Koln Aachen Tod 4 Remaster Discussion

Wow, yeah. After the GWE remaster this definitely doesn't make the same impression. No announcments or major updates to trains. Disappointing I have to say. I thought a 'Remaster' was to 'bring to the latest standard' (TSW6) which has suspension and announcments. A shame really. I suppose any update is positive but a full remaster should have been considered.

 

So matt has just no release date yet just sometime this month.

 

I will give you hint, it will been within the next 19 days heh

 

I think they learnt that it's not a great idea to announce anything too early, especially after the GWE remaster debacle. That was supposed to come out in the TSW5 iteration but got pushed back because Liam had to work on WCML:S IIRC, then there are other things. I believe Liam himself said (at least on the Discord) it was announced too early. At least this time it's a nice surprise and we know it is coming imminently, it's not a case of potentially waiting who knows how long.

 

I think the stream quality didn’t do it any favours as it really did look inferior. Still, a remaster is a remaster I guess even if it’s not a very good one. A lot of TSW6 features are missing also.

 

Strange. Ive played Koln with the updated timetable and never had a crash. Though blurry textures appeared with the new timetable sadly

 

Lol

 

Какие, например? Я не смотрел 4 часа стрима.

 

Disappointed there are no suspension physics.

 

It was said in this thread (I guess by the developer) that there will be in train announcements?

 

I thought so too, and I wonder if it would have been possible to Copy the Suspension from the Ludwigsbahn ICE for this ICE, or at least to use it as a Substitute.

 

Ultimately a gratuitous reworking, but little more than a patch.

 

Not quite a remaster is i do hope they put more effort into the west coast way remaster.

 

It depends on who does it.
DTG certainly isn't messing with it.
They're busy elsewhere...

 

Has the 406 been fixed yet so when lzb takes over pzb doesn't switch off.

 

I still don't get why they are releasing this remaster already. They could have announced it already, kept us waiting an entire year, but released it with all the TSW 7 bells and whistles. I really don't understand the remaster strategy. There is not a lot of money to be made with remasters, so why rush it?

 

It was done by a new third party I think possibly as a practice run from what was said, and from what was said it wasn't exactly a rush. I think that is a bit disengenuous.

Certainly it's not as comprehensive as GWE but it has a new timetable and the lighting being updated is the main thing for me.

Suspension would have been nice but if it wasn't in the scope so be it.

 

What's disingenuous about setting high expectations? We know they can do it.

 

I don't think you'll find many (any?) takers around here for that as a strategy, judging by the amount of moaning about content being announced for one iteration of the game but not coming out until the next (or later, looking at you Tadami Line).

 

Limiting the scope of these remasters (mostly a visual upgrade) surely increases the chance they will do more remasters for free. I'll take that over nothing any day. And the visual upgrade is still a massive improvement.

 

True. I'm the only one here that just wants quality releases. Everyone else is like 'just release something". /sarcasm

 

Expecting quality (and rightly so) is one thing. Moaning about a free remaster that seriously upgrades the route (while maybe not meeting everyone's expectations) is another.

 

I don't play routes without TOD4. For me, the graphics update is already a huge step forward just to get me to play them. If there are no "new features" like station announcements, I don't care. They added them - great.

 

And if we want the other older routes to be upgraded, complaining about them when they do, is the right way of going about ensuring we don't get any more!

 

Yeah I just talked to DTG the general setup for announcements is there but I did not know that DTG have to generate segments for them internally so that they also actually work, DTG is looking at when we could get those segments generated. and when they’ve been generated all should automatically work

sorry for the misunderstanding and hope this get’s sorted ASAP!!

Otherwise thank you all for the overwhelming support!! , really means a lot, I’ve taken some notes of a bit of criticism to hopefully improve this for you before release.

best wishes!
Nour/Folezz

 

I'm very much looking forwad to this! Overall it is a nice surprise as we didn't know this is coming, as GWE Remaster was announced ages ago. So naturally this is not at the "same level" so to say. In the end it makes the route enjoyable again and it will let me get back to it, the new timetable release last year was great too, but the old TOD (even modded) didn't really help getting back to it.

But now, this will change!

Thank you for your hard work and effort in this remaster nourthelokdriver

 

Thanks for taking the time to do the remaster.

The lighting is enough for me (and the timetable but it's been done) anything else is a bonus as far as I'm concerned.

It used to be my favourite German route before TOD4 lighting.

 

I’m fine with smaller scale remasters of older routes, appreciate GWE levels of revamping are the exception rather than the rule.

