[guide] How To Make All Tsw 2 Routes Dark At Night

Before I get into the tutorial, I want to stress this is for PC only. It also only works on TSW 2 routes and/or routes which use the TSW 2 skybox. It will NOT work on routes which still use the older TSW 1 skybox, such as ECW.

Ever thought TSW just isn’t dark enough at night? Given the recent stream of the Dresden – Chemnit route, with its lovely night lighting, you can now apply this same night lighting to ALL applicable TSW 2 routes.

Step 1. Download Unreal Engine Unlocker here

Step 2. Launch the game and your desired route/service during the dark. I recommend launching a route in Winter, with the fog setting applied for full effect.

Step 3. Launch the Unreal Engine Unlocker and apply the following command to it: r.SkylightIntensityMultiplier 0

Done!

Note: Please only use this command during a night service. Not during the day as it’ll make things look too dark.

Comparison below showing the default settings to the new settings at night:

 

Will this work in the ini?

 

Yes, however it’s better to use it using Unreal Engine Unlocker, as it allows you to change it real time.

Changing it in your ini file will make it a permanent change, which will make it look too dark for daytime runs.

 

Hopefully, the team will implement this to all the old routes and the upcoming ones. londonmidland Is there a possible way that you can turn it into a mod?

 

What will this do to routes like Dresden which are dark already? Does it need switching off for these?

 

I don’t own that route so I’m not sure. However, seeing as that route is already dark, no change would be required.

 

Seeing as it’s just a simple change of values, there’s no way to make it into a mod (I think)

 

No! I want brighter lighting on my night drives. Currently you might as well be playing Simudrive or one of the other old text based sims, far too dark at night especially in built up areas.

 

I also prefer the original, and join here, I would like to see the landscape too. Driving with a completely black screen is not fun, the "improvements" are like driving with blindfolds on.
I don't mind it being a mod, but please don't make it the default. Or at least give people an option to have a dimly lit night.

 

Unreal Engine Unlocker add r.SkylightIntensityMultiplier 0 no difference

 

Forgive me, but this is an oft repeated phrase and I fear DTG have got completely the wrong end of the stick with it.

Can I check exactly what you mean when you say it? Are you saying that the light generated by objects in the world is completely wrong, and consequently the world is too dark and completely unnatural (which is what I believe), or are you in fact saying that you want the world to be lit artificially so you can drive at night as if it were day (which is what we have now)?

If it’s the latter, then I simply don’t get it, and that opens a whole other debate.

For the avoidance of doubt, I believe the lighting is in the most part completely wrong, is unnatural, and 99.9% of it is fake. Alongside that many objects in the game are lit from invisible sources so, for example, cabs are oft lit almost like it’s daytime when it isn’t.

London Midland has demonstrated this time and again over the last couple of years. I fear DTG are hearing ‘nightime is too dark’ and are using fake lighting to light the world and make it artificially bright, where what many of us actually mean when we say things are too dark is that the light cast by stations, streetlamps, cars, houses, towns, industrial areas etc is totally wrong, and is consequently making the world FAR too dark. It all comes down to light sources and shadows, which still seem to be a struggle from a performance point of view. Again, TSW is one of (if not the only) modern title that so obviously struggles with this issue. Surely, given how well renowned UE4 is it can’t be an engine limitation.

It’s a crying shame that night time in TS1 knocks spots off night time in TSW. In fact, that could be said for ALL lighting in the game.

 

No we don’t have artificially lit nights currently in game, it is for the most part pitch black. That and the complete lack of ambient light, or light pollution if you like, in built up areas makes night driving in TSW a horrible and pointless experience. With the cab lighting off and the instrument gauge lighting low, on a moonlit light you should be able to make out objects, the terrain silhouetted on the skyline etc. There’s also the issue of getting down and walking around in the dark. The in game flashlight is useless and in a station, yard or depot there should be copious lighting from the overhead arc lamps.

If some want it pitch black then be my guest, but give us the choice or a gamma slider or something.

This is supposed to be entertaining and driving looking at a pitch black screen isn’t that.

 

That’s what I feared. Of course we have artificially lit nights, it’s visible everywhere you look. You can be driving through a pitch black cutting at night and your consist glows in the dark. It's not just night of course, everything is artificially lit.

