Arosa Second Stream - A Sour Taste

Discussion in 'TSW General Discussion' started by Monder, Mar 24, 2021.

  1. Monder

    Monder Well-Known Member

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    Considering no big changes have been made to the Friday version of the route the original feedback stays as it was, but I want to focus more on the new things AND the feedback we've been given.

    The more I see from this route and Rivet the more I admire DTG itself. Comparing feedback to this route to the one on SEHS is night and day. We were told feedback is going to be addressed today, nobody probably expected miracles, but this was just straight up pointless:
    -distant scenery - no fixes, performance would be hit (still don't think it would be that drastic, but ok)
    -freight services - maybe in the future, but (assuming from the answer) they'll save it for a loco DLC (why did you put the logging car in again, Rivet?)
    -day 1 patch - not much, basically this version unchanged

    I have pushed (to the anger of mods, sorry mods, needed to be done) Jasper to answering, why the scenery is not helped by textures if new trees would hurt performance. It was mentioned time and time again in different threads that different and more varied textures might helps the route a lot without hits to framerate. So apparently even that would destroy the performance and would require "a rebuild of the route"... well if you do it poorly, maybe you should look at it! You're asking full price for this! DTG went on and after the feedback fixed (maybe over fixed) a lot of SEHS problems. The route has definitely seen improvements. Here it's basically "Naaah, we won't be doing anything"... pretty sad to be honest.
    There have also been new things popping up - the bugs with pantographs, lights etc. won't be fixed for nearly a month, also apparently until then you won't be able to make uphill scenarios, because your loco would derail... WHAT? Is that a release polished product?

    It is ironical to see such an approach on a route, where they today highlighted a building having "Wo ein Wille ist, ist auch ein Weg." (Where there's a will, there's a way) because I see no will in delivering a polished product or doing something about its problematic aspects.

    There were also some details, not big ones, but I'll just throw them in:
    -cars are definitely not flawless
    -Jamie, you're awesome, but maybe watch the video on brakes made for this route :D
    -the loco seems to brake itself when the dead-man switch is on and Jamie left the seat in the station. Is that how it should work?
    -Chur station is nice
    -admittedly the route offers completely different driving in one or the other direction, not seen a whole lot (even SPG has braking and throttles on both sides of the summit)
    -runarounds in Chur look very cool

    I honestly was thinking about getting this route in this state when it hits about a 20 % discount, but (and this is purely just my opinion) I was seriously disappointed with how Rivet handled... "handled" the feedback that I might pass on this one entirely. One would expect an improvement after bumpy releases of 204 and IoW. But it definitely makes me appreciate DTG more as this lifted SEHS feedback reaction even more in comparison. Yes, the fences ended up being overdone, but it was still something and other things were truly improved. Well, I guess it's time to wait for Clinchfield, which so far seems absolutely stellar.

    But maybe I am completely wrong here and will be beaten to death by positive feedback. I just wanted to share a perspective after a rather disappointing stream.
     
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  2. Dinosbacsi

    Dinosbacsi Well-Known Member

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    This is, from what I could see so far, they used a nice variety of textures, the issue is not with the way they painted the terrain - as you can see different colored blobs of terrain all around. The problem is that no matter what textures you used and how much time to spent painting them nicely, TSW will blurr the distand ground textures anyway. So maybe those hillsides look much better if you were to move the camera closes, but from track perspective they're ugly, no matter what you do.

    So I say what I always say, that this seems to be a core TSW issue, not Rivet's fault. Of course that doesn't matter from an user perspective, at the end the point is that it's ugly. I'm just saying that there's a chance Rivet can't do anything here really. Sure they could spam the mountains with trees to hide it, but I don't think that was the goal.

    As for the rest, I agree. I also find it weird a bit that the streets are completely snow covered. Couldn't they have do a road texture that's cleared of snow or at least have tire marks on them? The whole route falls a bit short on the textures department, even though the rolling stock itself is amazing, I have to say.
     
  3. fabristunt

    fabristunt Well-Known Member

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    The bug with ai traffic and light it's the same one present in IOW. It's been 6 effing months and they not only can't still fix such a thing, but they even release a new route with that bug!
     
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  4. stujoy

    stujoy Well-Known Member

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    Smooth. Well done!
     
