OT: Do you like trains?

[warchild]

thanks empeck.. heding over that way to read it...

eye opener..

I just installed a demo of MSTS (yup. they're still available ..) and right off, t didnt want to run on windows 7 64 bit with the Nvidia drivers, but it rn fine on vista. Graphics are on par with that time period and fs2000 which isnt saying much.. Layout editor has a few decent things going for ity, but only a few.. virtual cabin?? what virtual cabin?? Looks lie the default 747 panel got used in more than one place..
Bottom line is that, no matter how you slice it, railworks has msts beat all around ( naturally ) and whether heres anything that works on it or not its the best game in town ( err, simm ).. I didnt see a single thing in msts to recommend it to me over railworks outside of there being terrain in the default layout editor example.. that isnt enough.. So, the best bet is to relax, breathe and enjiy whatr i can as developers come online with more addons for railworks..
Now if only RW didnt hae such a weird graphics file forma5.. oi..

[warchild]

One of the quirks i face with most routes is that they are too small.. its odd because when i get in a plane, i want to fly for an hour or two and then go do something else, but when i'm driving a train, i wanna drive one of those ones that keep you waiting at the crossing for an hour while they go by.. trains big enough that they go on for miles. stuff that you could see going over Sherman hill a few years back.. I want to start in Chicago, and go to seattle or portland and all through the sawtooths and cascades.. Most routes are just a bit short of that..

Theres a really nice railworks F7 combo thats perfect for the job too.. the sound is that deep throaty sound that can kull you to sleep, and theres more than enough power there for a one or two mile consist.. ::chuckles:; talk about fast freight.. I guess the bottom line is that, when it comes to trains, i'm a size queen.. i like em, big. real big.. and that kinda wipes out doing shorter routes.. maybe omeone will do the UP northern transcon route, or the CP/Via transcon route.. could you see highballin acros the canadian prairie and then taking it nice and easy up through the rockies in british columbia?? Jeez that could be sweet..

[HippyEd]

Hey Pam, you need to drive a coal train from Powder River Basin to Boardman, Or. Longest trains on the line. Also the steepest grade going up to the Coal Plant. 115 cars with 14,000 tons of coal. 3 trains a week.

Ed

[warchild]

:::LOL: hi Ed.. Ya know something, i'd love that.. I'm a bit skeptical as to whether it can be done or not.. One of my experiments was to build a fifty car consist behind four DD40s. Now, the four centenials are producing enough power to topple a pretty decently sized building, and yet, the best speed i can get out of it heading out of san bernadino up into cajon pass is 51 mph.. Oddly, an F7 lashup ( f7 A-b-b-b-A ) gives me the exact same performance pulling a 15 car passenger train.. I'm gonna have to look into that. Dont have any real suspiions yet, but maybe its something with the way railwoks is managing that area.. No matter what though, That aint what i'd call fast freight..

Oh yeahhhh.. I found this handy litle page last night that could come in handy designing routes and scenery... enjoy .. http://www.railsimdownloads.com/wiki...?page_ref_id=5

[Snuffy]

I'm still teetering on the edge here ... I'm trying to get my head wrapped around the importation of DEM info first.

I have a feeling that based on what I want to do, I'm probably going to have to learn to model as well since there seems to be a massive lack of period stock for my layout.

Haven't bought anything yet just reading all I can ... Just attempted do to a data gathering at USGS and got no where.

[michael davies]

Theres a really nice railworks F7 combo thats perfect for the job too.. the sound is that deep throaty sound that can kull you to sleep

It was only a matter of time before you opened my can of demons LOL. EMD 567s are the only sound I will drop everything for, if I'm ever comatosed the wife has instructions to play 567 and 645 sounds, they form such a deep memory in my child hood days in Denmark, listening to them accelerate past my grand parents house and up the hill, the sound drifitng in and out of the forest clearings as they got ever further away, its a sound I'll never forget. Forget the hanging gardens of Babylon, Niagara falls or the Grand canyon, the 567 is the 1st wonder of the world, period, end of debate.

