https://rail-sim.de/forum/filebase/entry/10019-thn-harznetz2000-v1-0/ Just to let everyone know: my teams route "Harznetz 2000" is now live on Railsim.de Nearly three years of labour from me and some other german builders. Comes with QD, scenarios and hundreds of self created assets. Like many freeware routes, you will need to own a couple of payware routes and a big ammount of freeware assets to run it. Happy to hear some feedback.
Just looked at the screenshots in the manual - the route looks pretty, good job. One question though, in the manual there is a route called 'ELAP' by DTG. What does ELAP stand for?
Basically Kuju assets (Railsimulator - but not US) Edit (I had to look it up but "European Loco & Asset Pack" )
yes, that´s right. It´s the basic Asset Pack from Kuju included in most routes. In the German community we just call it "ELAP". If your downloading freeware and own some Train Sim stuff, you should have it anyway.
European Loco & Asset Pack is the base assets from Kuju Rail Simulator that were bundled in a depot and moved away from the core files. It contains these folders: Assets\EisenbahnwerkRW\ Assets\GermanRailroadsRW\ Assets\Kuju\RailSimulator The US Loco & Asset Pack contains the assets of the US edition of RailSimulator. Assets\Castlerock Assets\Kuju\RailsimulatorUS
As you know, i’m looking VERY much forward to this route. Thank you for you and your co-builders work. I’ve been to Goslar a couple of times and have crisscrossed the Harz mountains as well. Last year i was in Quedlingburg for a couple of days. And while outside the scope of this route, it will bring back to life many good holliday memories.
Mmh. Why has the asset been modified? Left, my current installation, right, Assets provided with the route... Edit: DisplayName has been changed... I see. Left is the original asset from EZY. Wouldn't it be better to link to the official pack rather than including it and start issuing different file versions? Another friendly hint: remove tgt, cost, and bak* files before packing. Also, RouteInformation/image.png should be either 512x288 (4K) or 256x144 (HD). It currently works with bigger images, but we've had compatibility issues once. Better to stick to the defaults. Tech stuff first, route review later Edit: Seems I got all reqs already (apart from most of the rolling stock, but that's no problem). First start, looks good Thanks toms87, Stephan and SeKu for your hard work and once again debunking the myth of TSW routes being "more detailed"!
oh, this is a tricky one. Team EZY, who created many freeware routes, helped us out with some asset creation while our main asset creator Seku was having problems in his peronal life. EZY decided to take the signal boxes from the Harznetz, remove the names off of them and release them to Railsim as a generic assetpack. As far as I remember, only the included ones provided with our route display the names like Goslar, Oker or Bad Harzburg. That´s why there is difference. I thought we had done that.... but there will be updates. we had the first one tonight with the most pressing issues, thankfully, only small stuff up untip now. I have taken great care in landscaping the route in a way, that I believe is unprecedented in TS Classic. The whole TSW vs. TSC discussion and heckling from certain sides of the community, made me push this project alot further, than it was ever intended to be. I hope you can spot what I´m talking about, when you take a good look all around the route (especially the branchline to Altenau). I have already had some kind feedback on Railsim saying, that the detail is stunning. With all your experience in TS Classic, I think you also spot the crazy amount of custom assets created for this project. Check out Goslar!
I will take my 204 out on a freeroam route inspection tour. So, let's start at Altenau then. There's only been a few .bak and .bak1's in the Lofts folder, and some tgt, xml and costs in the assets. Not hurting, but also doesn't hurt to let a .bat file run over the folders before uploading (ATS Berks and Hants comes with a Gigabyte of junk files). Also CurrentSave.bin.md5's can be deleted. Starting my freeroam... forgive me for not having vR freight wagons Lovely... ain't seen nothing yet but already impressed....
Spikee1975 Your 2D trees seem to be the right colour! That´s nice, so you will be seeing the route, the way I have built it. I´m having problems with the Radiomaster 2D trees. I built the route with greenish 2D Trees in the distance (right side)... but for some user the route dispays these ugly looking 2D trees (left). They are both by Radiomaster. The ugly ones dispay as RU_Baum_2d in the editor and the more green ones dispay as RU_tree in the editor. how is this possible? Do you know what´s going on here?