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  5. Ravi

    Ravi Well-Known Member

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    They seem to be rushing it. I was ok with this pretty much all last week but this stream has made me nervous. But its not fair to compare DTG with Rivet because DTG has more routes and have learned from their mistakes. It has only taken them like 10 or 12 routes before releasing HMA which is pretty dope. So hopefully, this is Rivet learning and their future routes may come out better for it.
     
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  6. Monder

    Monder Well-Known Member

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    That might be the case with distant mountains, though I still think it would be helped with more grey-ish rock textures. But the forests closer to the track definitely need a more dark green texture, that one would not be affected by the blur and colour closer to that of the trees would make them look way better. You don't need to add trees, you need to use them better.
     
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  7. Yerolo

    Yerolo Well-Known Member

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    I had this route preordered but prompty cancelled it after the 1st stream....the 2nd stream has not made me regret the decision. I am instead using that money to buy Clinchfield

    I may purchase this route later on when it is on sale or if further work is done to improve it (but not holding my breath on that). I really do want to support the 3rd party devs...but there is a huge gap in quality between what they produce and what DTG do which is hard to ignore.
     
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  8. appledates#4945

    appledates#4945 Well-Known Member

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    8F76F98B-C818-4FA8-88D7-094E5F5B4E99.jpeg ED73382C-1B72-4AD2-8454-6DD1DECF13EA.jpeg
    Really sad to hear you didn’t find anything you liked enough to want to enjoy this route. I think a lot of people will end up enjoying it.
     
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  9. Monder

    Monder Well-Known Member

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    There are still two 3rd party mystery boxes left to open now and I do think TSG especially might be able to create some great DLCs. Their work on TSW sounds proved to be really great, so hopefully the DLCs will be great too.
    There are things I liked about the DLC, the rolling stock is great, but it's the scenery is a huge deal especially when slowly moving through it and seeing it all the time. And the contrast is crazy - so many details on the train, maybe one of the best trains in the game, and the sometimes horrible scenery. I would happily trade the buttons for signalling a train to stop (which doesn't affect it anyway) for better-looking scenery, which is crucial for the Alps-based route. You might be satisfied with it and that's fine. I am not and therefore I am not willing to pay full price for it. I vote with my wallet and after the "response" to feedback, I might choose to not vote at all.
     
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  10. appledates#4945

    appledates#4945 Well-Known Member

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    EC7CB74F-D09A-478A-B671-578473FDF7CC.jpeg 9DAA4D7B-51B4-48D8-99C0-930C83F8EFC7.jpeg
    It seems you pushed for an answer and finally received one, and weren’t happy with the answer you received. I’m sorry but I don’t think you could compare what was changed on SEHS before release to what your expecting from Rivet, as doing what your suggesting would no doubt be a monumental task. Since when have we held distant scenery in TSW2 to the same quality of its real life counterparts? The fact is when your looking at this route as a whole, it is much more then this distant scenery complaint. You might be able to pick out some spots that aren’t spectacular, but they are more then okay and are on par with the rest of TSW, especially when the majority looks good.
     
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  11. GrayDawg

    GrayDawg Well-Known Member

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    You got to be kidding?
     
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  12. DTG Natster

    DTG Natster Producer Staff Member

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    If you are already sure that Arosa isn't going to be the route for you then saving your money for a piece of DLC you know you will enjoy more is a wise decision.

    This will allow you the opportunity to gather more information about the route from other players, and potentially purchase it in the future if it's on sale or you change your mind.

    I realise the stream could have been seen as disappointing, especially if you were looking forward to this route. We aimed to give the community answers to the questions that cropped up during the previous streams, and explain a few other details so that when it came to making your decision to purchase or not you weren't left with any unpleasant surprises.

    The route will get bug fixes, it will just take a bit of time. We will continue to work closely with Rivet to ensure your feedback is noticed and taken on board. They want to provide you with a product you are pleased with just as much as we do.
     
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  13. appledates#4945

    appledates#4945 Well-Known Member

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    Believe it or not, I’m not kidding.
     
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  14. thijsdenbraven

    thijsdenbraven Member

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    It's good to know that they are aware of some off the issues
     
  15. appledates#4945

    appledates#4945 Well-Known Member

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    The feedback from the community aside, does Rivets work on this route meet the standards of DTG? Will Rivets work be looked at poorly by DTG because of the harsh criticism from the Train simulator community?
     
