Train Sim World 7 - Discussion

You would have thought Matt would have done a dress rehearsal on the XBox before going live.

Hopefully these issues won't manifest on the PC version so keeping my pre-order in, with the usual two hour trial period get out if need be, but you have to wonder at the role of the EP he should be on top of everything particularly in the lead up to a high profile release. Whether that's constantly "having to check", knowing what is and isn't included with each route - basically the ins and outs of everything.

Quite concerning what processes are actually in place at DTG and what the oversight workflow on the project is. Who is actually in Control?!

 

I think the question to ask is: is anyone in charge? because DTG sometimes seems like anarchy

 

Blurry textures on the German route too.

I specifically asked Alex this the other day and his response was that the beta testers hadn’t reported any. Great show all around.

 

honestly, I wonder what beta testers and those "ambassadors" are actually for
just to get free DLC? that’s what it looks like... proof of that is the 805's panel with those shitty bugged buttons; how the hell did that get past QA?
note: I mentioned the ambassadors because, as we all know, they also get early access to DLCs

 

Wouldn't surprise me if they were the 'beta testers'. Which explains a lot as they won't be overly critical so they can keep getting free early content

 

Maybe different people/teams. But blurry textures should be solved by now, well actually long time ago.

 

They can shift people around. Console and PCs aren't that different nowadays.

 

Really this is just unacceptable.

The crashing seconds into your first service is predictably shameful.

The blurring being there is annoying. DTG have repeatedly said there’s a fix that has to be implemented route by route, as it’s not solvable via a core patch. Why on earth then are we seeing blurring on a new route? Is it lies or laziness? Do we really have to wait and see if a route blurs before it’s fixed? (If it can even be fixed). A massive backlog of routes exists that need fixing, it’s so stupid that they’re willingly adding to that backlog with new routes.

Why do these issues exist at all in a ‘new’ game, these should have been dealt with before a new launch. It’s just a spit in the face of console users to not only ignore the problems, but to increase PC graphics & give them exclusive features.

The worst part with DTG is, it’s impossible to tell if it’s lies or incompetence, because they’ve proven they’re fully rigged to go down both of those paths.

 

This is what most publishers do: they contract out console versions of games to entirely separate, dedicated development studios with specific and specialist console experience.

My brother, for example, has done a lot of console conversions over the years, as well as mainline PC development.

Unfortunately, he came across one project where, despite being employed by the publisher to do the conversion, the publisher scrapped this particular console version (even though it was working) because they couldn't get their head around the need to scale down assets, for example. This is why they brought in the team, to get it working on that console, but couldn't accept the necessary methods to get it running.

Anyway, it wouldn't be a bad idea for DTG to get outside help from another studio to focus on the console editions.

 

On PC too.

 

Rivet Games (probably an extension of DTG, certainly made up of some ex-DTG Scotland employees(?)) had a handle in the creation of Leeds Lines, so they’re already doing this across the board.

 

That’s a good point. But I was referring to tackling the issues with the base game.

 

I totally agree. When there are problems from the first iteration of an almost ten year old franchise still waiting to be fixed, and it doesn't run properly during one of its showcase events then it has to be time to have a proper look at the state of everything, doesn't it?

 

That's two out of memory crashes on the German route. Also blurry textures. It's not looking good

 

Would it be helpful to know, that the beta testers didn’t report any issues?

 

Matt has been discussing at great length how they are dealing with the texture issues.

He also said there are some fixes going in for crashes.

I hope so for console users sakes.

 

But I appreciate that they did the stream on console.....because it took courage

 

I would be very interested to see how such testing on consoles goes........

 

The Leeds route looks good at least…
The two crashes on the German route is shameful

 

Did the UK route behave itself?

 

I’m pretty sure the ongoing stream is exactly how the testing goes.

Personally I think DTG should be doing a console preview for every single thing they release, maybe then will there be an understanding of just how poor the console quality is.

I don’t know what’s worse, 30 seconds out of the first station and you crash, or a couple of minutes before the end of your 1hour journey, suffering through those textures, you crash.

 

They port it, release it and then the people paying £29.99-£32.99 test it

 

Are they still doing a Playstation stream?

 

It's a shame they didn't show the stream on the basic Deluxe version......... with all layers fully deployed, disaster was predictable... the question is whether it will run without blurring at least in the basic Deluxe version... but even in the case of the German map I doubt it

 

Nope. Because their excuse is that ps5 doesn't allow beta builds. I'm sure the ps5 dev kit does allow it and they can limit the power to that of a ps5...

 

Another zinger from Doesn’t Test Games

 

Absolutely embarrassing. Two memory crashes on a route shown on a preview stream a day before the public can play this and we get ‘I’ll raise that with the team’. Heard it all before.

From another disappointed Xbox player.

 

Ahh, but!;

 

Call me cynical, but I wonder whether there'll be any preview streams on console after that. I can't imagine there's a lot they can do between now and releasing in just under a week.

 

WTAF?

I'm lost for words.

So we're still getting blurry textures, multiple crashes, z-fighting and screens which can't be interacted with?

I'd love to know what testing means for dovetail. Ensuring a product is fit for release to people who actually pay for it certainly isn't a criteria.