I'll check for you. Probably someone messed with the assets and you have a different version. I chose to not overwrite any asset I already got when copying the ones you linked/supplied. Edit: I do not have these RU "2D" trees in radiomaster\objekt. The dark green ones I have are RU_tree_xy. I've mentioned the changed DisplayName of the EZY asset, that's why I do not rely on them in freeware assets - people change them, I need the xml name. Double click the left tree. (The radiomaster assets are all ripped from other games ) This pack is featured in a lot of asset "megapacks" - and probably containing different modified files. I've attached my radiomaster\objekt\scenery\vegetation filelist
toms87 I think these radiomaster trees are not localised, I'm wondering why they show as "Baum" for you. Seems a german modder has added these to some package that is around. That's an age old problem - people not using their own provider folder when changing assets which avoids all the hassle of finding assets. I'm glad all is as intended and I will lock my radiomaster folder, pack its contents into an .ap to save it from overwriting, as all further content added to it is not "official" and can then be easily spotted as being outside the .ap. Loving the route. That forest looks so real...
Main note: an English Readme would be nice. That makes it easier for those of us who are unilingual. I'll have to figure out what I'm reading before I know if I have everything to run this, so no further comment at this point. EDIT: Voraussetzungen links to the RSSLO version of Regensburg–Ingolstadt. Will the Steam version not work? Same with Im Köblitzer Bergland. And the Hausach extension. Better to link Steam versions IMO.
Remember it is freeware, so share the workload and feel free to contribute - and you can easily autotranslate PDFs these days with a few clicks. https://www.deepl.com/en/features/document-translation/pdf
Indded, it is really well done... I'm feeling jealous now, I'm going to have to improve the scenery on my own routes. Out of curiosity, what range of FPS do you get on the route?
They did a good job - route building is not about wildly placing a lot of assets, but putting thought into optimisation. 2D foliage where appropriate and indistinguishable from 3D assets. Look at how the terrain is covered with good looking dense grass. The result is a route which for me runs at constant (capped) 75 FPS. The ATS Berks and Hants is the opposite - good intentions but bad implementation imho.
RSSLO steam releases are sometimes years after their first release. So most of us German route drivers are used to buying directly from RSSLO. None of us keep track of what routes have steam releases. As to what version is needed; they are generally the same, though differences have occured.
The only difference is the stock supplied and tracks. RSSLO Steam routes use old Kuju/GermanRailroads stock and the ever same 1016 mostly. As an asset dependency, it makes no difference for this route whether Ingolstadt is from Steam or RSSLO directly.
Based on what you've said, my method of route building isn't much different, although the OP's work has turned out better. That said it's really good inspiration for my own work, so I'm going to see what I can do. PS: Where did you get that reskin for the 204?
It was not originally an ATS project. It started on UKTS as Devon Rails and a separate project for Devon and Cornwall existed, and they later merged on multiple sites. It wasn't until v3 that it became exclusive to ATS. I suspect something is up with that, especially because the dev decided the ATS payware wires were the right choice for the route. I suspect money exchanged hands here... If someone knows how to properly swap them around as a patch, that would be fantastic. Though a clue might exist with the ATS patch of the AP Bedford route. NOTE: A typo was corrected at the time of post #29 below. Replies in between may reference "rails" where I now have "wires".
thanks for the praise guys... This was actually my third route and the first time I was feeling, I finally got things right. Glad to hear this feeling beeing echoed in many comments. Spikee1975 has pointed out two crucial points. I put a lof of thought into getting the forest feel right. The branchline to Altenau runs through dense forest all the way. In other routes, forest never seemed right to me. It´s basicly a combination of Radiomaster, Albula Line and Konstanz-Villingen Trees with dense grass in Assetsblock all alongside the route. When your driving a train in real life and looking out from the cab, the main thing you will see is Grass...and the default ground textures are just not good enough. So in my view it is mandatory for any route builder to lay grass in assetblocks alongside the line. It is extremly timeconsuming (thats why most don´t do it!), but the results speak for themself. PS: the route has been added to unoffial TS route map. Nice to see that =) https://umap.openstreetmap.fr/de/map/train-simulator-classic-neu2023_940885#10/51.9354/10.4535
toms87 I'm really enjoying slowly exploring the route. Sometimes stopping, taking a look around. It's a wonderful experience, and deserves a donation. So why not rename the thread and put "Harzbahn 2000 released" into the title? Will also be displayed when googling then Clausthal
For future reference, here's the list: https://store.steampowered.com/search/?developer=RSSLO Whoops! Meant to say "wires", not sure why that came out as "rails". I will update that, thanks for catching it. Typo. I meant the wires above the track.
