Suggestion: Spotlights/light Sources For Led Signals

Discussion in 'TSW General Discussion' started by londonmidland, Dec 27, 2021.

  1. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    I was playing around with Unreal Engine Unlocker (paid version) and it has an option to add unlimited spotlights in any position on the map. It's fully customisable in colour, colour temperature, intensity, placement, direction of light etc etc.

    So I thought I'd have a quick go at adding one to an LED signal and tried to match the colour of it. The end result looks fantastic. Not only does it create a light source on the lens hood and exterior of the train but it also looks amazing inside the cab. I've not experienced any light clipping/bleeding through the cab.

    So, it begs the question, why have DTG not set this up by default when setting up signals? I find they always look so flat, as they cast no light source.

    Images below:
    TSW2_Josh_1640645173_00.jpg TSW2_Josh_1640645204_00.jpg TSW2_Josh_1640646125_00.jpg
     
    Last edited: Dec 27, 2021
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  2. jmhdc812

    jmhdc812 Active Member

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    That looks REALLY nice!! Which begs the question, what kind of epic mod are you about to create for us that will utilize your newfound skill? :D

    Edit: To be perfectly clear, that's epic and not Epic. ;)
     
    Last edited: Dec 27, 2021
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  3. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    Its not a mod, it was created using Unreal Engine Unlocker in real time, so can't be saved unfortunately.

    The reason why it isn't used, as I've just found out, is that apparently it is too performance taxing, especially for consoles.
     
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  4. Dinosbacsi

    Dinosbacsi Well-Known Member

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    Performance reasons, I suppose. It might not be noticeable with just one signal, but with many signals casting light on the screen, it might be a major perormance concern.
     
  5. jmhdc812

    jmhdc812 Active Member

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    I knew it wasn't a mod...yet. ;) I was just optimistic that you'd turn it into another one of your "must have" mods, is all. The performance concerns make sense. Too bad though. It does look really nice!!
     
  6. Wolfovizer

    Wolfovizer Well-Known Member

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    I was going to guess performance, from your test/playing what sort of performance issues have you noticed if any?
     
  7. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    I only had it tested on one signal so no performance impact but I assume that would change in areas of multiple signals close together.
     
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  8. Wolfovizer

    Wolfovizer Well-Known Member

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    Thanks for that, I can imagine Glasgow Central would probably kill most console, I don't want to imagine near London Victoria :|
     
  9. vyncwr

    vyncwr Member

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    It's just speculation but is it still as performance consuming if you turn off shadows for them? I don't know how it works in unreal, but I know my vga needs more for shadows, maybe it can be solved by this? Would be nice I remember some swiss route on train simulator had this.
     
  10. Dinosbacsi

    Dinosbacsi Well-Known Member

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    That might worth a try. Also to have a set render distance on them, that way they shouldn't have much of a performance impact unless you get close to them.

    And if the performance is acceptable, would it be possibly to add this effect to all signals on a route then, or would you have to do them manually one by one?
     
  11. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    There is no way for us players to add it ourselves. This is something only DTG can do.

    The only way I did it is for testing/debug purposes only. It doesn’t save so when you reload, it’s back to normal.
     
  12. Dinosbacsi

    Dinosbacsi Well-Known Member

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    Ah, I see. Well, maybe DTG sees this and gives them some ideas. The lighting and other effect defiitely have a long way to improve. For example, I'm still waiting for locomotive headlight falres to be visible from further away, the same way signal light flares are.
     
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  13. mariussoare_84

    mariussoare_84 Well-Known Member

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    Thank you for sharing this londonmidland I always admire your leaps into the magic world of lighting in Unreal Engine. On the other hand, I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and heading into a new year full of hope!

    The images look very good and one can only sigh when looking at them.

    I can't help to look at other games that are available over a multitude of platforms. Snowrunner runs on Nintendo Switch but this does not keep the game from looking and behaving much better on a PC. I wish this universality of things at DTG is rethought as the game can evolve so much nicer if allowed to fly, you know what I mean?

    On the other hand, if the real estate industry had DTG's approach (the less developed dictates the pace), we would have been in such a sweet spot in the world. :)
     
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  14. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    I agree with what you’re saying here. For some reason, DTG are really reluctant to add such features because they won’t work well on consoles/consoles aren’t powerful enough to support these features. I really wish they’d branch out a bit more instead of keeping us all in one bubble, giving us the exact same experiences. Furthermore, they could always add toggles to the graphical settings for PC, so you can enable and disable features at your wish.

    TSW is probably the only game I play which is so restrictive when it comes to toggling graphical settings and features.
     
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  15. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    The question then becomes how often do you have light sources (especially signals) close enough together than multiple sources would cause significant enough light casting to impact on a player's perspective...?
    If one signal casting light for say 50m causes the noted effects then there can't be that many locations where more than 3 or 4 light sources work simultaneously, such as multiple signal gantries or terminal stations.
    For the most part I don't see a lot of places where such light sources cast that wide and strong a beam to cause the effect, especially with LED signals which seem quite focussed.
     
  16. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    The examples I used in the pictures above are highly exaggerated, just to show off its effect. In reality I’d expect it to have a much smaller effect, unless the signal is placed at an angle, if it is on a bend.

    If we’re going bare minimum effects, then even a simple light source reflection inside the signal lens hood would be better than nothing. It eliminates that ‘2D effect’ signals currently have in TSW.
     
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  17. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    do not that much of an impact overall in visuals then?
     
  18. Clumsy Pacer

    Clumsy Pacer Well-Known Member

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    Probably because a lot of last-gen console players will never-endingly moan about it (remember they make up most of the playerbase); there's already quite a few people on last gen who simply won't accept their console isn't powerful enough to use the layers on BML, Munich or the upcoming Chemnitz route.
     
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  19. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    It would still be nice to have, regardless.

    Though the whole lighting system in TSW needs a major overhaul tbh. It’s a mess.
     
  20. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    Unfortunately true. I’ve already seen some last gen players moaning about that they can’t have all layers but they would also be the first to moan when their console crashes. Can’t win.
     
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