Xbox Having To Ask Ai To Find “safe” Routes – How Did We Get Here?

I love Train Sim World. I’ve been with it since the early days, and I’ve always been willing to put up with the odd bug or visual hiccup because the immersion can be fantastic when everything works.

But lately, on Xbox Series X, the sheer state of things has worn me down. Z-fighting, blurred textures, stutters, and memory leakages… it’s become a gamble every time I load into a route. I can’t just pick up new DLC and enjoy it anymore—I have to stop and ask: Is this actually playable on my platform, or will it look and run like a mess?

And that’s led me to something I never thought I’d do: asking AI to sift through the game’s entire route catalogue just to figure out which ones are “safe.”

Here’s an example of what I mean.

Question I asked:

> "Can you tell me a list of German or Austrian-based routes and DLC for Train Sim World which are not affected by z-fighting on Xbox Series X?"

Part of the AI’s answer:

> “Lower-risk routes include Mittenwaldbahn: Innsbruck – Garmisch, S-Bahn Vorarlberg: Lindau – Bludenz, and Niddertalbahn—though even these may have minor flicker in certain cabs. The worst issues appear when using the Vectron, especially the FlixTrain variant.”

Then I went further.

Second question I asked:

> "Which UK routes are safe to play without blurred textures and memory leak issues on Xbox Series X?"

AI’s answer:

> “Older UK routes like Tees Valley Line and West Somerset Railway tend to have fewer blurred texture problems and less aggressive memory usage. Some modern high-speed routes can be riskier due to larger, more complex scenery loads.”

This is where the game has left me—turning to an algorithm to figure out what I can and can’t enjoy in a game I’ve invested heavily in. It’s not because I want to, it’s because I have to.

I should be spending my time planning my next run, not planning my next workaround.

 

AI Suggestions:;

German / Austrian Routes – Xbox Series X Playability

Mittenwaldbahn: Innsbruck – Garmisch – BR 111, ÖBB 1020 – Low risk – Minimal reported flicker.

S-Bahn Vorarlberg: Lindau – Bludenz – ÖBB 4024 Talent – Low risk – Smooth running; no major z-fighting.

Niddertalbahn: Bad Vilbel – Stockheim – BR 628 DMU – Low–Medium risk – Only minor flicker on small cab elements.

Ruhr-Sieg Nord: Hagen – Finnentrop – BR 143, BR 185, BR 363 – Low risk – Older route, stable visuals.

Main-Spessart Bahn: Aschaffenburg – Gemünden – BR 146, BR 185, Dostos – Low risk – Older route, minimal shimmer.

Dresden – Riesa – BR 442, BR 146, BR 185 – Medium risk – Some flicker in layered services.

Frankfurt – Fulda: Kinzigtalbahn (German Regional) – ICE-T, BR 114, BR 423, Vectron – High risk – Avoid Vectron layers to reduce issues.

Bremen – Oldenburg – BR 110, n-Wagen – Medium risk – Some cab flicker on certain services.

UK Routes – Xbox Series X Playability

Tees Valley Line: Darlington – Saltburn – Class 37, Class 101, Class 08 – Low risk – Stable visuals, light scenery load.

West Somerset Railway – Class 47, Class 09, Mk 1 coaches – Low risk – Very low texture streaming demand.

Northern Trans-Pennine: Manchester – Leeds – Class 45, Class 47, Class 101 – Low–Medium risk – Generally stable; rare minor blurs.

Cathcart Circle Lines – Class 314 EMU – Low risk – Compact route, low memory footprint.

Edinburgh – Glasgow – Class 385 EMU – Medium risk – Some blur in dense station areas.

Southeastern High Speed (Extended) – Class 395, Class 375, Class 66 – Medium–High risk – Long route, higher texture streaming risk.

London Commuter: Brighton Main Line – Class 387, Class 377 – High risk – Heavy scenery load, frequent texture blur on Series X.

East Coast Main Line: Peterborough – Doncaster – Class 801, Class 66, Class 158 – High risk – Large scenery footprint; memory leakage risk over long runs.

 

Hmm its weird how some people find these problems and others don’t, like for me the only route on the series x I encounter problems with is west coast main line modern

 

Yes it certainly is odd!

 

Or just switch off a few layers and everything is OK. Some routes you can switch of a lot of layers and you wouldn't notice the missing ai. But you will have a much better playing experience.

 

I don't buy newer routes anymore. I own a few TSW3 and TSW4 routes, but the perfomance of those routes is already less then the older TSW, TSW2020 and TSW2 routes, thanks to TOD4.