Yeah, that was my mistake. As for the topic, going to start trying to figure out if I have the freeware assets. I count 42 "object" items not including the UKTS packs. That's a lot of stuff. I want to know how much use Regensburg–Ingolstadt has. Been debating checking out an RSSLO route but just not decided to bite yet as money is tight and I finally bought my first Nintendo game in a year and a half the other day. LOL
Well, all the rest is free to download, directly linked from the manual and quickly installed. I take it you already have the RomanianAssetPack from RailStudio. So the calculation is easy. Get Regensburg-Ingolstadt and you actually get two routes. Summer Sale is round the corner.
Two routes? How is this two routes? Looks like the map is one route on the RSSLO version, too. Unless you are talking about this freeware as the second. Also, summer sale does not affect them, but it would be neat if they did a similar sale for all four big Steam sales (the seasonal ones). Not necessarily the same discounts, but at least giving the option for either version of the routes. Is there any difference besides the track?
Of course I mean two routes, this and Harzbahn. I don't see any difference between the RSSLO Shop and Steam version. Steam's comes in .ap format, that's it.
... which still makes me wonder why nobody has implemented zlib.dll into TSTools yet. .ap format is standard since TS2014. It gives you all the commands to handle .ap files. Just like you can easily patch GeoPcDx files using PowerShell commands, and don't need a GeoMod.exe anymore that needs hundreds of confirmations.
The developer, Mike Simpson, is way over 80 years now, and stepped down from the ts scene. I don’t recall him ever allowing modifications to his app. Would ofcourse be great if it could still be developed.
I don't understand this. If I want to do something for the community and cannot work on it myself, I'd release it as OpenSource.
In theory, it does support AP files - by letting you unpack them. It just won't search inside of them. Which is a tad annoying when it comes to knowing you have all of the things you need for a scenario. I think Locoswap shows inside AP files, at least, so it is more useful.
Amazing! This route has so much to offer. Narrow gauge tourist steam, single track through the mountains, and high speed double track action.
This is actually there in real life... you can ride on it in the summer months in clausthal-zellerfeld. The Innerstalbahn has been gone since 1977. Both never co-existed. But they do in our route. Well, it´s not excatly an ICE line... but compared to the rest of the network, the line from Vienenburg to Salzgitter is "high speed". As you may have noticed, the tracks already go to Hildesheim without scenary. This will be phase 2.
I don’t disagree. And Mike seemed like a very nice guy who would surely allow this. I just don’t think anyone thought of asking him.
toms87 Hey ho, just installed v1.1. I don't know if it's important, but the update is missing assets that were delivered previously, for example SeKu\Bad Harzburg Hannover\brauerei_schranke.bin+GeoPcDx are missing. (And the TrackRules folder) So people not having installed v1.0 will be missing this. Another thing, you must check all files before packing them into an .ap as you did. zlib.dll, which provides file access (no, the .ap will not be loaded into RAM which is a common myth, only all used provider blueprints.paks will, being an index for quick access of all blueprints, a bit similar to UE's .uasset (index) and .uexp / .ubulk (data) structure) cannot deal with umlauts in filenames (urging all content creators to NOT use umlauts in any filename for game files (even spaces can be problematic in some cases, though not for TS.) The file Assets\SeKu\Bad Harzburg Hannover\Wildemann Brücke B.7z would be inaccessible in an .ap - fortunately this is a leftover archive which is not needed and can't be processed by TS. (Found another one, "Ottiliae_Schacht.7z") Also, any lua script using #includes will not be able to load the includes if inside an ap, needing direct file access and not virtual zlib file system. Not checked if that's the case here, but just wanted to mention this. Found some other stuff being removed (not saying it's wrong - probably not used by the route) Left: marked files not present in V1.1 (right) As said, no issue for people updating the existing route, but maybe for fresh installations, leading to issue reports.
Imagine if the hole between Hildesheim and Hannover would be plugged sometime in the future. I could take a virtual Train Simulator vacation from my hometown (Odense) to the Harz
I have had this naughty little plan all along mister Kim Olsen. There is not much missing to have whole network from the Harz up to Bremerhaven, Hamburg, Lübeck, Kiel and even Denmark. But I´m no fan of the "Norddeutschland Strecke". But yes, old Interregio lines like Frederica to Bad Harzburg, Bremerhaven-Bad Harzburg, Hamburg-Bad Harzburg could be drivable in the future. Someone has been working on Hannover to Göttingen and Hildesheim for a couple of years on Railsim. I´m waiting so see, what he will do. But there is one Problem: All of the Harz Stuff (including Rübeland) are set 25 years ago. The routes to Hamburg and Hannover are set present date. But I guess we can look over that. PS: don´t get your hopes up for Hildesheim too soon. I have been on summer brake after all the work of phase 1. I have not been working on it. Will be something for dark winter days.
