Regardless of what you think of this route, it's far to say that Southeastern High Speed has had an eventful existence within TSW2. It started as one of/if not the most anticipated TSW route ever right up until the first gameplay stream when it was widely criticised for many issues prevalent during the stream (i.e. ballast colour, lack of fencing along HS1, the sound being too quiet, lack of services, etc, etc). Now DTG did try to rectify some of those issues such as adding more services and adding the fencing along HS1 (even if it was inaccurate), but even when the route came out, it still out to be a complete mess. Now DTG has since consistently updated this route with new improvements/fixes and now the route is generally a lot better than what it was at release and it even received a pretty good loco add-on in the form of the class 465. However there is still one major issue I have with this route, one that in some ways completely destroys the entire route and that is the scenery of this route in general. I don't just mean like the fencing along HS1 being inaccurate, oh no. There are a lot more pressing issues with the scenery along this route and I'm going to use this thread to go over some of the more major scenery issues with this route. Now I'm not going to go over every scenery issue with this route, but what I did is fly along the entire length of the line and see if I can find any major scenery issues with the route and I found plenty of them. So much so that this thread will be divided into two posts to discuss them all. When finding these issues, I usually try to factor in whether you can see it from the following perspectives: Drivers point of view Passengers point of view Walking point of view Now with all that out the way, lets get into some of the scenery issues that I was able to find. Now the area around St Pancras isn't too bad. There are a few floating roads in the area, but nothing that comes of as noticeable or jarring. Now there are issues with the scenery around Stratford International, but I'm not going to go too hard here because it's an area you're not going to see from a drivers point of view anyways. The first issue I do want to talk about is when you come of the second London Tunnel and you're racing along HS1 and you see this: This is at the other Rainham station along the c2c line that runs opposite HS1 where there is a floating signal box at the West end of the platform. Now I won't go too much into this as I've already covered this in another post, see here for more: https://forums.dovetailgames.com/threads/so-now-i-see-why-there-were-no-fences-initially.35994/ But generally speaking, the HS1 section isn't actually as bad some people claim it is. Yes, the fences along this section are inaccurate and in some areas, it certainly can be improved, but there doesn't seem to be any major floating scenery sections and there are areas that are very well done.... It's only when you get to the other side of the Thames Tunnel when the problems begin. As you exit the Thames Tunnel heading into Ebbsfleet, you will be immediately greeted by this floating yard on your left hand side (and this becomes a theme for what's ahead): …and there's another floating lorry just on from that: Now I what to talk about Ebbsfleet International station in general because I think the whole area could do with an entire upgrade: Now you know that none of the Ashford bound trains are driveable and while it would be nice that at some point they are made drivable (I mean there are already mods that do exactly that) I feel like before making those services drivable, you would have to completely redo the entirely of the Ebbsfleet lower level platforms as they currently look terrible. The platform is sinking in the ground (lower than the height of the platform doors), there is a road leading into the station building that appears to be floating and there is no catenary at the southbound exit of the station (probably because DTG didn't think anyone would see this section: I also feel like the background scenery around this section could be improved as there doesn't seem to be much going in those hills behind the station. Moving on from that, next stop is Gravesend where you can see a road where cars appear to floating going to and from the bridge at the western end of the platform: …and on closer inspection, those trees appear to be blocking the view of a great big hole in the terrain: Moving on as we leave Gravesend, there are also a few insistences of floating fences on the eastern departure/approach into Gravesend, including a section where there the end of one fence is sticking in the air: Next stop is around Strood where there is this road where cars are driving below the road surface before they turn right along the road under the bridge that carries the line heading towards Maidstone: What's happening is that this road you see here is sitting higher than the road that the cars go onto heading towards the river so it appears the cars are coming from out of the ground. This is better viewed from the Rochester Bridge: Which leads me into a problem that I have this section of the route in general... ...is it me or why do I get I feeling that this whole section of the line between Strood and Rochester is sitting higher than it should be? I say this because first you have Strood station building appearing to be positioned on top of a large mound...: …But when you get to Rochester, the station building appears to be doing the same thing as Strood's: So could it be that the whole Strood-Rochester section is actually sitting higher up than it should be as you look on the likes of Google Maps, you can see that the station buildings for both is actually sitting level to the surrounding area so who knows whatever happened to this section of the route to end up like it is. So far, most of issue haven't be too major. It's mostly been minor floating scenery and the odd area that could do with some major improvements. But it's really when you get pass Chatham when you starting into some of the more major scenery issues. Firstly, as soon as you exit the tunnel heading out of Chatham eastbound, you are greeted with this floating house that would probably collapse into the pass of the railway in real life: There are also a few insistences of floating fences along this section of the line between Chatham and Gillingham: The final issue that I want to bring up in this first section is on the westbound departure/approach into Rainham where outside one of houses, there appears to be a car that is sinking into the ground: That's going to do it for part one of this post. Since there's a limit on the amount of images you can take in a single post, I'm going to come back a part two the remain section between Gravesend-Faversham as trust me, we have only gotten started when it comes to talking about the scenery along this route.
