 July 2014 - 06:34 PM, said:

Amen, Brother. Disclaimer for following statement - this is just an observation, nothing else.

:sign_thanks: All the problems, real and supposed, would disappear (probably in the 90+ % range) if we immediately cease developing Open Rails and intensely go to work on bringing Microsoft Train Simulator up to date and error free. Now what I propose is to get some venture capital and get a team of 100 or so world class programers that are also extremely well-versed in all things railroading and put them to work recrafting this slipshod program that was released before being ready just to make a buck for Microsoft. I can hear screaming, cursing, and frothing at the mouth, but your dear baby train simulator is just that - a baby - it never progressed past infancy. There was a promised version two, never released, just a series of patches (well meaning though they were - Bin among the best) from many people - representing an unplanned, uncoordinated effort to keep something from dying. Tricks, work arounds, obscure code, misunderstood, misinterpreted code, --- fanatastic routes and activities built with tools never supported or well designed. Geeze it's amazing anything even half-way decent was made in the last decade. At this point Open Rails does EVERYTHING better than MSTS . New Rule, if you encounter something wrong, assume it is wrong in MSTS. Always a safer bet -- (boy will that get some disagreement!)

For a minute quit turning purple and imagine an alternate world that never saw the existence of MSTS but only had Open Rails (FREE) and all the content (FREE - for the most part) we have. Boy-O-Boy would I be a happy camper. Come to think of it - I am a happy camper.

Maybe most of you cannot understand what I'm talking about. Granted compared to 99% of the readers of this post I know nothing about train simulators, modeling, route building, activity making, and railroading in general. MSTS is probably the worst train simulator in use today. It's old, out of date, its slow, its cranky, its got crummy visuals, laughable camera options, and it's been placed on a friggin' altar out of reach of mere mortals.

This rubbishy simulator you are running down has produced some real excellent routes and rolling stock and a MAJOR reason (I think anyway) for this is that Microsoft abandoned the simulator but left it on sale. This allowed what really should be described as the "impossible" to occur, that is a stable trainsimulator interface. With this stabilty came much knowledge on how to "work" the simulator to advantage.

I have tried all rail simulators except for Run8 and as far as I am concerned MSTS (with MSTSbin) is a good deal better than all other sims.

Its also very likely that without MSTS there would be no openrails. In the opensource operating system Linux with something like 15 to 20,000 different open source software items availible there is not a single mechanical simulator of any kind. A rail simulator is a specific case in a little known open source category (mechanical sims) and to produce a good one requires a VERY rare mix of talents and knowledge in an indivdual.

The past is the roots of its future, but the past is land where the people have different values that are not often understood today so criticism of the past is most often futile.

Lindsay