Want's and Wishes

[High Iron]

After reading some of the threads posted, I just can't help myself but respond with some of my thoughts regarding the Want's and Wishes of the next generation of a train simulator. Whilst' some are wishing for ashes and other things, I would like to hope that the main improvements are just within the basic sim itself.
As MSTS is still used and very popular, even with me, it is very outdated. At the end of the day it is a program going into it's seventh year with no updates, changes, or fixes. I have been in the process of trying to create a route that is over 600 miles in length, and it has been pushing MSTS and me, to the limit. In my personal opinion and route designer experience these are my hopes.

- Allow for greater detail of terrain, (double or triple the ground poly's). We lose a lot of awesome terrain detail because of this. Cliff hanging tracks become wide enough to put a 2 lane hwy on.
- Ditch the 2000 meter maximum display distance. Something is lost within the sim when trees and buildings suddenly appear. This may also solve the problem of white voids when using distant mountains. It may even negate the whole requirement for distant mountains to be generated altogether as they are already in the existing terrain file. I say let the user define the distance based on system performance.
- Improved lighting. Tunnels are dark, very dark. Only the headlight shines the way. I have driven locomotives and have never been able to see 2km ahead in a tunnel. The cabs should go dark both inside tunnels and when it changes from day to night. This feature of fading interior light from day to night and vice versa has been around for many years in all flight simulators, why not a train simulator? Also there needs to be the ability to have more lights all around both on the ground and on trains. Headlights, ditch lights, number board lights, truck lights, classification lights and walkway/step lights should all be achievable on the locomotives, both lead and helpers. Street lamps and station platform lights should cast light on the ground and objects near them.
- Cab views should be able to utilize the model shape and texture files to give accurate representations of what's in front out the window. This would allow aliasing a generic cab for a particular type of locomotive and eliminate all the difficult work of painting in the details. No fun having a cab that shows a big yellow and blue hood and railings when the whole locomotive is black! This also would allow for nose and railing details to go black when within tunnels and when it's night outside.
- Sound, lets take advantage of the great sound cards out there today. Inside the cab, the rumble, the bells, the horn are enough to blow away my neighbors :7. Outside, it sounds like a 2007 Buick passing by on the hwy. Trains are LOUD outside, the simulator should reflect this very simple fact.
- Signal scripts...(route designers need I say more)use a system that works on the KISS rule or at least a block system. Real world railways use computer programs to operate their signals. Last time I used my train sim, it was on the computer, hmmm...
- Make sure loops and wyes, all real things on routes, don't cause any problems.
- Allow for the selection of any locomotive that is available on the route at any given time. A driver should be able to disconnect from a consist and run the locomotive to the end of the train and use the helper locomotive to become the lead unit, cab and all. Or perhaps you wish to fire up the SW1200 sitting three tracks over to disassemble your newly arrived consist.
- Move away from the regimented idea of Activities or Orders, exclusively. Although activities are fun, once completed they are rarely repeated. The rail environment has to be alive and changing, and should be fully functioning whether doing a pre described activity or not. The user should decide whether or not they want to be directly, indirectly, or not at all involved in that change, based on their skills and or interests in different aspects of railway operation. The idea of loading and unloading appears to be the goal of all future planned train simulators so no more mention is needed, provided that the trains physics are effected based on loaded or empty condition.
- A nice touch would be the ability to have varying weather within the sim, either user selected or even better for some, real time. Those involved in flight simming are very aware of the ability to simulate real time weather conditions within the sim utilizing the vast amount of data available online, particularly Jeppesen. The ability to start a train say heading into the mountains in clear sunny sky's and warm temps and encountering low clouds and freezing temperatures in snow and emerging on the other side in overcast and light rain would add not only realism to the sim but also a level of random challenge to the whole simulation that no predetermined activity could reproduce.

These listed things I believe would go a long way to building a solid foundation for a train simulator that many would enjoy for years, and would eliminate the early boredom factor that some enthusiasts encounter, then maby we can think about seeing that spider crossing the rail getting squashed ruthlessly by that big locomotive. I'm not trying to be cynical or pushy, just clear on what I see as overall important factors in a first class railway simulator to be built on and improved in the future. I want to develope first class routes, I need a first class railway simulator, who will step up to that plate, remains to be yet seen. Please reply if you agree or do not on any of the for-mentioned points, or perhaps even add to them.

Cheers, High Iron

[oakpalms]

Several of your comments have already been addressed here in the Kuju forum section. Some of your comments are new and certainly very positive toward an improved sim. One of the major problems that seems to have developed with MSTS, at least I think, was the fact that when MSTS was being developed the developers never dreamed that it would be taken to the degree of development that MSTS users have pushed the simulator.

Along with KRS, hopefully, we will get a complete set of documentation on what can and can't be done in expanding KRS to its fullest potential. For example, loops within MSTS have been proven to be fully functional, but it has taken our community years to find out just how to go about it. For example, having a player train take a siding while being passed by an AI train has been proved to be fully functional, but it has taken our community years to find out how to set it up.

I feel the most important thing that can come with KRS is a complete set of documentation on how to do such things that they are making capability for--it may not be loops and train passings, but something else this time.

After all, what is the use of the sim if it takes us years to find out how to tweak it--some of us don't have that much time left. Give us great documentation and not rely upon Michael Vone or someone else to have to spend a year trying to figure out the sim and then write documentation for it. As developers make contributions to KRS, then someone should be writing down a commentary on how to make use of what they have developed and that should be included with the sim!

Bob Edwards

[rjdiii]

What he said.

I 2nd... 3rd...

The strongest thing MSTS had going for it was it's greatest weakness. Had the ability to create basically open ended content not been there, I highly doubt the community that has been built around MSTS ever have happened and the product would have simply whithered into obscurity.

The ability of people who have a passion and a desire to create content as much because of their love of the content, has pushed people to accomplish amazing things, and has resulted in absolutely fantastic content that has allowed me, in a virtual sense, to experience and learn about places and do things that I otherwise never could have imagined I would have the opportunity to do.

When I ceased creating my Donner Pass route it was most certainly not because my interest had waned, infact the more I got right the more I was demanding of the sim to accomodate me, to the point where things were breaking faster than I could fix them, resulting in the inability to progress. I have noted little progress on the northeast corridor routes or some others demanding high object levels over many tiles for fidelity in the past 18 months, I would guess for similiar reasons.

[High Iron]

I would certainly agree with all said. The same could be said about flight sim as well. If not for the third party upgrades and content it too would have whithered away. I remember when folks started breaking apart the program to create the things like the SDK's. The same has happened for MSTS, although with fewer people tinkering with it, it has taken much longer. Considering it was " the " first train simulator ever made, it could have been worse. I just hope, which ever one succeeds the predecessor has taken note of not just the eye candy wishes, but those of the third party developers, both freeware and payware. Like flight simulator, the program really forms the foundation for the third party developers. I've seen planes designed for FS9 that still outstrip what's being created for FSX. I think the train sim world will work the same. I don't care for how much detail there is in the rolling stock, only that the flexibility and documentation is there for others to do it. Case in point, who still uses the default MSTS equipment? I think when we look at programs such as KRS we have to look past what is being presented and rather consider what it has to offer. Do I care if the locomotives look really nice? No, what I care about is wether or not someone else can! Do I care if it ships out with 500 mile routes? No again, what I care about is wether I can create them without problems and proper detail. Of course all these things will never be determined until we have the actual program in our hands. Screen shots don't tell me what the program can really do, they just tell me how it looks, important yes, but not the totality of what will make a good simulator that will last for many years to come.

Cheers, High Iron