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  16. GrayDawg

    GrayDawg Well-Known Member

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    A few specifically chosen screenshots to show it off where the worst parts don't show and were it actually looks good, hardly counts as "evidence" that the route is in fact beautiful with just just a few spots not being spectacular. Especially the ones in snow which we all agree looks much better, for obvious reasons. You must not have watched the first stream at all.

    Picture 1: I was shown this, and I thought, this looks bloody amazing. I want to to have this, I want to drive here:
    Picture 2: I was then shown this, nah this is what you are going to get, and in todays stream, we are not going to do anything about it:
     

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  17. Crosstie

    Crosstie Well-Known Member

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    I purchased this route already. I think I'll enjoy it as a bit of relaxation in between the drama of SPG, Clinchfield and others. But there are some strange anomalies which I guess I'll have to turn a blind eye to. One is the streets of Chur. Where I live, we get lots of snow, but I've never seen our streets covered with that beautiful layer of pure white snow. Traffic and plowing and salting soon turn it into a gray, tire marked morass. What gives?
     
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  18. appledates#4945

    appledates#4945 Well-Known Member

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    Specifically chosen screenshots? They are screen shots from different areas of the route and different seasons. They mostly are in the cab or trackside and show plenty of background scenery. I don’t feel having a screenshot from an exterior view behind some random building is being less selective then the view the majority of our time will be spent in. Yet we have always had the same exact distant scenery. Which I think everyone can agree is not the best in any route, I just don’t know why people are all of a sudden expecting pop-in and other issues that have plagued TSW since launch, to magically be fixed by Rivet games, on the second route they have created for this game.
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  19. GrayDawg

    GrayDawg Well-Known Member

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    Ok, not convincing enough for you, how about a trackside view then? I played games looking much better than this literally 15-20 years ago. When I spend my money on a game in 2021, a game where immersion is a major factor, I think it's not unfair to expect a little more than what is shown here, with the developers saying, we are not going to do diddly-squat about any of it. Very reassuring that. If you don't know any better, or if you really don't think so, so be it. Each to their own. Enjoy your purchase. I'll go for Clinchfield instead. Toodles!
     

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  20. JBViper

    JBViper Well-Known Member

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    I watched a live from Australia.
    There are 5 scenarios (with different difficulties) including 2 freight of 50 minutes each. A tourist circuit scenario of 90 minutes. The tutorial lasts 30 minutes, with maneuvers and loading of the wooden cars at the rear of the train, it's cool.
    Also, even if it's a single-track, I find that there is life in the opposite direction with sidings.
    I'm pleasantly surprised for the maneuvers at the terminals, it changes.
    Personally, I'm even more eager to have it.
    Thank you for reading me and good night ;)
     
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  21. 7orenz

    7orenz Well-Known Member

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    Remind to DTG that we Xbox customers are not your goose that lays golden eggs. In addition to not having March Madness and perma-discounts on everything, in the last month alone we have seen 2 full-price DLCs (without promotional discount). And that's not really good.

    You and Microsoft are smart with the excuse of time windows, the famous slots, which incidentally, however, are never found ... The PSN (Playstation Store) also applies 10% discount on Arosa Line. I hope Microsoft customers are just as smart.

    And please, stop with the excuses.
     
    Last edited: Mar 25, 2021
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  22. 59321747

    59321747 Well-Known Member

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    I haven't decided to buy it now. I will wait until summer or autumn to buy it. By then, the bugs and scenery should be repaired very well. At this stage, I am focusing on two US routes, but why is Gan Zexi still under development?
     
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  23. appledates#4945

    appledates#4945 Well-Known Member

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    Yet here is another screenshot taken from the stream from the cab that looks great. Maybe it’s because it sticks out more on this particular route, but placing the blame on Rivet games over a problem that has plagued TSW since the very beginning and throwing everything positive they have done with this route out the window just seems a little unfair and has a negative effect on TSW and it’s future.
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  24. RotorHed

    RotorHed Member

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    As far as I can tell the discounts are provided by the store owner - MS in this case.

    I actually suspect the discounts that do occur - like the initial PSN discount - are eaten 100% by the Platform owner and not DTG. The theory seems to be that MS take about a 30% cut of sales on their store so the discounts up to that value can come from them without DTG seeing a loss on their side.

    That’s not to excuse anything, but I do think that DTG in this case can’t do anything further. If MS aren’t interested in discounting I think DTG are stuck with RRP on the store.
     