I totally agree with you, however, that nights are too dark, but that is because the lights and shadows cast by world objects are totally wrong (Glasgow Circle being a perfect case in point). It is NOT because the night is too dark per se. You seem to be talking about the way the human eye adapts at night to ambient light, which again is something that TSW doesn’t simulate correctly either.

The whole lighting system in TSW needs a complete rework. It just simply doesn’t work, and I honestly can’t think of any other modern title that I’ve played that has these problems.

 

This is brilliant. If DTG are reading this, please consider bringing these changes to console if possible.

I disagree. This is supposed to be a simulator, not an entertainmentator. Driving in the dark creates immersion and is realistic. Having been in a train cab at night I can tell you that you can't see hardly anything apart from the track directly in front of you and the dials of the cab. Artificial light at night where stuff is lit up from no apparent light source is not realistic and contributes to why some people call TSW a 'game' and not a 'simulator'.

For example, where is the light source coming from that lights up the outside of this 387 while the ground and track stays dark. It looks ridiculous:

 

In that example above, not only is the train completely wrong, look at the building in the far distance, it would never be lit like that in the real world.

I used to have literally hundreds of shots as examples that I planned to submit as I ticket then I thought why bother? It's all so flippin obvious that it shouldn't have to be the players pointing it out. I deleted most of them but here are a couple I had left over. There are a litany of examples of fake lighting, lights not casting any light/shadow, objects that emit light that shouldn't, incorrectly lit trains, a nuclear blast somewhere on the South coast etc etc.

You cannot possibly say that the TSW is not artificially lit!

 

I think there are so many views on this issue it will be impossible to reach a consensus. The best solution then is for DTG to offer a choice, via a slider or a gamma option so the player can pick what settings suit their personal requirements.

We already had the sim vs. game debate in another thread, but I "play" this to amuse myself in the same way I'll play Snowrunner, ETS2 or Fallout 4. That is not happening when I can't see what I'm doing at night, regardless of whether it's prototypical or not...

 

Sorry, but that just isn’t true in the slightest. We have artificial lighting at night in TSW and it looks absolutely ridiculous. You see train quite literally ‘glow’ at night.

The issue with TSW is that there aren’t nearly enough dynamic lights/lights placed in built up areas. This leads to places looking post apocalyptic.

 

Like I said, have to agree to disagree and I cannot support any campaign to make nights darker than they are already. In fact I will actively oppose it - unless it is entirely optional. Sorry.

 

This is my point though. It's not about making nights darker, it's about making them properly lit. We absolutely need the latter, what we don't need is more artificial rubbish to fulfil the desire to have 'lighter' nights.

The game needs much more dynamic lighting, proper shadows and eye adaption. Every other game I posses can manage it (or at least fake it convincingly), so why can't TSW?

 

I'll chuck in my two cents, I do operate at night and our trains have proper headlights. You can see everything in the beams like daylight. Outside the beam of the lights though you can't see very much, but when I look backwards along the train I can very much see it.

If you operate without the lights which is unusual, it depends entirely on the night, a cloudy or new moon night you see very little, on a bright near full moonlit night you'll see everything.

Cane Creek on a moonlit night is about perfect for me, its definitely artificial but I can see things, and more importantly I can see what's going on when I'm playing night in game in the real life day time.

Paul

 

Nice find! I wonder, does anyone know what's the default value for r.SkylightIntensityMultiplier?

 

Reisa Dresden night is really nice, it definitely adds something. The lighting on Chemnitz is pretty good and certainly better than what we have seen before in other routes. Maybe if the night lighting is properly addressed it will make it easier to get the headlights right. It can't be easy to calibrate how much lighting effect they are supposed to provide when everything else in the world is already lighter than it ought to be.

 

The default value is 1. When playing in the day, I set it to 0.5.

 

In some cases the headlights definitely aren’t bright enough. As you said, it’s probably set in the default environment night settings, which is obviously flawed.

I believe the best way to test the headlights is if you’re inside a baked tunnel, which removes any artificial lighting by default.

 

Is there a way to alter the headlight brightness on the individual train models?
The 146 from Reisa Dresden seems to have them perfect

 

I don’t think there is, unless you know how to Hex edit them.