Both TSW2 Dresden routes also do not have the best performance, Riesa - Dresden is remastered with TOD4, but Tharanther Rampe is not and still crashes and has bad fps on the part from Tharante to Chemnitz.

The Vectrons do give issues even on older routes, so I don't know what is wrong with them, but a good reason to avoid.

The issues won't be fixed in TSW5, so our only hope is TSW6, and my hope is at a very low point.

 

Sure, that's a temporary work-around. It doesn't prevent the z-fighting though. That really irritates me and be quite distracting.

 

Im not very computer savy please tell what is z fighting so I can see for me self thanks.

 

Z-fighting is a graphics glitch where two surfaces are so close together that the game can’t decide which one to show, causing them to rapidly switch and flicker. The Flixtrain is a key culprit, with cab buttons and screens twinkling like a Christmas tree, the sunflower on the HST completely distorting and flickering, and the text next to buttons on the Class 377 constantly shimmering—just to name a few. It’s distracting for players and first became an issue with the introduction of TSW2, continuing ever since. It appears to be seen mostly on Xbox and nothing has been done to resolve the issue apart from trying to prevent it from occuring moving forwards. This is particularly frustrating as layered content that suffers z-fighting continues to be layered onto new routes.

 

Oh ok thanks you for the insight very helpful yeah definitely some trains are bad with vectron and the acela to name a few.

 

DTG have previously said that fixing the Xbox Z-fighting problem would require going through each route individually and manually moving decals, which would take too much time. However, from what I’ve read the issue could be linked to how the game renders on Xbox rather than the placement of every single decal. That means it might be possible to solve with a platform-wide tweak — like adjusting rendering settings or decal behaviour — instead of a full, route-by-route rebuild.

Here’s why I think this is worth exploring:

- This issue only really affects Xbox players.

- It didn't happen before TSW2, which is when the game moved to a newer version of Unreal Engine.

- It doesn't seem to happen on PC or PlayStation, at least not in the same way.

That suggests the problem might not be the decals themselves, but something to do with how the console handles depth or layering of textures. So instead of fixing every decal manually, I’m wondering if DTG could explore a solution just for Xbox — perhaps an adjustment to how decals are drawn, or tweaks to the way surfaces are layered on this platform.

 

If it tries to tell you there's anything on the XBox version of TSW that's unaffected by z-fighting, it's fabricating an incorrect response, fyi.

 

Thank you! AI has developed a sense of optimism

 

Less "optimism", more that the problem with a system like these is that its purpose is to satisfy your request.
If the thing you are asking for does not exist then, with greater likelihood dependent upon how you phrased the request, it will often simply say that it does, in order to meet your stated desire. It doesn't "understand" the language you use, it simply recognises patterns of words, not the implicit meanings.

Think like that Star Trek: TNG episode where Geordi mistakenly asks the holodeck to create a villain for a Sherlock Holmes story capable of outsmarting Commander Data, rather than of outsmarting Holmes, and the computer obligingly takes that phrasing and creates a fully sentient Moriarty with access to the ship's entire databank who threatens the entire crew, rather than delivering the fun little LARP session the two of them hoped for on their day off...

It's a major problem for the courts right now, where people whose expertise is in law, not in software, have been using it as if it's a search engine. They ask it to find citations of legal precedent supporting their arguments which do not exist, but which it will happily churn out, leading to judges fining them for presenting fake evidence, or worse, a recent case where one of these fake cases made its way into a judge's ruling, and that ruling had to be retracted after another court had already cited that ruling as precedent for its own findings.

 

Google's AI once told someone to put sillica gel on a pizza.

 

I play on PS5 and XSX. Z fighting in on XSX in every German route produced from TSW3 and 4 onwards. Drive the Railpool Vectron, still has Z fighting to this day. It's in lots of other areas too.

In TSW3, 4 and 5. XSX has the best framerates, lowest draw distance and most graphical bugs and glitches compared to PS5.

 

I remember when DTG Matt announced that all new content going forward day one for TSW5 would be free of z-fighting, that was clearly not the case, and I doubt it will be for TSW6 either.

With Xbox presumably the smallest installed user base, we shall forever remain second-class citizens.

This is despite DTG Matt owning and playing on Xbox himself...

 

It's frustrating. When the series x was first released, I quickly bought it thinking it would enhance my experience. Since then, it's just been a catalogue of annoyance: sound issues that bugged it for years; z-fighting; texture issues etc etc.

I think what's more frustrating is that these issues are platform specific. If it was a dlc that was causing issues, I'd be hopeful of a fix. But with this, it's seems unending.

Furthermore, I don't understand why these issues drag on for years.

