Upcoming Release Frankfurt S-bahn: Coming Soon!

[EDIT - Jan - Insensitive] Not alot he can do i guess but would love one of the higher ups to stop hiding away and actually interact and get involved here on the forums. Being brought by this French company a year or 2 ago was the start of the downfall

 

The demise of TSW (and TSC before it) has been prophesied quite a few times before.[/QUOTE]
heh recently I was looking for some info on some bug or some other piece of info and came across a thread from 2021 which was almost carbon copy... and it was sth like alerter not working or sth like that... and a couple comments there were like spelling apocalypse for TSW

 

The demise of TSW (and TSC before it) has been prophesied quite a few times before.[/QUOTE]

You can’t be worried about things like this. There’s lots of people who blindly support because the alternative is nothing, but what good is that if there’s no quality?

Im not doubting what you are saying, but this game is in no way optimised for consoles, you can absolutely tell by way of its progression over the years and the stumbling blocks it hits

Matt I appreciate you taking the time out to respond. I don’t think anyone questions desire or effort you clearly have passion for the subject matter. What you can’t control is the business, how it operates and resources.

I feel that’s where the issues lie, as it’s usually 99 percent of any business that’s want get maximum profit from less cost.

 

You ain’t getting that proof that’s the point. You are taking things on face value which can’t be trusted.

 

oh come on guys, you act as if it was some Illuminati type of shenanigans going on here with big-DTG relentlessly going after your souls

 

TSW on Console ( any of them ) is actually a waste of money from this point on.
All you get is either a blurry mess, or a cut down experience but for the same price tag.

 

I'm sure they still have a lot to discover in terms of memory usage and optimisation. For example, I have never understood why on the route from Frankfurt to Fulda, 90% of the crashes on my ps5 have occurred in the Hanau area, which in theory should be much less demanding on memory than in the Frankfurt Hbf area as there is less traffic, fewer different types of trains coinciding at the same time, fewer scenery assets, less signalling, etc. I don't understand these things, but it seems very strange to me.

Please Matt, don't stop researching and working on all this. I think it is the biggest challenge you are facing right now because the direction of TSW depends on it.
If you don't succeed, the gap and inequalities between consoles and PC will become bigger and bigger and you might not be able to develop more demanding and complex routes in the future, which would limit a lot the possibilities and survival of this game we all love.

 

No, just how "business" works these days. But yeah, go OTT with the response. Lulz

 

In other words, he doesn't keep saving it to memory, and leaves it there when he doesn't need it?

 

There's a fair bit of bashing of Matt and of DTG in a few threads right now, not just this one, but I think one fairly undeserved bit right here is over the idea of them not giving a damn about console versions, clearly that's one place where both the folks who care about the actual output of their work, and the money people in the top brass are 100% in alignment, that they want an end product on consoles that's not going to continually haemorrhage players. Maybe you personally disagree on the specific choices of compromises they're making in trying to accomplish that, and that's valid, but at the end of the day, it's about making something that sells. Yes, on the one hand that can be seen by short termist financial folks as "minimum viable product", but the folks working on it who'd be liable to be the ones laid off if the higher ups pulled the plug, they know that it's important to deliver something people actually think is worth it.

 

Hi Matt,

Speaking of spawning a train into the timetable, like an ICE 1 or a cargo train, will the game still run fine, or should we expect crashes?

 

there you go

 

Would it be possible to leave Unreal Engine and creating/finding another Version with is working better like MFS 2024 or a Open World Racing Game Like Forza Horizon or The Crew Motorfest?

 

As a console player, first impression and feelings were, yeah I am very disappointed. However, after yesterday's preview stream, yeah the stations look a bit empty okay is not the best but the overall route looks nice, I like it at least. And also I get the explanations from Matt and it makes more sense to me now. Only thing that I really find annoying is that there are no IC services on the route. (I read the explanation from Matt so I get it too, just like the 101 a lot) But overall after yesterday I must say it is a good route I personally like it.

 

I don't understand the discussion. You say that 40% less traffic means the route should be cheaper; that doesn't make sense. When buying a route, other DLCs don't affect the price, as the price includes the route and the included trains. Anything else is extra. The same applies to RRO, where the BR 422 and 185 are included, but other DLCs are not. That's why we get from the route for what we pay for.

 

Thanks!