 

Thanks. I hope this will be added for the release version to make the Remaster even better

 

They’ve probably been covered multiple times already, but from what I saw no suspension and no announcements.
I didn’t watch the stream for very long as had other priorities at the time.

ps: Why did you reply to me in Russian

 

I don't play routes anymore that have no suspension physics. I don't care for announcements either but suspension physics changes the entire experience just like TOD4 lightning did. It's not me at DTG claiming on a stream that if you have driven a locomotive with suspension physics you can't go back. (Matt is very proud about suspension, rightfully so)

Some stuff added trough all of the different iterations have become essential to me for a nice experience. TOD4 and suspension is one of those.

 

I've said it for a while, but I hate how much I like suspension. It really doesn't even seem like a big thing at first, but just like you I cant drive stuff that doesn't have it anymore. When I looked at this yesterday, I was kind of surprised to see it not be included, it makes such a difference.

 

Google's automatic page translator is at work. Or maybe I forgot to use the translator to write a comment.

I think I agree with you. I recently started playing the BR101 Expert, and the suspension takes it to a whole new level of immersion.

 

Tucked away in the Roadmap article, but this releases on Thursday.

 

I just fear this will be released without announcements and then DTG won't bother to release another update that includes them.

 

Looking forward to Thursday's release and now knowing it's the Dev's learning ground to be able to create the Rhein-Niers-Bahn, finally a German freight heavy route and NRW in state of the art quality, I hope they've taken the experience they needed to bring us said Rhein-Niers-Bahn in a good state and make it my newest no 1 German route.
Currently Stuttgart - Heilbronn holds that rank as it came with the E40, which will hopefully layer on the new route.

 

In my opinion, they did a good job. Overall the upgrade looks good and on par with other routes. A few things I noticed:

• A lot of buildings around Koln HBf do not have lighting, maybe at other places too but those are not shown as much as Koln at nightime. Everything looks dark around the station, I also didn't notice streetlights.
• Koln HBf looks pretty dark, the lighting under the roof seems not bright enough, however I don't know how it look IRL.
• Still no passengers at Aachen HBf

So this will not be the perfect route for nighttime, it never was, but was hoping for better night lighting.

 

Yeah im very disappointed about the nightlife around köln. In general you could not call this upgrade a remaster. It's only activates TOD4 with minor fixes. I'm not really impressed. The daylight is nice but the rest is messed up with cheap and fast fixing. The yards are completely dark and that will not reflect the real route. So I will not play this remaster.

 

Good to see a balanced and fair comment amongst the usual entitled and ill informed rest. A TOD4 update is huge and a LOT of work.

The GWE Remaster was the gold standard, not getting that with every remaster and I’m fine with that.

 

A big thank you for the remaster - it's really very much appreciated and makes so much of a big difference.

It's been so frustrating to see several UK routes getting updated while many superb, older German ones haven't. So, I really hope this is the first of many more German remasters.

 

By the looks of it, also trees and other vegitation are upgraded. From the publiced article, also other stuff is upgraded, so it's not only enable TOD4 lighting.

The route seems perfectly fine for daytime running, in the end there are multiple routes where the night lighting is not very good. Actually, there are a only a few routes with outstanding night lighting.

 

This remaster should be the bench mark of all future remasters going forward, it’s a perfect blend relaxation and challenge for me.

 

For some reason, many people believe that they can simply press one magic button to "do it well."

 

Indeed, it is.
There's a mod that does it.
After that, you just need to ignore the station boards, which are turned off, and try to use the route only in clear weather or with little cloud.
RSN (an old German route) is truly exceptional with the use of this mod.
I don't think Koln-Aachen is a wonder at night even now.

 

Besides, DTG completely messed up the game's lighting with ToD3.
At two in the afternoon in the middle of summer and with a clear sky, it looked like it was already sunset.
I mean, you could tell something was wrong right away.
It's not that ToD4 is an improvement. ToD3 was bad.

 

I'll admit, I'm a bit disappointed that there's likely not going to be conductor mode or faults.
Still happy the route is at visually getting updated. It's definitely one of the better German routes. I did vote for this one in the last survey for remasters.

 

What times the update tomorrow

 

10am gmt like normal, not sure if it’s out on every platform at that time or if pc is later

 

Thanks I thought would be wasn't sure tho.

 

While thats true, and you can change the base tod system with the mod, it breaks all light bakes and lighting that then needs to be adapted for tod4, which the mod doesnt and cant do. Its great for having the new feel on old routes but does way less than a proper remaster. As its not only station screens affected, its every single light.
For example with it the Rapid transit S Bahn tunnel and other station lightbkaes like Victoria on BML are pitch black. And remember there are no mods on console so for them the remaster will be a huge upgrade. and as nour said announcements are probably on their way too.