 

The Harry Enfield character comes to mind here

"I do not believe you wanted to do that"

In all seriousness, I respect the fact the stream even went ahead, but it was a predictable mixed bag of beauty in the UK route, and the utter farce of the rest. I do respect some quite detailed answers given on features and off topic queries, even managed to bag a hint at Firefly working on something special for us, without extracting any secrets.

Overall, not buying it. Not this year. A combination of being bored of the same eras and rolling stock being too modern, and the fact I'm paying for more of the same. I want AI Guard and a faster external cam, so I'll get the freebie and hope it doesn't break everything.

Suspect sales have been given a big knock tonight. Rightly so.

 

I'll be honest, even with some faults turning up, I much rather this insight and honesty from the start. I genuinely think Matt is trying to be as transparent as possible with this stream so kudos for the honesty even if it wasn't what people wanted to see in some parts... I'm on PS5 as a Gen9 player and appreciated the transparency early on.

However, I did I watch most of the A & W stream and didn't notice anything substantial. I missed a few bits of it. Did any blurring occur on this route? The parts I did see were relatively smooth.

 

UK route behaved very well

 

This would be understandable if these faults, crashes, bugs and blurry textures hadn't been reported previously over the past god knows how many years yet here we are today with yet another yearly release with the same bugs, blurry textures and crashes.

 

imagine a few beta testers will be told their services are no longer required tomorrow. no way they could've put in sufficient hours of testing if they found no such issues. it's cost them thousands after tonight. they could've just made the german route reduced only for consoles, which still would've gone down like a lead balloon of course, but wouldn't have been the car crash we saw tonight

there's no way matt would've done the stream if he had any idea of these issues (how he didn't know is a question in itself of course) but you could tell he was genuinely embarrassed.

 

People have been reporting these kinds of problems since Rush Hour, if not longer. Something like this has been quite a while coming, and it'll be quite telling how DTG respond to this. Are these worse than the "problems" that led to them holding Tadami line back on release day?

 

it won’t cost them that as people will keep on buying shoddy routes and DLC’s. Shouldn’t be in this state, it’s not on.

 

For once I actually felt quite bad for him here clearly carrying the can live for poor work in the background. He is the boss, yes, but he’s also passionate about trains and deep down is likely very peed off. It’s got to be tea with no biscuits for some folk in the morning. Not good enough.

 

Do they beta test on console? Did I not read somewhere that they don't tend to?

 

They won't sack any testers as they don't have any

 

Yeah. Early Access is going to be fun...

 

I asked Alex the question as to whether he could guarantee that "not much, if any" blurry textures was still valid on retail X|S consoles at launch and he rather conveniently declined to answer....and after having just skimmed through the stream (I was watching the footie), I now know why he kept his mouth shut. Care to remind us again why the prices were hiked?

Sad really because I used to love this game up to (and possibly including) TSW4 but it's just not worth the hassle any more.

 

Matt said on a Facebook post that he had everything installed, so it may actually run better during early access.

 

Honestly you're completely right and I totally understand the frustration (and I'm sure stronger words are relevant too), and as a Gen9 player myself I also completely understand too.

Unfortunately, I feel any substantial differences are going to be bundled into this substantial winter update that's been promised... Which isn't fantastic as that's a while off yet and adds to the frustration even more.

Not that it helps anyone, or changes this unfortunate situation, but I do get the impression Matt is genuinely trying his hardest to be as honest and show the game in it's rawest form on console, which I respect him for. However, I'm aware it doesn't diminish the continuously frustrating issue of blurring that gets me down just as much as anyone else, so I don't want to seem like I'm making excuses.

 

The showcase of the German route was so bad that they honestly should not release it in that state to consoles. Either that or remove a ton of timetable layers to get it stable. If the series X crashed multiple times and had those blurry textures imagine what it would be like on the series S.

 

That still doesn't bode well, though. Unless they're going to recommend people on console only install what they want to play every time they're on.

 

if that's the case that's absolutely appalling

 

As was I. Building a route is not the same as engineering the game and engine.

 

I don't envy Matt tonight...... but I don't have any illusions.... blurred textures and maybe even the pads will remain features, because if they had some method, as I've been saying for quite some time, this couldn't happen... they already said at Ingolstadt - Nurnberg that no optimization method was used on it and I think it will be the same here.

 

So disappointing with the console stream, yet are we actually surprised now?

I've gotten to the point where this might be the first time I won't bother with the newest iteration from the start and instead have a break from this game. It's bad enough already that I avoid playing many routes and locos nowadays which I should love to enjoy because of blurry textures and performance.

What's most frustrating is the whole point of TSW was to be a game for both PC and console, right? Obviously, PC has much better hardware and have so much more capability which is fair enough for improved performance and graphics. But, it's the fact that as console players we now have to worry about whether a route will even struggle to work as expected.

The thing is though stuff like this has been said way back in some of the earliest roadmaps from the beginning of this year and much of my optimism has gone as there's really been no major improvement with exception of Medway Valley etc. It's bad enough that several older content is rife with blurry textures (how long would it take to sort out every individual DLC), yet brand-new content in the newest iteration of the game is still continuing with blurred textures and so on.