Just had a real good run of the route, the scenery I wanted to point out of particular note as being really nicely done, the LiDAR, LA Skyline and all the details put into the trackside buildings, car traffic, props, nature are some of the best I’ve seen in the routes and a real stand out positive of the route as a whole edit: would be real nice to get the cab camera lowered a bit down in the Metrolink cab car, it’s rather high. Console: XSX
I can use some liveried coaches/locos, but atm cant find the liveried control car, so my consist is saved unfinished
All the Metrolink equipment needs louder brakes, the independent in the F125 has a good volume but everything else is a little iffy. (Example here: )
Take a Hike scenario is still broken You get to the first marker and you can physically see the person you need to speak to in order to find the hiker, you get to the marker, it tells you that you need to carry on eight miles down the line but you go to interact with that person and nothing happens, even though he's there, you can see you need to interact with him, the game won't let you (Have put this in Troubleshooting as well)
Love the route. Thanks for adding my home town Santa Clarita! There is a glaring issue with this route and it drives me up the wall. I grew up listening to the Metrolink go by daily and saw it all the time. I'm 29 so make it 29 years of listening to both engines that they use. The horn on both the cap car and the engine are wrong. I'm no audio tech, but I do have a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 3rd Gen with Adam T5Vs which are close studio reference monitors. The horn needs more base or lower sounding tones. It's too high pitched.
I like this route quite a bit, one small issue which drives me more bonkers than it should is that most of the level crossings aren't "level". The track is placed noticeably higher than the road in a manner that would rip the suspension off most cars that drive over. I don't expect DTG to go through this route and fix it but its something to avoid in future routes, minor detail that stands out greatly.
Actually both horns on the cabcar and the F125 are pretty much spot on. They were both recorded directly from the cabcar and locomotive. I also grew up in Santa Clarita, between Via Princessa and Santa Clarita station near Reuther Ave. crossing. I’ve heard the horns all my life, too. They’re pretty accurate.
having a run after a long time and while I love the route, absolute chill, and the loco is great, besides the obvious lack of enforcement from the safety systems I also noticed another issue... how the hell am I supposed to know when to change speeds when many speed changes, either up or down are just not shown by signs, or some signs are only from one direction (I am driving LA Lancaster and some speed signs are only visible if you drive the other way) I guess IRL the screen with map and all shows the speeds, but guys, how do you drive HUDless here, besides route knowledge (which is an all-encompassing answer lol)
A lot of it is route knowledge, as stated above. Learning and memorizing the route, just as an engineer operating on the line does in real life. Also referred to with the term “qualified on the territory.” Engineers spend several months making many trips with a training engineer learning all the speed changing, air brake points, station stops, crossings, etc. Now I know this is just a simulator and it’s just for fun and a lot don’t have the time to dedicate like that for learning a whole route by heart but it definitely helps.
IRL, doesnt the display also tell em like mileposts, speed changes or sth? y know, the screen that isnt actually working in-game? I know route knowledge is a big part, but then, there should also be correct speed signs and some kind of in-cab help, just in case... which I guess is partly the PTC stuff that isnt really implemented... as aeronautic said, I guess I will have to pretend HUD is that
Yes, you’re absolutely right. PTC would display all of this relevant information. In addition to temporary speed restrictions. PTC along with route knowledge ensures you’re doing everything right. Since we don’t have PTC, the HUD is actually a decent alternative.
The regular air brake hiss/sneeze seems to disappear after a while. This seems to be especially triggered by high throttle departures or high levels of breaking.
Yes I think this has already been raised to DTG for fixing. Along with some other fixes regarding the air brakes in the cabcar.
Elephant style freight consists in the timetable are a bit disappointing... Why can't we have nice realistic consists like on Sherman Hill?
Just noticed an update to AVL. Anyone know what this was for? My guess is laying the groundwork for SBD.