 

I feel that the amount of routes a person owns/ has installed heavily impacts it, for example when I have only had a few DLCs installed, I had little problems however when I have all my routes installed (all UK apart from Mildmay and about half US/German) I have a lot more issues. Especially regarding blurry textures and performance.

 

Hmm maybe but at same time I have 102 addons installed for day to day use and I honestly haven’t encountered as many problems but this could be a luck thing or something

 

I don't know about Z-Fighting, but having fewer DLC installed definitely affects loading. I redownloaded tsw4 recently to pick up the achievements I missed. Whilst I pretty quickly gave up after realising how tedious it would be to carry on, the game certainly loaded faster with only Great Western Express, Diesel Legends and Midland Mainline installed

 

I wouldn't trust AI to give you the answers you want.

It tells you what you want to hear.

 

Also the AI might base its answers on older bug reports, which might have been fixed by now. Maybe it only bases its answers on Steam Reviews on older versions. Maybe not.

I doubt the answers on such specific topics are to trust. The best idea is to ask in the forums on that regard.

 

Regardless of the accuracy of the responses AI gives, the point of my post is that I feel pushed to look to solutions, such as AI, to help make decisions of which dlc to purchase when there are so many issues and bugs that detract from the experience of the game on Xbox. It seems bizarre that I have to make a decision based on a DLC's likelihood to experience z-fighting, texture blurring, crashing, sound-popping, as to whether I am able to purchase that DLC. The fact that I turn to AI to give an overview of which DLC are "safe bets" highlights the bad state the game finds itself in for a significant proportion of the community, who have no options other than to put up with it or stop playing. This is easier said than done when DTG monopolise the market.

 

The fact anyone needs to ask any form of AI if the should buy something that they clearly want basically shows that the human species is fast plummeting off the highest of cliffs.......

 

Oh absolutely, asking AI about DLC quality is the first domino in humanity’s grand tumble into the abyss. Because, you know, watching a 20-minute YouTube video padded with ads, or trawling through social media threads where half the replies are just memes, is clearly the noble way to make an informed choice. I didn’t ‘clearly want’ anything except the option with minimal z-fighting and blurry textures. I just chose efficiency over theatrics. If that’s the cliff, at least I’m going down with smooth rendering.

 

This is one of the weirdest threads ive ever seen.
Asks AI why he should avoid being stuff and gets angry that AI has told him to stop buying stuff, he had already decided on the reasons to stop buying stuff.


Just get a gaming PC.
use mods
edit .ini
use DX 12

99% problems solved.

 

Weirdest thread? Only if you read it upside down. I didn’t ask AI to psychoanalyze my spending habits or tell me to ‘stop buying stuff.’ I asked it a very specific technical question: which DLCs on Xbox Series X actually run without looking like a Picasso painting in motion.

What I got back was consolidated info on routes less prone to z-fighting, blurred textures, or memory leaks. That’s not me being indecisive about buying—it’s me trying to avoid wasting money on something broken.

Some folks trawl forums, others watch reviews, I just used a tool that compiles that mess into a straight answer. If that’s confusing, that’s on the game’s state, not the thread.

 

It's an interesting idea. Often using AI to find information. Buying DLC for TSW5 is starting to be a lottery. Any source of information is always useful.

 

Why do you think the AI is likely to provide accurate information?

 

Why do I think AI can provide accurate information? The same reason I’d check a YouTube review, a forum thread, or ask a Facebook group: every source carries some degree of bias, inaccuracy, or nuance. AI isn’t magically flawless—it’s just another tool in the toolbox.

Once upon a time, even books in libraries contained mistakes. Did that mean we stopped trusting libraries? If a website posts something incorrect, should we swear off the internet? If a friend gives me an opinion that doesn’t align with mine, should I never ask people for advice again?

Of course not. It all comes down to using common sense—recognising that no source is perfect, weighing the information you get, and making the best decision with what you’ve gathered. AI just happens to be faster at compiling the messy bits together.

 

You used AI to generate that post. I can tell.
What makes you think that AI contains accurate information about z-fighting for DLC for a niche game? Has it provided you its sources?

 

AI helped me explain American systems in locomotives. For example, what HVAC, Zero speed, and others are for. It saved me a lot of time searching the web. It translated my DB101 Expert manual into my native language. It is a very useful tool.

 

How do you know that those explanations and translations are accurate?

 

I asked many questions that I know the answer to. Since I work in a car repair shop, I asked complex questions about cars. I always got the right answer. It is interesting that AI can also ask additional questions. Then the AI answer is more accurate. In TSW, I asked about KWS in German locomotives. The answer was correct again, I even got a link to YouTube. But it is just a tool, I can always verify the answer.