 

Is the extra 6GB memory in the Series X and PS5 just used for more detailed textures? I would have assumed it would also allow larger timetables etc. than the Series S.

 

[EDIT - Jan - Quarrelsome]

 

No it's not. Of course he's told what to say and do by his boss or the board and so on ;D

 

The floor is my bowl

 

While this may be an obvious suggestion, what about completely purging from RAM the tile that has been left but one? I'd guesstimate that 90% of player services are one way, and there should be no need to keep the previous tile but one, perhaps two on a staraight line route, in memory as it will never be referred to again in that session except in exceptional circumstances like someone arsing around and reversing the train back 2 stations

 

I still think, but it's my subjective opinion, that you should have left both timetables, but you should have said that only Reduced guarantees trouble-free operation...... but that's just how I would understand it, so don't stone me for it

 

And what happens if you get to Frankfurt, for example, and cross to the other end and take the next service back? I know that almost no one operates it, but why not, is that an option? Will it then load in the opposite direction?

 

[EDIT - Jan - Quarrelsome]

 

But the customer ultimately decides what the "minimum viable product" is and right now a BUNCH of customers are saying this product (at least on consoles) at this price isn't meeting that standard.

It doesn't matter whether Matt's a nice guy (which seems obviously true), or that i'm an a-hole (also obviously true).

I'll just say only DTG decided that this route has to come out next week and not next month or next year. Why not delay until it's ready for all platforms?

Because it never will be. It seems clear they bit off more than they can chew for various reasons.

The only solution seems to be a significant discount for the console version. 40% fewer services calls for a 40% discount but there is a new train, so maybe 25% would be fair?

 

Can we leave the funny images to Fred?, at least his make sense.

 

ah well, that dad joke didnt sit well here, it seems O ... anyway, I will buy the route cos it's German content and there is never enough beeping inferno to me

 

got annoyed and ultimately carried away, so my bad looking forward to the route, of course, as I love expanding my German collection

 

This is, yet again, an incredibly bizarre thread. I don't think anyone here, including the DTG reps, are saying that the state of timetable on consoles is great. It is however, what you get currently.

The amount of people who keep using the word optimisation as if it is some magic bullet is staggering. A news flash for you all, this is a form of optimisation. Removing the excess so that the software can perform better. It not ideal, but it is one of the most immediate remedies while more complex things are looked into. Something a lot of people don’t seem to realise is that simulators have always been pretty poor when it comes to performance. This is not to say that things cannot get better, there are always optimisations that can be made, it’s just that at some point you will run into an upper limit and when dealing with complex calculations for things like physics, that limit is gonna become apparent much sooner. In order to mitigate it, you have to sacrifice some of the more prominent parts of the experience.

For those who are constantly comparing this to other games, you have to understand that it is quite literally in the name of the game. “Simulator”. This means that a great deal more has to be calculated and accurately executed. Things need to behave in a very specific and reproducible manner. Unlike a game such as GTA 5, where cars and pedestrians can load in 20 meters ahead of you with some basic parameters and a spline to follow, the entire route has to be accurately run at all times, as Matt said. Within this, I’m sure there are further things that could be optimised but, the fundamental task is always going to be more resource intensive than it is in traditional games. In any game, whether it be Train Sim World and OMSI 2 or Grand Theft Auto 5 and Cyberpunk 2077, one of the first big optimisations you can do is limit the diversity and amount of AI in a scene. An unfortunate consequence of this in TSW, is that the “scene” in this case is the timetable itself. You cannot just unload the models and call it a day, the actual AI needs to be removed from the timetable in order to gain overall improvements.

I think there is also an optics issue at play here. While there are objectively barren areas such as Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof, the rest of the route felt reasonably populated to me. If it wasn’t for the fact that Hauptbahnhof is such an incredibly busy station with a diverse range of trains and that the timetable itself is named “reduced”, I really do think most people would not be complaining. As someone who has been playing TSW since day 1 and TSC before that, I’m used to stations and routes being somewhat empty by default. Up until relatively recently, most TSW UK routes had plenty of empty main stations, New Street and Piccadilly anyone? It is a bit LOVE, but first and foremost, I am there to drive my train. The population of AI that runs out of bounds is secondary to that. I do genuinely think that if the Full timetable was renamed to something like “PC Enhanced” a lot of you wouldn’t care as much.