Considering that SBD will be coming out soon I wanted to check out AVL. I bought TSW4 on sale, and even then just for German stuff. But I am always interested in US routes as well, and seeing as we get so little US content I wanted to know what AVL is all about. I appreciate when other people review content so perhaps someone will find this useful. I am pleased to report that AVL is more playable that I had imagined. Between Union Sta. and Via Princessa there is high speed running between stations. You can be held at signals to wait for trains which is interesting. The scenery is a reasonable (for TSW4) representation of the area. I find the area through Soledad to be slow and somewhat tedious but it is probably realistic and that is subjective in any case. Most of the services are either split or originate at Via Princessa so it is very possible to avoid the far northern stretch and still get a lot out of the route. Where the route fails however is quality. The 125 seems okay although the seated position is a little farther from the windshield than I would like. However, the cab car is terrible. The seated position is far back and also ridiculously high. If you lower the sun visor you cannot see out at all. It's pretty undrivable as was noted after release but nothing has been done in 10 months. The cab car also does not display tail lights although the 125 does. It's hard to say why DTG lets stuff like this out and then never fixes it. The floating/sinking vehicle problem is just terrible. It's like CJP but even moreso because there are so many roads. The level crossings look very bad with the track so much higher than the road, but the cars just float over or sink under them anyway. For comparison look at LFR which also has many roads and level crossings but much better presentation. The mastery tile is also very poor graphically, when we look at for instance the very nice work on the SRM mastery there is no comparison. There is a small number of freights which has correctly been described as an afterthought. You will notice static stock at one location with some tank cars, taunting you with what could have been. The freights don't even display the correct lower speed in the HUD and instead show passenger speeds. Such a basic mistake, and the fact that we still see this after 10 months show how little effort DTG will expend on US content. We also see some of the same problems from CJP including dull signals and trackside signs that are so difficult to make out. I would like to sound the horn for level crossings but noticing the tiny black X on the tiny white square is hopeless. I maintain that although these trackside markers may be correctly modelled, there is little point if they can't be seen. Due to the nature of graphic fidelity and forced perspective, it would be preferable if these signs were a little more visible. Overall AVL does a decent job at bringing out what is enjoyable about TSW while also highlighting so many deficiencies. If it wasn't included in the base game it probably would have been a major flop. Even with only two US routes released a year we still have poor quality and no updates. DTG hasn't provided a compelling reason to spend money here; my recommendation is to buy it at a deep discount, if at all. Thanks for reading.
Yes, a very fair and balanced review. I stopped playing AVL largely because of the scenery issues you mention. Plus single track commuter and little to no freight running gets very boring after a while. I actually quite like the 125 and I wish it could be driven someplace else. The scenery deficits on Cajon have been pointed out by many of us but there's obviously little to no chance of improvement. You didn't mention the shoddy vegetation in a number of areas and weird mountains in others. Overall, the attention paid to US routes has steadily deteriorated since the " high point " of SPG. NEC routes ( Boston and NYT ) have received some aftermarket attention, but only what was strictly necessary. ( In the case of NYT, the efforts of a few individuals saved it from becoming complete abandonware after DTG had said they were done with it..) Other routes, like CRR and Oakville showed a lot of potential, but have been simply abandoned. Others, like Pen Corridor, have lots of excellent gameplay but need some serious tlc. The revamped LIRR is about the only bright spot. That reboot shows starkly what might have been for other routes. But it's another commuter route, not the freight runs that we really crave and which define American railroading. Overall, as I and others have said often, US fans have gotten the short end of the stick in the last few years. I have to repeat that Sand Patch, the very first TSW route, was the zenith of North American content. Pretty much downhill since then, to be honest. ( Sorry, I meant to just agree with your post, but it got me started. )
I should probably mention that my other reason for wanting to do a review of AVL is out of concern for what SBD is going to look like. I have been told that this line runs down the middle of a highway. If so then I think we are getting set up for a major failure. Imagine a whole route showcasing a highway with incorrect lane markings, wrong-way traffic, floating vehicles, disappearing/reappearing vehicles, and blank or nonsense road signs and traffic lights that pop in out of nowhere. Perhaps TSW5 will have some sort of new technology that fixes road traffic, but to be clear I absolutely doubt that that is the case. It's curious that DTG would select a route that showcases so many flaws, but then again it will be included with the base game so they probably aren't as concerned as they might be with a standalone DLC. Since we don't get to see the routes too far in advance anymore, anticipating and noting likely problems is all we can do, although I admit that this is unlikely to make any difference at all, and that if SBD looks anything like CJP and AVL then it might even be unplayable.
