Railworks America

How many of you use Train Sim World?

Harry

Negative here.

Every so often I spend 10 minutes on it then remember that, as pretty as it is, it just doesn't do it for me.

Rod

Wasted 3 hours over the lifetime of TSW, doesn't cut it for me.

In TSC I have more routes, scenarios and assets that I can possibly use in my remaining life.

august1929 wrote:Every so often I spend 10 minutes on it then remember that, as pretty as it is, it just doesn't do it for me.

Rod

Same here.

Chacal wrote:In TSC I have more routes, scenarios and assets that I can possibly use in my remaining life.

agreed

Rod

Have to agree with Rod. I have the original TSW (called "CSX Heavy Haul" or something like that) and haven't run it years. I don't know how much it has changed, but last I saw there was no way to create scenarios with the variety of tasks that I can do in a single TSC scenario. The huge amount of content for TSC and the level of community support makes it a no-brainer for me.

I have bought all the versions but I don't use them much. I don't intend to be a train driver so I find the program complicated. I prefer the classic Train Simulator because it is much simpler to use for my hobby.

I wish TSW was as simple as the Classic.

I have TSW mainly for the European routes. Sometimes it's nice just to get in and drive. But with scenario creation limited and the emphasis on passenger / commuter instead of US freight, it's not my go to. I'm hoping that with HIS coming out with their ATSF / Cajon freight pack, maybe the tide will start to turn. We'll see.

I have TSW5, but rarely use it due to it not having an editor that is easy to use to customize my routes. Also, DTG is really not putting out much new US content which is all I use.

I prefer Trainz22 most of the time and occasionally TSC.

I have Trainz22 but find it a little harder to navigate. Also, I wish there was something similar to RWTools for Trainz.

Harry

harryadkins wrote:I wish there was something similar to RWTools for Trainz.

Me too!

So what does Trainz do that TSC doesn't do?

Reality is both TSC and Trainz do about the same thing. Both have strengths and weaknesses. Trainz is slowly upgrading the core game engine to more modern standards. PBR materials and fbx objects are now supported. However, the upgrading also has a tendency to break older content. While TSC is using an older game engine, the original Kuju content still works. Both support repaints, but with Trainz you can not distribute a repaint unless it is your own base model or you have the permission of the original content creator. And that is an almost always a no-no for Trainz payware content providers. It's the very same thing that sunk RRMods as a TSC content creator. We can distribute TSC repaints of payware without any issues as long as the geometry files are not included.

The Trainz DLS is filled with all sorts of freeware to download... some good... some not so good. It's up to the content creator to keep "rev'ing" the content to the later standards. Again, content in TSC always works unless there is complicated scripting, and that seems more of the exception than the rule. I personally think route development is easier in TSC, especially when it comes to laying track. And I feel scenario creation is easier in TSC, although you can build some very complicated scenarios in Trainz as they have a wide variety of standard rules. Custom rules can also be created.

The Trainz DLS licensing is confusing and can result in your freeware DLS item becoming a packaged item if it's used in a NV3 route. That is why so many content providers host their own content to avoid that mess. In turn, when those content provider websites disappear, so do the assets and your left with routes with missing assets... unless you want to go to the Russian sites and take your chances there. I've had more than my share of DLS routes that I've deleted just because they were missing too many assets. Our RWA file library is a godsent and I don't think some users in the community realize just how fortunate we are that Buzz and Chacal keep the thing going.

Between the two, train physics are about a wash and it really depends on the content provider. Mods can be done and the payware folks are pretty good at keeping the content physics libraries updated in Trainz. Same applies to our 3rd party content providers.

Finally, and back to Harry's statement, our TSTools is invaluable. No such thing exists in Trainz that I know of. I tried doing a simple engine swap in a Trainz scenario. Not the couple of clicks that we've got with TSTools. For myself, I spend far more time in TSC than Trainz. It works for me. Even with some of it's drawbacks, TSC is still a darn good train sim that has stood the test of time. I just hope DTG continues to invest and improve the core product.