Console players are not being treated like second class citizens as some of you seem to be making out, you are just unfortunately going to limited by the tech. Being blunt for a second, Gen 8 support really should go across the board. This isn’t some PC elitist take, it’s just being realistic. These machines are now over a decade old and do not have the capacity to be running complex physics simulations. I don’t think any console generation has had this much continued support and it’s really being stretched to the max. Gen 9 is of course much better but, it is still going to be less responsive when the fundamental tech inside is around 5 years old now. If I was still running on my GTX 1070 and 4th Gen i5, I wouldn’t be demanding that the product be cheaper because I’m unable to run the full experience, I’d either run the full timetable and crash a lot (something that console companies will reasonably not allow) or I’d compromise and run the less intensive timetable. There is of course something to be said for DLC pricing in general, but that’s a separate issue.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to be dissatisfied with what is on offer, I do however think that you need to look at why this is what’s available. TSW is one of the few simulator games that has a console version and there is a reason for that. I’d still take a slightly less rounded product than no product at all and if you ultimately disagree then just don't buy it, there's no need to go round and round in circles after you've made your point.

 

If I install TSW on the PC via the Xbox app, can I run the full timetable?

 

It would just load as normal in the concept when you start the return journey, but if you're travelling away from a tile >1-2km away (ie. where you came from) there would be no need to keep it in RAM, but as DTG Matt said its not quite that simple in implementation

 

Utter hogwash. Spoken like an “I’m alright jack”. It’s this attitude that’s contributed to the poor state of the game.

 

On a lighter note, this is how DB currently operates in reality too.... so...

 

So what's your actually suggestion for addressing these issues? Don't just say "optimise", you seemingly have some knowledge of how these things work otherwise you wouldn't be insistent on the fact that it could be considerably better.

 

For me, a fair price would be to take at least 25% off.

 

It feels like a street market here.
If you don't like the product, just don't buy it.
TSW is a game, not a constitutional right.

 

On PC we don't crash here, just getting worse frame rate (8-15 fps) than Frankfurt Hbf area. If my CPU decides that it worked too much and throttles, the time would literally slow down to 50% speed.

 

Can you say please Where Are the Station Screens at Frankfurt Hbf?
None Track had any PIS Boards

 

Hello Matt.
Considering what you have mentioned above, and... this is a route of suburban type of trains , could be possible to add to console an option, to not include ICE trains, before loading it?
The word "mammoth" as you mentioned, it is an important one!

Just as an idea, to improve this issue.
In my case I have no problem, to not have ICE trains, when the route was created for smaller ones.

Furthermore, if you want to drive an ICE1 or 3, you could do it, by Free Roam tool!

Regards

 

I haven't been disabling individual layers lately, but I'm not installing anything I don't want to have active, and that seems to be beneficial, it could be a coincidence, but it seems to me that it works a bit...

For example, currently for the FTF track I only have the BR101 + Hauptstrecke add-ons installed, then LGV, Vorarlberg and Maintalbahn ..... And I have the other layers logically disabled, and so far it seems that even the textures aren't getting blurred .....

This is just my subjective opinion on the PS5 Pro, maybe it helps

 

Whose job is that then? Do you want me to go in there? Would you like me to canvas the user experience and feed back? Because that already happens. As in most businesses it's COST, not ability that holds things back.

The game is in the state it's in because the resource is off and hasn't been concentrated into the right areas. It's been moved into areas where money is made at a significant cost to the consumer. It happens in every business and isn't unique to Dovetail. As a dev you should be well aware of cost cutting on builds and features. It's all about getting the work to market quickly, not the quality.

I could even imagine the likes of Matt and his team being unhappy about certain decisions, but that's the life of producing software.

I'd argue that TSW is pumping out more content than ever, but that they are doing it on top of a broken framework. Doesn't take a genius or a software developer to understand that, the product doesn't meet standards, anyone can see it and its been like that most of tSW shelf life but much much worse since TSW5.

Your line about rather having something than nothing really just sums up the whole situation. Im of the latter opinion that if you are going to invest time and energy into something, do it properly, please the masses and keep the people who pay your bills onside.

 

Well funnily enough my textures blurred on Fulda. So when I stopped to get a pic of it and went into photo mode, the textures cleared up. I then went back into the game and then they started to degrade again. not sure what that means.