Yeah, the line runs down the middle of Interstate 10 for a portion, and with how US roads already look in other TSW maps, I fear how terrible this part of the line will look when San Bernardino Releases.....
what I dont like (besides the safety systems which dont really enforce anything) is that the speed change signs are placed very weirdly, when compared to what the HUD shows you... like the HUD shows you lets say a change to 40 mph in 300 ft, and the sign is sooner or later than that, making any potential HUDless runs pretty much impossible to do
Well whaddaya know, decided to take the cab car for a spin and... it's fixed! The view is now just about as good as could be expected. The marker lights also appear to be activated when the cab car is at the back of the consist as well. So, two unannounced fixes, probably came along with the recent unannounced update to AVL. My guess is that DTG was fixing up the cab car for SBD and probably didn't even realize that the fix would go out for AVL automatically, or else they might have said something about it. This definitely impacts my recent review of AVL, as having a driveable cab car obviously makes this route much better. I would now recommend this route at a discount, but not necessarily a deep discount.
It’s odd that there have not been any patch notes for this but it is still a welcome update. The cab view is much better now. I wonder if there have been any other fixes for the route that we are unaware have happened.
AVL is a route that is crying out to be integrated into Run 8’s SoCal network, but that’s another story!
I'm not sure if there was an update but suddenly the camera angle in the Rotem cab is WAY too far forward. Its like you're sitting on the edge of the seat. Is there a way it can be put back to the way it was?
The view used to be far too high and in order for it to be lowered and still allow all the dials to be seen it had to be moved forwards a bit as well. It’s a compromise but it is better now than it was and should not be changed back.
The issue is it affects how speed is perceived. Now, the train feels too slow. If they're going to move the driver view closer, then they need to increase FOV. As someone who has driven this very train I can tell you that I should not have such a limited field of view. The previous view was perfectly fine. In fact, I'd say it was far better than this new one.
You would also know that you aren’t supposed to be driving with your head almost touching the cab roof, like you are sat on a pile of cushions. The old view was far from being perfectly fine due to the height being so unrealistic. The new view isn’t perfect and you don’t see out of the side window as much but the view from the front windscreen is now more realistic as you are at a realistic height. Ideally the view would be where the real driver’s head would be but as we can’t shift side to side or lean forwards to be able to read the dials fully that position wouldn’t work in the game. A FOV slider would help but the game doesn’t have that feature unfortunately.
Actually you can define secondary cameras, so leaning is possible, just as the various close up display / fuse panel cameras. Rivet have shown it is also possible to let the player set their preferred position by allowing seat adjustments. Something that was dropped unfortunately.
Would be nice if we were allowed to move the first-person camera to wherever we wanted, as in Train Crew...
Extra internal camera views are a good thing but are not easily toggled backwards and forwards for console players who don’t have a keyboard attached. It’s a two button combination on controller that only cycles one way through all cameras. I’m not sure I’d want to be shifting camera positions constantly throughout a drive even with a keyboard attached. I doubt it is a solution DTG would be happy to use when just putting the view slightly forward is easier. Adjustable seats should be a standard feature but other than a few early locos DTG just don’t do it for whatever reason.
Okay wait, touching the roof? My view was never that high up. Unless I had some strange glitch or something, my view was never that high up. Makes me wonder if I did something that affected the view or something because the view was further back. The height wasn't the issue for me. I could see out the side windows just fine. Time to investigate a little lol [Edit] So after checking, no, the original height was accurate. So, the Rotem cars have a very steep incline with the way the front is shaped. So even in real life, drivers foreheads are pretty high up to the sloping roof/front line. There's a video on YouTube showing someone using Metrolink's training simulator and it shows them fairly close to that slope.
You are wrong there. The current height is accurate, just that it is further forward than it would be in reality. As it was before, if you used the sun visor it completely blocked your view of the track ahead and looking sideways you were almost level with the top of the side window. It was very high up and not realistic. This is why many players complained about the driver view in the first place and why it has been changed, with the compromise that it is now a little too far forwards than reality. I was one of those people who complained, and then later I was in dialogue with DTG about it, and it was explained to me why the view ended up so unrealistically high (which is how I know the reason) and I was shown what the new view would be before the patch.
A little spelling mistake. Finishing the scenario where you have to look for a hurt hiker (Take a Hike), you arrive at Lancaster. You are then told to: Talk to Clark Smith to inform him off the situation
as I have probably mentioned a couple times, I enjoy the route, quite chill, loving F125, but: 1) nonexistent safety system enforcement 2) would love to let F125's speed loose somewhere
