G'day all, as the title states I'm looking for some help or tips with using the German safety systems with a PS controller. I've been playing TSW since 3 and have, except for a single run on San Burny, played exclusively UK (England/Scotland) routes. I've reset my player profile a few times now to reset my progress and I'm finding myself getting bored.. well not bored but not exactly having the same amount of fun as I once did.. and so I've decided that maybe the German routes are the challenge I've been looking for. I've done a single trial run on FTF without PZB/LZB/AFB/Sifa to see if it would be interesting and boy is it fun.. and hard.. but the safeties are giving me grief. Do any of my fellow PS players, tips? Tricks? Am I insane for not using a keyboard? (Find out next time on.. dragon.. ball.. Z!)
Im on xbox so cant advise but what i would say is pick short German route and just practice using once you know you doing its quite easy to use
Hey there, Xbox player here too, but it's the same layout, so on PlayStation it would be the circle button to acknowledge sifa and pzb. When you leave pzb monitoring, you need to hit the pzb/pzb release button before going over 45 or 85 depending where you are, for that one I'm not too sure about the shortcut so I manually do the desk switch. Id really recommend looking at Matt's pzb tutorial on YouTube, it's a really good explainer, a little long but it's very thorough. It should be in the popular videos on the tsw page. Best of luck
With XBox immersive layout pzb release should be X + DPad Right on PS5 i would guess square + dpad right.
I found PZB very difficult without a keyboard. Been using one for it since my PS4 days. Make life alot easier
PZB on controller is relatively good to manage. I recommend that you turn off Sifa at least for the first runs. Not only because it may be distracting, but there is also this sound issue on most German locos (pressing the circle button is used to acknowledge both PZB and Sifa, so you will get the PZB beep or even "Zugbeeinflussung" every few seconds). There are EXCELLENT videos on Youtube for German/Austrian safety systems in English language. Search for "tygerways". I think the user who created them is also present on the forums. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEcMfBievhQSgsuJArLFqIO7CB2XUGbQ7 Also, there is a website which summarizes all the signalling and safety systems stuff in Germany. It is aimed at helping real train driver apprentices. Unfortunately, it is available in German only, but it still might be worthwhile using it with the translator function of your browser. https://www.tf-ausbildung.de/index.htm
Controlling PZB and SIFA with PS controller is easy. When using immersion layout, acknowledge is Circle, PZB release is Square+D-Pad right and PZB override is Square+D-Pad left. The difficult part is sometimes to find out how to turn it all on^^
Picked a route and going to attempt without sifa at first while I get PZB/LZB down. Thank you all for the tips, I've got Matt's tutorial and I've found a few tutorials for the individual loco as well (thank you ambassadors)
Kinzingtalbahn - Br114 first (Hella fun I must say) and then I'll try the 146. Really not bad at all and the circle for Sifa/PZB is easy really. It's circle and Dpad for release but I find the desk switch easier to point at
The ECS moves on Kinzigtalbahn are nice and good to learn, as there is no stopping pattern and you can concentrate on learning LZB/PZB over long stretches of route. If you are using AFB, it is also a good idea to learn the "LZB end" techniques on the different locos (ICE-T is different from Vectron or ICE 3, for example). That was a bit frustrating for me in the beginning.
So I've taken the Br114, Br146 and Br423 for a stroll up/down the route and I'm confident enough that I've got everything turned on - I still don't want to take the Vectron/Freight on just yet and might grab some more time learning brake timing a bit better first. Thanks again folks, not sure why I was afraid of the DE routes so much, they are actually quite enjoyable (although I am guessing it gets crazy pretty quickly with the layers)