 

That particular shot I have no problem with at all. Why? It's south London: a metropolis of millions, the entire night sky filled with a dim haze of accumulated artificial lights. Big cities do look like that at night: "light pollution", some (esp astronomers) call it. Cathcart's biggest flaw is the complete absence of the ambient night light Glasgow ought to have, leaving us in pitch blackness.

Now, I agree with you wrt the same effect on Sand Patch, out in the middle of nowhere, or even the more southerly reaches of BML. But urban and rural areas need to be handled differently.

 

Update: Regarding making night time darker looking in TSW, I've found a nice 'middle ground' in regards to things not looking pitch black as per the original tweak, but still dark enough. Now you can see a bit more of the inside of the cab, but its still nicely balanced with the outside conditions.

Change r.SkylightIntensityMultiplier 0.0 to r.SkylightIntensityMultiplier 0.1

 

To be fair, that doesn’t look a million miles away.

 

i think we should like them to know on this week's roadmap which is on Tuesday, how we feel about this, night lighting.

 

I’ve noticed on my iPad it looks extremely dark, but when I’m actually playing it on my PC I can see things a whole lot better.

So it seems screens also have a big impact in the way people see things.

 

So does ambient lighting, monitor angle (vertical and horizontal), the person's age... the list goes on and on

 

Nice command, i was using UE unlocker for weather settings.

Tried the dark route on the Clinchfield Railroad while doing a Night freight Hop . Where is that last log, just 1 remaining ..., all the way back to dante.

 

This look really nice, but it can't be applied to all route I think.

 

Lighting in Train Sim World is still one of those things that need a lot more improvements done to it.
It's worth keeping in mind that, unfortunately, lighting is something that's basically tuned on a per route basis, thus adding a huge amount of workload. Not all routes on TSW have the same looking nights. Take the following screenshots for instance:


Sand Patch Grade


Schnellfahrstecke Köln - Aachen


Southeastern Highspeed

On some routes, such as Sand Patch Grade and perhaps the GWE as well, nights are clearly visible and you can easily distinguish different things in the scenery. The world is artificially brightened, despite there not being any artifical light source. Most will say that it looks unrealistic, and for the most part I kind of agree with that. Sand Patch Grade at night looks too bright.

Then there are routes like SKA or Southeastern Highspeed, which are much, much darker. The train however, is still being lit up apart from its surroundings, almost as though it's glowing. Add to the fact that in both pictures there should be buildings surrounding the tracks, however none of them are lit up! There's hardly any street lamps or any other light source that lights up the scene. And when there is a light source, such as on Southeastern Highspeed, the beam seems too narrow. It's almost like little islands of light. There's very little ambience in the scene and in some ways, just looks off, even if it is overall a lot more darker and realistic.




Naverhkehr Dresden

Of course, next is the big elephant in the room, the Riesa - Dresden route. Despite what some might say, I firmly believe that the lighting on this route is a massive step in the right direction. This purely has to do with the fact that the scenery is actually lit up appropriately! There's building lights, street lamps, and most importantly of all...the lights have different color temperatures to them! It's not all just 'cool' white lights, but lights with different warm shades of orange, with some more intense than others. This is such a minor detail, but adds soo much to the immersion, and makes the scene appear right.

Keep in mind, DRA has amazing lighting, but it's still not exactly 100% perfect, and could use minor tweaking. However, it is a really good point of reference for all future routes to use. Dresden is still appropriately dark in dark places, but the world is lit up in a correct way, allowing you to still navigate fairly well. Dresden is the only route that I'm able to play and enjoy nighttime services, because I can actually see where I'm going. As a driver I can reference landmarks and recognize where I am without having to rely on the HUD.

For this reason, I believe that a combination of route lighting like Dresdens, and Londonmidlands tweaks could make for an amazing night time driving experience.
Trains and cockpits are dark and fit in with the environment, however the scenery is lit up with appropriate light sources and in appropriate places, much like it is on Dresden.

Keep in mind, while some people enjoy really dark scenes, others might see a pitch black screen, and obviously that's not fun. This is one of those situations where it's perfectly okay for gameplay to triumph over realism.
I still think there should be a little bit of that artifical world brightening, as though there was a full moon. But obviously not like how it is with Sand Patch Grade.
Furthermore, I believe the player should he allowed to access more settings, such as brightness, contrast, bloom, etc. and fit it to their liking.