I used to chase MX's, MY's and MZ's in Denmark, much to the chargin of my fiancee, later wife, when they were gone, a small fortune spent in Belgium on the Nohabs there, chasing and rail fan trips to sample and cab ride them, forgave a company meal and night out in Ireland to visit the local station and photo and sample Irish 567s, cut across four lanes of freeway in Belgium when I heard a 55 start up.

Dont mind 645 engines either but a 567...game over .

Its an illness, an affliction, there is no cure, like a moth to a flame I am drawn.

If I ever have a row with the wife, a bad day at work or generally depressed, I go here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6K3oMQlxyA&NR=1 An excellent sound and video of Australian bulldogs almost slipping to a stand or here for full raw up hill thrash http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rr_o-7028dU, a short clip of a Danish Mz (EMD 645) exported to Australia http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbMjROQB714 and finally an Irish 645 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZc4X-nfgBo&feature=related none of your Euro tree hugging Cat 5 emission regulations here !! . All an instant gratifying spine tingling, eye watering, lump in the throat experiance.

I appreciate many here will cast odd looks, I understand peoples passion for Spitfires, Mustangs and other fine specimens of flight, but whilst I love all trains, the 567 stands shoulders above everything else.

Its a door I keep tightly shut, but when opened am lost for days. The Railworks F7 is a nice model, I know the modeller very well, we met in the US once at a rail sim convention, hell of a modeller and hopelessly in love with EMD F units.

I'd been kicking my heels for a theraputic Max project to do, whilst I also love other stuff ( Close run between UP stuff and a Euro MaK1206 or Dutch 6400) the Nohabs will surely win through, if Railworks sounds like any of the above then I'm sold, I'm still looking for a decent sound chip for O scale Nohabs, then I can finally have an excuse to begin my scratch built 567 loco model ( prototype undecided right now, probably SNCB as the DSB My is already covered by Heljan in RTR).

Time to re compose myself LOL.

Enjoy

Michael

PS I love turbines as well, get a copy of Turbines Westward by Lee, its in its 5th run now I think, all the Turbine data and pictures you could ever want for, Giants of the West is another by G R Cockle, mostly DD35s, and GE U50s but has some Turbine stuff in there, mostly GTELs, George has also done Centennials West a soft back on DDA40X's both of these are out of print, my GotW cost over $100 second hand ten years ago and I've seen them go for more recently, He did one other of diesels of that ear whos name escapes me, also out of print but I've never seen one second hand anywhere.

PPS, don't ever get me started on GG1s and the NEC !.

[deimos256]

its soooo tempting to buy this, I wish they had a demo so I could make sure it was what I was looking for. I recently dropped $50 into the wind on FTX NA Blue only to have it perform poorly and be unusable. Is the actual running of the trains somewhat straightforward? I dont think I have the time to read over countless manuals these days with school.

[warchild]

wellll,,, railworks is designed to run on 512 meg of ram. it seems to like the newer video drivers, and heres one ( 1.. ) set of instructions to set up your joystick throttle for saiteks.. theres little AI, very few routes, tons of scenarios, a cantankerous and frustrating scene/route creator and more confusion that ive had with a game in a great many years. Over all, it feels raw.. It doesnt feel finished or polished, and valves involvement with its distribution and sales makes me dubious about its future, however,,,,
given all the pros and all the cons, the pros weigh more.. it IS fun to edit scenarios and change out consists and power lashups. ity IS fun to sit in a 3D cab and look out the window as you keep the thing under the speed limit, it IS fun just toodling about with 15000 horsepower under you and frustrating ad it can be, it is a major load of fun just opening up the scenery creater and doodling and experimenting..
I've said it before, and i'll say it again.. for thirty bucks, you cant go wrong with it.. Downloadable payware content is inexpensive. Priceyest thing i've found and bought was the 4664 challenger at 18 dollars. i just bought a wide nosed SD-40 canadian for ten dollars.. I'll post pics of the VC's..

