(mod) Fixing The Station Lighting

Dumb question for today, lm. Does this mod work alongside the 1970's enhancement for GWE, please ?

 

I’m not sure, as I don’t own that. However, you can always have a try if you do own it.

 

Looks really good LondonMidland and makes me want to fire up the game again, haven't played in a few months.

Completely agree. I think it maybe they haven't enough devs who are competent in lighting. The modders with the game Fallout 4 have embarrassed Bethesda with what they can do with that game with lighting, mods, bug fixes, story fixes and much more and I think modders with the limited tools they have are doing it with TSW2, just imagine if they had a decent set of tools to work with?

 

I tan a few night services on this route and I forgot how light night time is and a complete polar opposite to clinchfield. They need that mid point

 

Glasgow Cathcart Circle is the next route to receive attention to its lighting. A comparison of before and after:

 

londonmidland Does this look like it is using your mod buddy ?
I can't say because i have never driven at night in TSW2.
Whole world looks too bright to me for night time.

 

That's down to DTG being so inconsistent with the night lighting across each individual route (they can't make their mind up as to what looks good), as well as the actual lighting cycle being broken. The only way to make it look darker is to add full cloud.

DTG can only fix these issues (though I wouldn't bet on it since they've been broken since launch of TSW)

 

Yup i was really asking if your mod was being utilised, alongside the 1970's mod londonmidland
The mention of too light at night. Was just to explain i do not know what night is like in TSW2, as only ever driven for very short distances. Due to the unsatisfactory nature of night light.

So not a slight in regards your efforts, buddy.

 

If TSW3 does not fix the lighting i will not buy it and uninstall TSW2.
Its 2022 (soon 2023) and we have a game with totally broken lighting in day and night!

 

londonmidland do i need UE 4 unofficial editor for Uassetgui ?
because i think i need pak files first to open them

 

No, you don’t. It allows you directly edit the .uasset files without the need of using UE4.

 

i extracted from u4 unfofficial editor with unrealpak the route leipzig and now i have access with uassetgui....( maybe thats the complicate way lol ) but now im asking me whitch parameter is responsible for the color of the lights ...

link to screenshot https://ibb.co/xhm63Mc

 

Under SpotLightComponent there should be a section called LightColor, as seen here

 

Glasgow Cathcart Circle lighting mod now out! Download here

 

Oooh thank you londonmidland you make me enjoy UK content even more! Will try your mod ASAP after work

 

WEll. It has more to do with rational management then insanity. That is how things work in reality.

 

Let me know what you think of it

 

I’m sorry, but I can’t agree with that at all. Can you name another game where the developer intentionally hampers the PC version to ensure parity with 10 year old consoles? For what it’s worth I can’t think of a single one.

 

Dear Neptune that looks amazing.

I hope this gets dtg's attention and makes them improve lighting. I wonder if they liked being outclassed by modders with less resources

 

DTG Alex

Any comment on a modder showing that the lighting can easily (it should be easy for professional devs) be improved?
Why is the lighting in TSW2 so bad when it could be better?

 

Neither can I. And that is it. DTG probably decided this was their way to go. I can sympathize with your disagreement. I'm not really fond of the fact you state - hampering down pc users for 10 year old consoles. Unfortunetly, as long as there isn't real competition they are not going to change that. So I accept DTG "as is" and keep hoping for something better to come. And a long as I am an enthusiast of Open Rails and I can keep creating my own dlc for it, i'll just keep comming back to TSW for a different experience. My head just blows when thinking to export my creations for tsw2... i just would not want to waste my time to make my locos and coaches compatible with the livery designer, for example...

 

Are there any things in particular you (DTG) want to do to improve the lighting?

It’d be interesting to hear some of the ideas/techniques DTG have for this.

 

Well intentioned though that comment certainly is, I'm sure you'll appreciate that we have heard and read that response a multitude of times in the last several years from a number of your colleagues, without any significant progress being made.

 

Actually i have never in my life played another game with such messed up lighting like TSW2.
It almost looks like some it was done on purpose...but what purpose?

Time of day -> Bad and not logical
Sunlight -> Terrible and nuclear
Shadows -> Strange and black
Station lighting and City Lighting -> Atrocious and way to dark...

If i want TSW3 to do one thing, then it would be to fix the lighting (and performance and sound issues).

 

Hahahaha, good one Alex, Oh wait, you serious?

 

That’s three things.

 

Oh, that's so pedantic.

 

I’m surprised someone from DTG actually acknowledged this thread about the lighting as they’ve been putting their heads in the sand for the past couple of years when it came to things like this.

Whether they’ll make a genuine improvement is yet to be seen. Hopefully it isn’t just talk (which DTG have a reputation of doing when it comes to fixes and improvements)

 

‘Last couple of years’ = ‘Since Release’



I’ll believe they’re going to fix it when I see it with my own eyes. Can a leopard actually change it’s spots?