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  25. schorni

    schorni Well-Known Member

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    As a customer, you only see that you are always at a "disadvantage" as an Xbox player. The customer doesn't care why, since it doesn't change the situation. Personally, I then no longer buy DLC for release. On the one hand because of this thing and on the other hand because again and again patches are needed to fix a route. With these methods, you are already "forced" to wait for sales to save money and not to ruin the fun with unfinished DLC.
     
  26. mclitke

    mclitke Well-Known Member

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    It is funny to me that you post all these pictures again and again as if they show something amazing, when all I see are bright monotone textures, making me think I was driving through a Simpsons episode :D
     
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  27. Rudolf

    Rudolf Well-Known Member

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    I will happily play this route and I am looking forward to more Swiss content created by Rivet. For TS for a long time we only had Swiss content for Swiss prices from some Swiss developer. So you may be happy or not, but Rivet is our best bet for now for Swiss routes.
     
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  28. paul.pavlinovich

    paul.pavlinovich Well-Known Member

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    Monder You're correct in what you're saying in how it looks. I buy games to drive trains, if the scenery is nice then great, but if its not then yeah whatever. I play Run8 which is about as basic as it comes for scenery, if you went much more basic you wouldn't have any :). It still uses DX10 and it doesn't really take advantage of the features from that. So alongside that bad scenery you get amazing train physics and driving and the sounds are amazing.

    For me the train driving side of Arosa looks interesting and challenging. I have seen an actual RhB driver commenting on the theory that you use the vacuum brake before the dynamic brake and he said that this is bogus. What was said on stream today that suggests the coaches would bang around and derail is also nonsense since you can ride massive trains down steep grades on dynamics. Once the train pushes up against the loco all the couplers will be tight and the ride would be smooth. If the terrain varies then yes it will bounce back and forth a bit but not to the point its uncomfortable.

    Consequentially I've kept my pre-order in. I'll be streaming this route on PC on Sunday morning Melbourne time on my trainsimulatordriver channel (see link in sig) so if you want a look where the person running the stream will pay attention to you and we can go exploring to answer your questions I'm very happy to do that. I play at 2K at 80-100fps and push it out on stream at FHD at 30fps so it should look reasonable.

    I was disappointed in one thing, I've asked over the two Arosa streams one simple question, I've asked it four times to avoid being dumped for spamming - "does it work with Raildriver?". Surely they must know but they just ignore the question. I asked Jasper on their YT channel and got back "DTG do that" when I asked, but when I contemplate the preserved crew saying that its difficult I wonder if "DTG do that" is a good answer. I could understand DTG building the configuration screen in "Advanced Controls" and doing the control mapping. I'm hoping in tomorrow morning's stream with TrainSim-Matt that perhaps we might get an answer because he's got a Raildriver so has more of an interest in the question. Of course by the time Matt is streaming tomorrow at 7am my time in theory I should have my copy up and running since it becomes available 5am my local time.

    Good to see another Aussie JBViper
     
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  29. Tigert1966

    Tigert1966 Well-Known Member

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    paul.pavlinovich - My views exactly. For me driving is the important thing. The route is quite recognisable, I could always tell whereabouts on the line we were in the stream. But I do also agree that it could be improved a bit. (Also I’m rapidly going off the idea of collectibles now that Jamie has shown us where half of them are!)

    I was really hoping they would answer your question about raildriver. I’ll be really disappointed if it doesn’t support it. My hope is that as every release since the start of the beta has had it, then this will as well. It’ll be the first thing I try. It’s a bit strange, Matt said he didn’t know about support on the Diesel Legends Streams as well. I find that odd.
     
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  30. kuchen0125

    kuchen0125 Active Member

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    Rivet Games has clearly exaggerated! I hope Rivet will no longer set itself the task of building a Swiss Route.
    Because the way Arosa looks in spring, you think it's a mobile game!
    Rivet has proven that they cannot plant many trees themselves on a 26-kilometer route. I don't want to know how bad it looks at 50 kilometers!
     
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  31. eurocityboy

    eurocityboy Active Member

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    There are definite positives to the route, and not every aspect of a route needs to be top notch. But the scenery just doesn't live up to a minimum acceptable standard. It's like making a route with the most-feature rich, detailed rolling stock, the most beautiful landscape and the most complex timetable ever seen in TSW, but then using a child making "brrrrr" noises as sound for the rolling stock: There are just certain standards that need to be met across the board, you can't just say "Well, certain aspects of the route are above average, so it's fine if we completely drop the ball on others."