Freeware and paintlits is where the bigest sadness comes in.. freware isnt around a lot, but enough exists to make a few really nice trains, and the quality is very good there as well, though i've got some that made me shudder.. painkits are an eclectic subject.. i dont really understand them.. there are some psd filles tht you can save as a dds file, and a converter for the dds file that converts the files to the graphics format used by rail sim, bt frankly, it isnt straight forward or simple, which is too bad because i'd love to model The rock and Rock island Lines.

Bottom line is that trainworks, though a sim, is more like a table top layout than a simulation.. your simply not restricted to one table top, and you get to drive the trans from inside them or ride as a passenger if its a pax run.

I've started blueprinting the main lines from Lasalle st station in chi town moving west. i hope to cover omaha, Grande junction, North Platte, yelowstone and the cascades, but i'm making the scenery without any included rail stock or power. it'ss be scenery and nothing else so that people can simply ad the trains they want and it'll work without the snafu's i've experienced.. However, thats a LOT of railroad, so its going to take a while..
If someone wanted to go from chi town southwest to santa fe that would be cool too, especially if we could jjoin them up somewhere ( like ummm,, chi town )..

[deimos256]

Wow, well I have seen some US expansions on steam that are upwards of 25 bucks, but with 20 miles of track and 30 industry routes and something like 100 spur lines that sounds pretty decent to me. I have pretty limited knowledge of railroads aside from turning down a job for a major US one. Anyways This is very very tempting and I'm very close to buckling.

[warchild]

Well, keep in mind, this more of a table top simulator than a procedural simulator, although you can set up procedural scenarios that'll make you pull your hair out.. In my experience with it, twenty miles is a bit shy of the norm.. monument up to cascades is about fifty miles, and san bernadino to barsto is quite a bit l9nger than that.. The colton line which i just picked up as well, is based on a table top model, but even it is more than twenty miles, and at this moment, is the most beautiful line i have.. I'm loving it..

I seem to remember back in the 90s when i was laying out N scale dioramas, that there was a piece of software that you could use for designing and running the trains, before you started laying down plaster and rail.. This really reminds me of that, but light years ahead. There appears to be the possibility of creating a complete world with this software, but its main thrust is the individual modeler. Still noises have been made to include multi player in future releases.
The nicest thing about this sim is that you arent restricted to a table top.. Perhaps thats not such a great thing, but you can model any route, of any line, in its entirety. To me, it almost feels as if that moves it beyond an enjoyable hobby, to a full on simulation. in its broad scope of possibilities, it loses that simple quaintness that table top modeling offers, but then again, your not going to be going to D&J hobbies or another train store once a week to chaw with the gang and talk about new Athern or bachman models..

Maybe doing both isnt such a bad idea.. I like camaraderie..

[Snuffy]

Well, keep in mind, this more of a table top simulator ...

So let me get this straight, no predefined continents? No oceans?, No rivers?, Nothing but flat green and the ability to locate stuff by lat and lon?

So if I want rivers and oceans and the like I have to edit the table top to give me those things?

I agree with an earlier post that said something about a demo ... I'd love to get my hands on just a 30 day trial demo ... But then again, I probably wouldn't have what I was looking for any how, so I'd have to make a decision based on subject matter that doesn't interest me.

Like I said earlier, if I can wrap my head around the inputing of geography, and then figure out the modeling process, it probably isn't such a bad thing.

[empeck]

So let me get this straight, no predefined continents? No oceans?, No rivers?, Nothing but flat green and the ability to locate stuff by lat and lon?

So if I want rivers and oceans and the like I have to edit the table top to give me those things?

Exactly. Both Railworks and Trainz works that way.

[Snuffy]

Exactly. Both Railworks and Trainz works that way.