 

I can confirm it’s July, not April. Let’s see what’s coming

 

londonmidland
After more than 3 days of laying in bed because of COVID-19 I finally was able to drive a round on Cathcart Circle with the new lighting. And.... just wow, this makes such a difference! Cathcart Circle is one of my favourite routes, as I both love Scotland and the British second generation EMUs, but I always hated to drive it at night just because it looked so bad with the almost non-functional lighting. Now I can finally enjoy the route at night too - thank you so much!

 

We have heard this same talk before.

 

I’m glad you’re enjoying it. The old, dim white station lighting was such an immersion killer for me when driving at night. Not only was it useless in lighting anything, it was the completely wrong colour. Now you have that lovely orange glow as you come into stations.

 

Cathcart desperately needed this mod, thank you.

Do you think it may be possible to modify daylight / shadows? One thing that I hate about how TSW2 looks is the shadows are so dark, if you are on the wrong side of a train it will be entirely black as if there is no global illumination. Everything that is illuminated looks completely blown out. TS Classic often looks better just because of the color and lighting which completely blows my mind.

 

You could try putting the skylight multiplayer back to 1 (it’s in the ini settings) but then I find that makes the moonlight/nights way too bright looking.

This is something DTG really need to sort out, because there’s far too many inconsistencies from route to route. As well as a broken lighting cycle which has never been fixed.

 

DTG doesn't need to do everything perfectly or do everything themselves (if it doesn't pay off for them). It would be enough if they gave the community some basic tools so that we could fix their bad work and improve their products ourselves. It would probably even work out to their financial advantage, as a community-debugged TSW2 would be more attractive to the new customers. Instead, the community has to virtually crack their product to fix DTG's flaws and their bad work.

They tell us that the TSW2 engine is so complicated that we can't cope with it. Well, as you can see we can cope even without their tools, so don't let DTG tell you silly things.

 

You're either really late for April fools or really really early, I cant decide which it is.

 

So a person working for DTG saying now that they are "looking into it" confirms that there will be zero lighting improvements for the TSW3 release. Otherwise it would be "we are already working on..." at least.

 

Statements like these are the root of chaos that we see often on here. How in the world does that confirm anything? The only thing confirmed, if we are to believe that, is that it's being looked into, period.

 

Where and who said this claim?

 

I've also heard it confirmed that TSW3 will include the following

An updated WCL including Valenta 43
Moving animals
Dynamic weather
The reintroduction of dresden night lighting
ECML or WCML
Better sounds
Scenario Editor
More layers on livery
Better map
A more friendly UI
A search filter based on train for creators club

Not bad for a reduced price of £20 and you heard it here first, for the delusionalist that think TSW3 will run on 8th gen with parity to 9th, it will also be coming on UE5....

Who confirmed it you might ask? - The sarcastic one!

 

Not going to lie, I am more than a little bit disappointed that its only going to include ECML OR WCML. For a twenty note, I am sure I am not the only one who was expecting both the complete WCML (including both Birmingham and TVL sections) the ECML with all Scottish lines included AND the MML thrown in as well.

 

let's be honest it's not too much to expect is it. I hope they do it with a 10% pre order as well

 

***correction*** It’s everything that said they want TSW 3 to be but the reality is that it’ll ship with none of these things /s*

*as much as I want this to be a joke, DTG are renown for talking the talk but does not walk the walk.

 

Just been able to try this, only done one run so far on Cathcart but I've got to say what a wonderful improvement. Suddenly the route comes alive at night. I'd just always assumed that there was a fundamental issue in the engine that was somehow preventing DTG from doing night lighting and that maybe it was a difficult fix. Either you are a magician or the route could have been released like this day 1 unless I'm missing something.

Thank you for your time & effort with this, don't suppose you have plan to do the same to SoS?

 

Thanks for the comments.

It really isn’t hard to change at all, it’s just time consuming seeing as I have to change every single lamp. Though this is something DTG could’ve easily fixed, given they have access to the editor and no doubt it would’ve been a quicker process to adjust the station lighting.

Regarding SOS, it’s something I could do, however, I’ve not taken a proper look at the route. I’ll also need some references as to what colour the station lighting was back then, whether it was orange or white. Thanks.

 

THANK YOU! GCC is one of my favorite routes in daytime, but at night it's almost unplayable.

 

East Coastway is the next route to be upgraded...

First of all, I removed the horrible excessive bloom the route suffered from, to enable a much more realistic look. Secondly, I updated all the RGB values of the LED signals, so they now look more true to life with their displayed colour aspect. They're also much brighter as a result and can be seen from further away.

I haven't started on the station or street lighting yet.