    This is especially true as TSW is more of a "walled garden" than TS. There is no editor, and consequently no chance for the community to fix what's wrong with the scenery and gameplay. There will be a lot of casual players who will pick up this "scenic alpine route" and be horrified at what they see. I predict a lot of bad reviews, and, what's worse, this will be perceived by many as a DTG/TSW core product and probably damage the TSW brand quite a bit. If they are going to go with the "walled garden" approach, DTG need to enforce much stricter quality controls on third party content and clamp down on this sort of thing. "It works, and the player can achieve objectives" is simply insufficient as a QA standard for products that are going to be promoted via the official TSW channels. DTG has just recently gotten better at ensuring a more consistent quality for their own products, and now they let Rivet and their shenanigans ruin their brand. Again, I'm not asking for miracles, I'm just asking for a minimum standard to be enforced.
     
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  32. LucasLCC

    LucasLCC Well-Known Member

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    IoW still has some rather large outstanding bugs. The custom liveries can't be used, Then AI drives with the lights off and notch 1 causes your wheels to spin.

    The fact these haven't been fixed is a tell tell sign that Rivet will have no rush or inclination to fix their products. DTG are partly at fault too, as they should put more pressure on Rivet to fix stuff.
     
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  33. eurocityboy

    eurocityboy Active Member

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    "Experience nail-biting gradients, stunning Swiss scenery and classic motive power with Rivet Games’ Train Sim World 2: Arosalinie!"

    The stunning Swiss scenery:

    langwies.png
     
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  34. markhazeldine

    markhazeldine Well-Known Member

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    I get your point, and normally I would agree with you, but the whole POINT of Swiss routes IS the scenery. It's about the mountains. That's why people like Switzerland, otherwise Switzerland isn't THAT much different to Germany. So I feel like Rivet failed at the main USP for me. Ok, the distant scenery isn't everything, but it's the mountain setting that makes it unique and if you skimp on that and you're telling me to focus on what's going on inside the train, then all of a sudden the route is "just another route".
     
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  35. Purno

    Purno Well-Known Member

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    I've pre-ordered Arosa, and I'm looking forward to driving it. Sure it has some issues, but the trains and scenery still look beautiful. More importantly, it's a Swiss narrow gauge route! So much better than the usual stuff we get from DTG. It looks so different! I want this in my collection, I've been looking forward to it since it appeared on the roadmap, and Rivet's Swiss add-ons for Train Simulator were one of the best.

    I also do not regret having purchased Isle of Wight. Whatever issues it has aren't big enough for me to spoil the fun. Although I agree the AI headlights should be fixed. :P
     
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  36. paul.pavlinovich

    paul.pavlinovich Well-Known Member

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    Indeed Tigert1966

    Just out of interest - you can control how many distant things look if your PC has enough grunt for it by manipulating your engine.ini settings. Not everything is possible to change but many things are. I also push the envelope and use the -DX12 in my launch properties.

    My settings are:
    [SystemSettings]
    r.ViewDistanceScale=8
    r.StaticMeshLODDistanceScale=0.70
    r.LandscapeLODDistributionScale=3
    foliage.LODDistanceScale=5
    r.ShadowQuality=5
    r.Shadow.DistanceScale=2.0
    r.DefaultFeature.MotionBlur=0
    r.TextureStreaming=0
    r.Streaming.FullyLoadUsedTextures=1
    r.Streaming.HLODStrategy=2
    r.BloomQuality=1
    r.TemporalAASamples=64
    r.SkeletalMeshLODBias=-2
    r.Color.Mid=0.4
    r.HighQualityLightMaps=1
    r.PostProcessAAQuality=6
    r.MaxAnisotropy=16
    r.Tonemapper.Quality=4
    r.Tonemapper.GrainQuantization=1
    r.SceneColorFringe.Max=0
    r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0
    r.LandscapeLODDistributionScale=3

    Don't ask me what they all do, I have no idea, I've gradually added to this from reading various threads here on the forum. Search engine.ini and you'll find bucket loads of them. Now there is a penalty and its significant so caveat emptor. On my rig 10th gen i5 10700 with RTX3070 with 2K monitor without the settings I easily get 95 to 110 fps with these settings I range between 65 to 90fps. This is a big hit but when you're going from an average of 100 to an average of 75 you don't really notice all that much. If you had a lower performing rig and average so 30fps then these settings are going to make you very very sad. The other advantage of these settings is they force everything to load up front so there is no stuttering.