Thanks Empeck, I just wanted to know what I was/might be getting into before I leaped.

What about MSTS? Does it have the predefined continents and such? How easy is it to mod or create layouts in it?

[empeck]

I don't know, I haven't played MSTS, and now it would be too difficult to jump into the game that doesn't have 3d 'virtual cockpit' for locomotives.

[michael davies]

Thanks Empeck, I just wanted to know what I was/might be getting into before I leaped.

What about MSTS? Does it have the predefined continents and such? How easy is it to mod or create layouts in it?

Ted,

No MSTS doesnt have terrain either, none of the train sims do, they all give you a bare enviroment to begin with, adding DEM to MSTS was quite easy, there are tools out there to do it for you, not sure on Railworks but something similar must exist, most just let you select the eare you want to add and it auto throws it in, then you add water and such, in MSTS that was quite easy, you just selected the water icon told it what elevation you wanted and it puts a flat plane in with water already added and thus your shore line is created. One of the pitfals with MSTS was that it could not model sloped water, ie like in a ravine or fast flowing river, but everything else was fine.

Best

Michael

[Snuffy]

Alrighty, so plan green flat table top.

And its only easy if you can get the DEM info ... I tried yesterday and failed meserably i'm afraid. LOL.

Rgr that on the "sloped" (as opposed to slopped,) water. LOL. Fortunately many of the fall lines in the rivers next to my project have islands and rocks and other debris to make the change in elevation less painful(?)

Thanks for all the help and replies, both public and private.

[warchild]

was working on doing one of my sandbox/fingerpaint learning things with the layout editor last night.. What i found was that if i "paint" the main areas first, then the rest of the layout gets a little easier..
Paint a BIG black or tarmac dot underneath the scenario marker, then block out the major terrain with colors that match what you want to put there ( grasslands, marshes, mountains etc ). After that, you can start laying track OR, raising and lowering the land to match what you want.. It makes it somewhat easier..

[warchild]

ok, sooo, i think i'm beginning to get a sliver of a clue... Spent a few hours in my railworks scenery sandbox today.. nothing spectacular but i figure if i can do it, it aint that hard.. After blocking in major terrain areas with different colors, i raised those areas, then sarted adding in track.. That may have been a mistake, but its one way of doing it.. in the end, i got a nice little scene Hope you like it..
Pam

[Matt Wynn]

Pam..... that wouldn't happen to be a Class 55 Deltic would it?..... you know what i'm like if anything looks even remotely like a class 55 deltic.... uh oh.... just realised my covers blown as a train enthusiast as well *Changes anorak and hides back in the dark corner*

[Snuffy]

Pretty cool WC ... you keep hammering at me and I just might break.

I did manage to find a link to some HGT data files ... Now all I gotta do is figure out how to use them. LOL!

Still haven't bought it yet .. but that rope is down to a thread or two.

Good Job on yer scenery!

[Snuffy]

Pam,

Try wrappin your head around this link ...

http://dds.cr.usgs.gov/srtm/

Check out the samples ...

http://dds.cr.usgs.gov/srtm/SRTM_ima...re%20examples/

[warchild]

Ah yeahh.. srtms.. Not sure if they're useful in railworks or msts or not.. the programs i know of use DEM's (Digital elevation models ) which can be purchased for various resolutions and areas.. I found some for Illinois counties at 15 cents each so prices arent too bad..

heres a link as well. dont know how good it is.. havent bought anything from them...

http://www.dielmo.com/eng/modelos-di...FSpeagodMlwzag

[Snuffy]

According to the railworks Scenery Creation document found here, (scroll to the bottom its the last link,) http://railworksamerica.com/fl/d-t.html It says that you can use the HGT data on the site I located (found from another forum on railworks,) the document in this link tells you how to use the HGT data.

And the best part ... its FREE.

[warchild]

Free is good.. free is very good.. Gonna head that way to check it out..

[heywooood]

*sigh*