There is still work to be done with the lighting in this game. I don't know about you, but when I think of the Unreal Engine, I think of games with amazing, realistic, and interactive lighting. So it comes as a surprise that TSW falls a bit short in this area, when it seems that much more can be achieved. Dresden proved that better lighting is possible, and so I could only advocate for DTG to continue tweaking and working on this.

 

I totally agree with you, Dresden is the only route that has better lighting than all the other routes. Let the team know this Tuesday when they are doing the Roadmap stream.

 

I did a lot of travel at night in the game.
"Night lighting" turns on when the clouds are at maximum and you have traveled by train for about 5 minutes.
Everything sharply becomes gray and light, as if it was not night and do not understand what.

 

Ironically that’s due to their Time of Day system being broken. It’ll actually get brighter as the night wears on. Full clouds can also have the opposite effect on lighting at night, and can actually make things look brighter in some cases.

 

Brilliant explanation and comparison skyMutt. I absolutely love the look of the scenes in Naverhkehr Dresden.

There really is no reason or excuse now that all future routes should be anything less than this. Unfortunately, as we’ve seen, this hasn’t carried over to the next new German route, and it looks like we’re back to barely any light sources, as well as lack of colour temperature/variation in lighting. The only improvement is that it’s darker now.

DTG really needs to get someone in full time, as part as their team, to work on the night lighting. Not just for ‘special occasions’ or whenever they have spare time. It’s been an issue for far too long now, and we really need to push DTG to do something about it sooner rather than later.

 

EXACTLY!

Making shortcuts now doesnt make it any better for the furure or the preservation crew.

 

So whats the message new releases dont come up with riesa dresden standard about night lightening:

Sry customers but:
1) we did it with dresden, but its not possible for 30euros with that amount of work
2) we didnt have the ressources / we ran out of time
3) dresden was more a "one time thing"

Dresden was a big step in the right direction. Not sure to call it "improvement" when following routes get back to old.

2nd question:
Which night lightening should be "the best" for "pre" era routes / steam routes?

I have to say, that i like the dark orange on ntps stations for example. The dresden lightening should be standard for all modern routes, but i think classic era based routes would loose their charme with that one. (Not sure, we dont have something to compare)

 

4) We started the route about 18 months ago and didn't want to put in the extra manpower which we've referenced to many times on the Riesa Dresden route lighting

 

Speaking of headlights, I noticed that headlights from opposite trains (or if you just look at your own train from the front) light up the ground pretty well, but when you sit in your own cab, your own headlight hardly do anything. I doubt if specular reflection were too much and diffuse reflection are too little, or if something went wrong in implementing heightmap and all those things in the textures.

 

A perfect example of the poor night lighting, even in the newest route for TSW. There are SO many inconsistencies with it in this screenshot below, and shows exactly why we need to ditch this awful artificial lighting at night.

- Why is the train glowing like it is daytime? Where is the light source coming from for it to be glowing so bright?
- Why are the assets glowing too, like it is daytime?
- Why are the trees in the background pitch black compared to everything else?
- The sky colour and terrain colour do not match one bit. It’s like someone has got a big white torch and positioned it towards the ground, whilst the sky is just there to look pretty.

 

Yeah, i so agree with you. I just can't believe that they can't do anything to fix this especially it is a brand new year. I was hoping that they would at least make the night sky better but it looks like they are still producing the same way as they use to. When will the team understand how we feel about this?

 

It’s absolutely rank rotten, and continues to be the millstone around TSW’s neck. Not just night lighting, but lighting in general. And shadows, or lack of.

 

As for the loco, it could theoretically be the reflection of the sky. Also, the sky isn't fully dark yet. Still bits of ambient light.

 

Not really, the light source on the loco is clearly on this side of it, yet the sky suggests the sun is just below the horizon behind the loco

 

Probably my last rant about the lighting but here's an example of a very poor station lighting setup here at Burgess Hill - lots of 'spotlights' within the station canopy area, rather than an even spread of light, and zero care/attention in even getting a decent colour temperature for the lights. This just looks like plain/default white, chosen from the colour picker, making it look ghastly.

How hard is it to make it look a bit warmer, or even cooler so you have a slight blue tinge if its a cool white LED? Not much I assume.

 

What about day time where cabs seem to have way too much extra light in them?

I noticed Sherman Hill didn't though, well done to them!!

Overall I am very happy with TSW2 coming from a railroad driving background.