    Here are examples of how they look... These are screen grabs and I've had to compress these a bit so the forum will accept them...

    Stock standard - no setting changes Bedwyn
    without-bedwyn.jpg

    With the settings above
    with-bedwyn.jpg

    It's a bit hard to tell from these so here are the zoomed in portions concentrating on the centre of the track
    Stock
    without-bedwyn-zoom.png

    with settings
    with-bedwyn-zoom.png

    Paul
     
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  37. davidh0501

    davidh0501 Well-Known Member

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    To be fair to Rivet, the game looked much better with the scenery covered in snow.

    That said I’m not a great fan of single track routes in general.
    They just make the world more lifeless and detract from the immersion.
     
  38. OldVern

    OldVern Well-Known Member

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    What I take away from this is that DTG behind the scenes should think very carefully before sub contracting a route project to Rivet or accepting solicitation that they have one to offer. Certainly needs to be far more QA behind the scenes before even a preview image is made public.
    As a concession to the awful quality and bugs, this should go on sale at a much reduced price - £15.99 or downward seems a good starting point (which would make it under a tenner in the inevitable sale).
     
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  39. Tigert1966

    Tigert1966 Well-Known Member

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    I’ve no doubt that on Steam, this will get bad reviews a lot will leave there reviews based on the stream and won’t bother playing it. I doubt anyone will pay a lot of attention to them. As with film reviews on the internet, those that hate it are very vocal, those that love it are busy playing/watching it. Diesel Legends is mostly negative and yet I’ve found it’s my most played DLC recently, because I actually bought it, tried it and found it to be surprisingly good fun.

    It’s fine to say you don’t like it and post criticism on here. But saying it’s going to hurt DTGs reputation is utter rubbish and a bit over dramatic in my opinion.

    Different people want different things. You can’t say it’s all about scenery when as clearly stated above, it isn’t for everybody. I suspect this route will actually do quite well. I’ve seen some pretty positive console videos already. I suspect I’ll like it. I’ve got 2 hours tonight to find out.
     
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  40. Mattty May

    Mattty May Guest

    My point on the scenery is this:

    If you are going to base a route in a specific location, then the scenery has to reasonably represent that location. Not every tree or building etc has to be in the right place, but you have to get a sense that you’re actually on the route - otherwise why bother doing any of the scenery in the first place?

    Also, the textures of said scenery should look realistic. Not uniform in colour, bland and cartoon like. Arosa looked really good in the snow, but that’s because snow is generally a flat white colour with little texture from a distant view. But on the first stream, the route looked absolutely terrible.

    I’ll maintain this is a real shame, as the attention to detail in the cab is superb and shows what can be achieved.
     
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  41. eurocityboy

    eurocityboy Active Member

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    You can't review stuff on Steam if you haven't purchased it.
     
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  42. Tigert1966

    Tigert1966 Well-Known Member

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    I know, but look at some of the reviews for DLC. They even say they bought it just to review it. There are often many reviews within 5 minutes of launch. Unfortunately for DLC you can’t see how much they’ve played it like you can for the main game.

    Plus as I said, people that hate it are often more vocal than those that love it. I’ve left a few reviews in the past, but most of them were due to frustration and disappointment.

    Opinions are fine, I’m not telling anyone they must or mustn’t like it. I’m just not going to pay any attention to rants on Steam from people I don’t know, when I can play it myself.
     
    Last edited: Mar 25, 2021
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  43. Lamplight

    Lamplight Well-Known Member

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    I sincerely hope we won‘t have to get a loco DLC just for using the freight cars we already got. I‘m holding off on Arosa right now specifically because of the lack of freight in timetable mode. I‘m not expecting SPG or MSB levels of freight activity, but some freight here and there would be nice.

    In the thread which asked whether we‘ll get Clinchfield, Arosa or both, I answered both. I intend to stay by that, but I‘ll wait for the promised April patch before considering whether I‘ll get it. I know the distant scenery is a deal breaker for a lot of people, but if you can live with that and you’re still on the fence about Arosa, perhaps waiting for that patch and seeing how that works out is the best option. That‘s what I plan on doing, anyway.
     
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  44. eurocityboy

    eurocityboy Active Member

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    LGV Méditerranée: 83% positive reviews
    Class 465: 98% positive reviews
    East Coastway: 88% positive reviews

    It's possible to do a great job with quality TSW/TS DLC and get credit for. The stuff that gets bad reviews, for most part, deserves it.
     