Right time for part 2 of this post and believe me, we are now getting into some of the real terrible scenery moments on this route. Picking up from where we left off, we now find ourselves leaving Rainham behind and heading towards Newington. Here, you pass over a bridge which has traffic going underneath it, but as the traffic is disappearing/appearing on the left hand side view heading out of Rainham, the traffic appears to float up out of sight or float down as it joins the road heading under the railway: But this is nothing compared to what's just up the line from this because it's time to show you the biggest scenery blunder along the entire the route and it's on the 4-lane section heading towards Newington. Are you ready? …3...2...1.... The entire town is floating!!! This is found on the right-hand side view heading towards Newington on the aforementioned 4-lane section of the line. I mean... I don't think I need to explain to much as to what's wrong here. The left-hand side view is not much better as there is also several pieces of floating scenery too: Even as you're leaving Newington and heading back to a 2-lane section, there's are even more pieces of floating scenery: Now somewhere in-between Newington and Sittingbourne there is a field of solar panels. It doesn't seem to problematic at first, but if you take a closer look, you will see the end of two sections of solar panels are sticking up into the air: …and just for good measure, just are you are nearing Sittingbourne, you will see more insistences of floating towns on both sides of the line. Left-hand side: Right-hand side: Next we move to Sittingbourne were in the car park of the station, some of cars seem to be floating just above the surface: Now this has been reported in the past, but it's still worth mentioning, when leaving Sittingbourne heading towards Faversham, there is this workman's hut that is sinking into the ground: Just on from that, there is weird rectangle shaped brick built thing next to some houses on the right-hand side view that is half floating in the air: Now if you are standing at the western end of Teynham station, you can see what appears to be a small warehouse off in the distance to the north that again appears to be floating: But there is even bigger case of floating warehouses just beyond here near the level crossing in-between Teynham and Faversham as not one but two of them are seen floating on the left-hand side view: This has certainly been a long one but I do have one more piece to show you and that is just beyond Faversham as trains head off out of the map, there are two more cases of floating sets of houses. Heading towards Margate: Heading towards Dover Priory: …and that is pretty much all the major scenery issues that I could find. This may seem like me beginning harsh on this routes scenery, but that's not what I want to thread to come across as. Let me explain. I never expect any route to look 100% like the real thing. There are always going to be factors that effect how a route turns out. Resources available, money, time available to make a route and much more. But as long as you are able to capture the spirit and feel of the route, then I feel like you've done your job pretty well. The point that I ultimately want to get out of this thread is that if you look all that I've shown here, it's clear that route lacks polish. It clear that there was no time given in order to polish out the scenery and make it look somewhat respectable. All of this just makes me ask one question... What happened during development of this route??? As in, how can a route that took around 5 months to make (because keep in mind, this route was in production when the game first came out back in August last year when we had the first roadmap update 2 days before the games release) somehow end up like this? Was it the autogen system that you seem to be using on this route and then not going back to check over the scenery to make sure that it looks okay? Was this route the subject of a turbulent production? (Which considering what happen in the weeks leading up to this routes release is not out of the question) Or was the effort just not there compared to other routes in TSW? Which on the last point, if you look back at another similar route to this one, East Coastway, that route is widely considered as one of the nicest looking routes in his whole. I mean, I would even argue that even if the route in general has issues, the outdoor section of the Bakerloo Line looks far better made than this route is. which would then ask the question of what has changed since those routes were made (I think you may know the answer to that one). In the end, I do hope that some of the issues that I have brought up can be fixed eventually and also do hope that the scenery in general can be improved because I feel like if the scenery can be made just a little bit better, this route will be fantastic. I mean, there are some aspects that this route does very well already, like the timetable is actually pretty good even if none of the Ashford trains are driveable, you have a great variety of trains to drive from what the route offers and what other layers allow and it has decent route length longer than routes out there in TSW/TSW2. So if the scenery can be made just a little bit better, this route could be one best routes out there. For now, it's just decent to good and a little bad in places. If anymore scenery issues come up, I will bring them up here and if any of you are able to find any other issues that i may have missed then don't be afraid to bring them up here as well.
I think that you will find it quite revealing if you compare the TSW 2 version of the SHS route to the TS 2012 (Railworks 3) version of the route (London-Faversham). It very much strikes me as a copy and paste port across (albeit with some newer shinier signals and a couple of station rebuilds, and the route cut shorter). You don't actually have to look very far to reach this conclusion - just look at the station buildings on the 750V section - these are textures that you are meant to walk very close to, and they are clearly over ten years old. They would look seriously out of place on a recent TS 2012 route DLC.... I think, overall, that the TS 2012 version of the route is actually better, as the team put some level of care into it, back in 2012-13. The TSW 2 route is certainly not to the standard of LIRR (TSW), for example, or any of the German routes. And SHS was in my "do not buy for many years" list because I already have it in TS 2012. But I bought it anyway, for the rolling stock, specifically, the Class 465, which is quite superb. And the Hitachi is fairly nice too. ;-) Oddly enough, quite a lot of the TSW 2 routes appear to be direct ports of old TS 2012 routes. I expect London (Gatwick....) - Brighton will be next (maybe as part of "Rush Hour").....?
Yeah I don't understand the developers at DTG, truly. You're placing a fence, a car, or whatever the hell else on the map, and you cannot be bothered with actually moving it up/down/left/right/whatever into position? Seriously?
And if they've given any physics to these ramshackle builds, then there would be a drain on performance - and, perhaps not coincidentally SHS is not one of the best performing routes in TSW 2. I half suspect (but do not know) that the reason why there is no commuter traffic and virtually no other AI traffic on the OSD route is that the really poor build out on OSD has totally soaked up CPU/GPU, even after they took out all of the inaccessible track that was previously (literally) under and inside the buildings of the new fake industrial estate they've planted there. It really doesn't take that much more time to get these builds done right, and cleanly. And it saves a huge amount of time in the long run. And if you do it right, you can then have a reasonable stab at optimising the gameplay. This is what the German routes have - better gameplay, because of lean and effective builds.
The landscape and scenery of SEHS is very poor in my opinion and represents everything opposite to what is said in this video. There is no doubt that SEHS was rushed to meet another self-imposed deadline. It’s hard to see how DTG can reconcile the photographic evidence in this post, with what they are telling us in the video.