 

What makes you think it hasn't? For the purposes of what I need it for, it works fine. If I was to ask for advise here, I would get multiple different answers. If it generates wrong information, it's probably because it's sourcing multiple perspectives from this forum and trying to make sense of it

 

Besides, you're missing the point. The reasoning behind my original post is to highlight that Xbox players, like myself, are having a rough time with the game, and I was highlighting the absurdity of how the state of play lead me to asking AI for advice. That is the real focus of my post - not critiquing the reliability of AI

 

Real thing is who actually cares about what other people use for information

 

My biggest question is, will these graphical issues continue in TSW6? The AI probably won't answer that for me.

 

Well, as I pointed out earlier, this becomes an issue when you get situations like recently when LLM-generated stuff was submitted in a court case citing a fake precedential ruling, which influenced the judge's decision in the case, which needed to be overturned, but not before another court had already cited that judge's ruling, compounding the initial error. When people get into these sorts of bad habits in their personal lives, it becomes all too easy to cut corners professionally. And these systems are essentially turbocharging the phenomenon dating all the way back to oral history, which got more prominent since the internet came on the scene, of bad citations making it into the likes of (nowadays) wikipedia articles, those articles being used as a source by "reputable" news outlets, and then those sources being cited in cleanups of the original wiki articles, entrenching the falsehood.
[Youtube: Cambrian Chronicles - "The internet's flag that doesn't exist" and related series on this phenomenon]
https ://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k6r5Kkts0s


Per the actual original intent of the topic - I am pretty sure not even a hyperintelligent Sci-fi AI could fix these problems in TSW6.

(Is there a way to stop getting the forum to try to insert previews when the video is only playable on youtube?)

 

You do remember this is about one issue/bug in a train sim and not some court thing right?

Honestly reading the class 66 manual would have been funnier than reading this and I despise the class 66

 

That you got right answers to some questions does not mean you will get the right answers to other questions.
And if it's just a tool and you can always verify the answer, why use it at all?

So it hasn't given you a source, then.

People who want a well-informed society, which should be everyone.

 

It matters if what they consult tells them nonsense that they then repeat as fact. Case in point was a Suggestions thread on this forum that had AI-generated factual errors about a route.

 

Here are the sources it used. Good enough for me considering the nature of the task. When prompted it will provide sources in as much detail as you like.

Dovetail Games Official Forums – multiple discussion threads about Xbox Series X graphical issues (including z-fighting) and performance differences across German/Austrian routes.
forums.dovetailgames.com

Wikipedia – general background on Train Sim World releases, included German routes, and DLC stock (e.g. Frankfurt–Fulda / Kinzigtalbahn in TSW 5).
Wikipedia – Train Sim World

Train Sim World Fandom Wiki – detailed route pages, release notes, and rolling stock lists (e.g. Mittenwaldbahn, Niddertalbahn, S-Bahn Vorarlberg).
TSW Fandom Wiki

Reddit – r/trainsimworld – player discussions of German route recommendations, DLC performance, and experiences on consoles.
Reddit – r/trainsimworld

 

Congratulations, you fell for its hallucinations.

 

Being afraid of progress is like refusing to learn the alphabet because you liked cave paintings

 

Unfortunately, a common problem with people not understanding how these probablistic predictive text models work, is while many assume that when they are asked for their sources and methods, this is what they give - what they in fact provide is a most probable estimate at what someone asked to provide such citation might likely say, rather than ACTUALLY citing how they got to a conclusion.

Is Chain-of-Thought Reasoning of LLMs a Mirage? A Data Distribution Lens

And history is replete with technological innovations that are dangerous in untrained hands and which we require proper certification for those trained to understand how they work before they are allowed to handle them.

 

Biggest problem is, the one thing AI cannot do is actually play the routes, so any "opinion" it offers will be entirely guesswork based on its own interpretation of what it collects in trawling, which may or may not be complete and can't be fact-checked first by the AI for accuracy.

 

Congratulations OP welcome to the forum of trolls.

You asked a legitimate question and had some valid concerns and people are slowly attacking you. Do not look for answers in this forum, most people are pretty useless in that regard and just look to belittle you. There’s only handful of posters who are genuine, most can’t take criticism of their precious sim.

As for Ai, I’m not its biggest fan, but what it will do is trawl these forums and Reddit for any information on problematic routes for your specific platform. Whilst it won’t be 100 percent accurate it will give you a steer at least.

Just watch they don’t tell tale on you and report you to their mod mates.

 

One thing I noticed playing WSR recently was that as you’re moving along, the flowers on the line side seem to grow upwards as you get closer to them. Can’t not see it now and it’s really irritating!