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  45. Monder

    Monder Well-Known Member

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    I'll definitely try to pop in and take a look. Would be interesting to see if a full dynamic brake can hold the train speed going down (it probably should).
    As for the scenery - I think the importance of it can vary based on the game title and location of the DLC in it. It is definitely a fair thing to expect TSW scenery to look better than Run8 and TS Classic. At the end of the day, it is they who market it as a next-gen train simulation, not me. Therefore it should beat all the older simulations, which it often doesn't do (even the SEHS HS1 part still has problems in that regard and that's why I will wait for a 15-20 % discount on it). Then there's the factor of the route selected - based on what route you select, the demands on the scenery might vary a lot. I do not expect the same level of details from a route set somewhere in the middle of nowhere I'm going through at 320 km/h and is nearly 100 km long as from a route, where the track is quarter in length, packed in a small area, going 35 km/h max... and it is in the bloody ALPS. It is true you have the scenery in front of you for way longer and it is a big trademark of the route. MSB has been brought up many times in these discussions. That route (apart from I think still having a better distant scenery than this) is longer, faster and mainly focused on an absolutely different aspect - the banking - and that is done rather well (within the limitations of TSW). The Cane Creek route currently in production will also be more distant scenery demanding as there's little else to do there, so the canyons will have to look great. On the contrary, Hamburg-Lübeck might not be about distant scenery at all, the route is rather flat and runs through forests most of the time.
    Imagine if someone went to do a Blue Mountains route and painted the whole thing with this light green texture. (Also Australia is great, hopefully one day in TSW!)
     
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  46. maxipolo12

    maxipolo12 Well-Known Member

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    Oh Yes another Drama topic :D
    Wait 1 year to have a product with updates and a fair price ;)
     
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  47. paul.pavlinovich

    paul.pavlinovich Well-Known Member

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    It would be awesome to get a Blue Mountains route. While I'm a Melbourne lad, I've ridden the Blue Mountains line and it offers a lot of variety from electric pax through massive freight.

    I just wanted a playback of a stream by MegaSim and it looked like most of the time 100% dynamic was holding it and the vacuum brake was used to stop it. Seemed that way anyway.

    I bought most of my DLC at a discount, this one attracted me at full price - mainly because is narrow gauge and looks fun :).

    I absolutely get that its different for everyone because we all have different priorities in what we want from a sim.

    Paul
     
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  48. Mich

    Mich Well-Known Member

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    I've not played Arosa specifically, but I have seen Squirrel play it, and I've played some of the other Swiss routes, the trees aren't that sparse in the old routes. And TS Classic is way more limited with this type of stuff since it can't utilize modern hardware as well as other games. Surely they could've put some more down, they don't all need to be high detail, you could have the distant ones easily be very low poly and motionless, or maybe even 2D images if they're far enough away.
     
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  49. Monder

    Monder Well-Known Member

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    Oh, this is very interesting. The dynamic brake definitely can hold the train well, but I've noticed something about it. You can see that whenever he went with full dynamic over a junction, the speed went up and down like crazy. This wouldn't happen IRL (especially with the braking power being dissipated to heat, so it is not dependant on OHLE). So this is just my theory, but I think they've gone with this weird blended braking tutorial, because there's something in the game (and this might very well be a DTG core issue), that makes the dynamic brake unreliable. So they make you use the vacuum and just about 20-40 % dynamic so that you don't notice these hiccups. We've talked about it with American freight and it probably is similar here, the dynamic is supposed to hold the train speed going downhill. If you were supposed to use the vacuum brakes on the whole way down, maybe they wouldn't overheat, but you would spend a lot more time in the repair shop just constantly changing brakes. Begs a question of what exactly is wrong with dynamic brakes (looking at you too, AC4400).
     
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  50. paul.pavlinovich

    paul.pavlinovich Well-Known Member

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    I had not noticed that, nice pickup. I wonder if its representing wheel slip over the points (or more to the point, lock up through loss of traction)? And yes the AC4400 is not brilliant on dynamics. I suspect there are core issues because dynamics in TSW2 aren't very consistent - you'd expect changes from loco to loco but when in a single loco going down Sand Patch for example, if the grade stays consistent and the curves gentle you should be able to set a fairly constant speed and well, simply, you can't.

    Paul
     
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