The new gradient profile simply does not work properly. I don't know what happened here. I cannot imagine none of the beta testers or testers has seen this. I cannot imagine Matt did not see this. What is going on here? Two pics from Cane Creek, just to show it. What you see is that locations are not shown, this is worse that in the previous overview. Second is that you cannot determine the grade, which is 1.0- 1.2% in this area and definitely not constant. Third is that the speed profile does not shift when the time window shifts, resulting in the weird second image. The first two issues do not apply to all routes. For Boston Sprinter it seems to work, same for Bakerloo but not for Köln-Aachen, that route is as bad as what you see here. It is very disappointing, because this is announced with a lot of noise as one of the key improvements for the Core update. I added a third image. This is at the point where the ascending slope changes into a descending slope. The ascending slope is 1.2%, descenting 1%. You simply cannot see it.
I have encountered the problem as well across all routes I played so far, especially what you have in the second picture. The first time I press Esc, all is good, but after going to this menu a couple of times, these weird glitches/bugs happen. It is also strange how large the range of speed values is. On SKA, it goes from 0 to something around 500 I believe, no train is ever going to go that fast, the range should go to 260 maybe. It is also bad how the options menu is now hidden. Not impressed by the UI design, and even less how "well" it works.
I do not wnat to repeat the other topics. The key point here is that this proves DTG still has a very serious quality problem and I ask how could they have missed this? Or did they see it, but decided to ignore it?
Classic DTG new feature. Badly designed, poorly implemented and useless at the time of release. The old overview screen used to give actual information as to your position on the route and what was coming up and that has been replaced with less information presented in the form of interpretive dance. Or at least that’s how it feels. And it flatlines after a while, as can be seen above. It’s done that on nearly every service I’ve driven since the update. It didn’t show the tunnels on Clinchfield very well even before it tanked. Nothing gets real rigorous testing until we get it but that should only bring up faults in the system not that a system just doesn’t work at all. That’s not really how it should work.
The big worry is that dtg want to expand the audience of their product. But something like this will just turn seasoned players new to sims away very quickly. Nothing says ‘can’t be bothered’ than something being shipped like this. The problems are also occurring on the Boston route, no route I have tried so far is free from the above embarrassments.
While not defending it been broken , does it really matter ? most of the items found in the menu are useless. Could just be me but the idea of pausing the game constantly to look at this stuff is tedious. Take the the new route overview for example with station names brilliant names on stations why is this just not a toggle in game ? they already have distance markers you can toggle on and off during gameplay so why not a nameplate marker ? no instead its in a pause screen sub menu. In my view these items are all aids to route learning yet you are unable to use them while driving ... hence for me I find them pointless, again not saying its ok its broken just honestly at this point a menu with a horrible line plot that does not animate or provide any feedback at all really that useful ? Considering it only plots against the line speed and no based on signals you received speed reductions ect its even less valuable. Having to pause to find this info is immersion breaking and with a bit of thought and some effort allot of these functions could have been added as overlays during gameplay.
Looks like this is yet another feature that needs fixing on a per-route basis, instead of having it automatically apply to all routes. The same issue exists on SPG. I can't imagine it would require a lot of work to resolve it for each route but it seems consistency is not DTG's forte. I wouldn't be as frustrated if they didn't specifically advertise this as being a new "immersion" feature.
The real problem is that this issue with the gradient display is one of the smallest problems overall, it's just a drop in an ocean of bugs, and no, I'm not talking about the download mess, I'm talking about what happens after you got all of your DLCs. I can only say I'm happy I got refunded my RH pass, and while the native 4k, HDR and (sort of) high-res textures are fantastic, I wouldn't mind going back to 4.23.
I've seen it work really well on WSR, gradients are nicely depicted, stations are there etc. Hopefully, the rest can see it work similarly well.
I'm ignoring the gradient and speed profile screens. They are not useful and are certainly not worth interrupting game play. In that sense they are consistent with the new UI in general. Why in the whole wide world did anyone at DTG think that this new pause screen was a good idea, an improvement? Extra mouse clicks to get somewhere, go to main menu, find a route; losing the simple "save and resume" screen etc. I'm almost bald from scratching my head. For goodness sake, give us a really useful 2d map, like the one TS has had for a decade or more.
To compare my Cane Creek images in this thread with this one. Here I am driving a 0.1% down grade This clearly demonstrated the grade profile is NOT working at all for Cane Creek.
This would be better as an in game overlay like the “T” button schedule I think. Same with the map (perhaps with an opacity adjustment function)
I like the idea of gradient as a semi-transparent overlay which only displays when a key is held down. Drilling down menu's is so microsoft... (Shudder at the thought of a Dtg Clippy popping up saying "I see you are trying to...")
I’ve suggested prompt cards before. Imagine cold starting a large diesel. Press a key and a semi-transparent start card pops up listing the steps needed. No need for a manual. Same for the map as an overlay. No need for a separate menu.
Or maybe have a kind of "Roundhouse Gallery" where the locos would be stationed and there you would get prompts for all control elements. Separated from normal gameplay here you could 1) see your collection, 2) learn about all the buttons and levers as well as safety systems.
I like the sound of that idea. A place to learn and look, separate from the driving appeals to me. I’m not much of a fan of having info pop up for me
ive had gradient problems on Boston. i mean when going down a gradient at 125 mph how does a train lose speed. i had to give it full throttle to keep to the line speed. here we go again not been tested. i know this id in the PC section but i play on PS 5
This would be cool. A showroom area you can poke around on , then I guess you can do that in free roam too.
Well, that could be prototypical, 125mph is quite fast and the train has a quite large front, so rolling downhill at that speed will slow the train down, that even happens with a car at 80mph and steep downhill, so wouldn't be too surprised with this effect being even stronger for trains
I like the auto vista on forza. I can walk up to the car ( or train in this instance) and learn about the engine or hover over the pzb acknowledge button and info ho to use it pops up