DTG Train Sim World: CSX Heavy Haul Beta Programme

[MadDog 353]

Giving credit where credit is due... DTG far exceeded my expectations with TSW.  I played it for about 4 hours last night and was very impressed!  Performance was fine on my system (4790K oc'd to 4.6 with an old GTX770)... I locked in Vsync at 1/2 refresh rate in Nvidia Inspector and maintained 30 fps consistently on "high" settings at 1920x1080... it would drop down in the yard and some of the bigger towns; but not by much.  I suspect most of the complainers must be shooter fans accustomed to 60 fps or greater.

Visuals are gorgeous.  The models exceed anything I've ever seen in a sim.  The level of detail (especially with the trees) does decrease a bit rapidly with distance; but the close-up textures are SO detailed, I imagine they had to dial in the LOD circles to maintain performance.  The night lighting is exquisite... equal to or better than X-plane (my only complaint is that the stars are huge and overly bright on clear nights).

I've never been anything more than a casual train driver, so I can't comment on the physics; but everything felt right to me.  It seems like it's much easier to maintain a constant speed than in other versions.  Controls were all logical (but I agree that they should allow users to change the keybindings in the future).  I really love how you have to get off the train and walk down the track to manually switch the rails (but can also do it via the map if you're feeling lazy).

It's true you only get 3 freight locomotives and a single 60-mile route in Maryland/Pennsylvania... but the scenery is beautiful with a huge amount of detail.  It seems DTG has adopted a quality over quantity approach this time around... and that works for me.  I probably have 10 routes on the old TS that I never even loaded up.  Overall, it was $35 well-spent.  I'm not ready to get my hopes up quite yet; but if their flight sim is anywhere near the quality of TSW, good times are ahead.

[HiFlyer 9,359]

48 minutes ago, MadDog said:

I suspect most of the complainers must be shooter fans accustomed to 60 fps or greater.

Now that's just asking for trouble: the most obvious rejoinder being "I suspect most of the people liking this must be simers accustomed to horrible framerates."

And then off we would go.

The point of all that is that we can do without even the most oblique of digs, because that's not what this thread is about. 

*Climbs off of soapbox* 

 

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

What is this thread about?

[Angelo Cosma 61]

1 minute ago, jabloomf1230 said:

What is this thread about?

The newly released CSX Heavy Haul Train Sim World release. Google or YouTube any of those words and you will see what the new Unreal4 Engine can do. 

[HiFlyer 9,359]

4 minutes ago, Angelo Cosma said:

The newly released CSX Heavy Haul Train Sim World release. Google or YouTube any of those words and you will see what the new Unreal4 Engine can do. 

Thanks. 

[MadDog 353]

36 minutes ago, HiFlyer said:

*Climbs off of soapbox* 

No need for any soapboxes... there wasn't a dig at anybody.

Fact:  There are complaints about TSW performance issues (mainly on the Steam forums) that I and others have not encountered.

Fact: Evaluation of performance is often subjective and anyone expecting consistent performance exceeding 60 fps in a "state of the art" simulation program is probably in for a disappointment.

I would counter that "asking for trouble" involves gleaning something controversial out of an innocent statement.

[HiFlyer 9,359]

18 minutes ago, MadDog said:

I would counter that "asking for trouble" involves gleaning something controversial out of an innocent statement.

You're likely right that I'm reacting strongly, but unfortunately its been a peeve of mine ever since I returned to flight simming in about 2010, and noticed the causal stereotyping of gamers thats become so much a part of the landscape in the various sim forums that it's almost invisible to the inhabitants, whereas to people arriving from the outside and bumping into it the first few times, it's like "Jeez, what do these guys have against gamers?" 

Over the years, I've learned to just sigh at 99.99% of these statements, both casual like yours, and deliberate, and maybe shake my head, as it seems to be part and parcel of the community: but in this case, as the thread starter, I felt I could make an objection.

I apologize if it seemed unwarranted.

[HiFlyer 9,359]

It seems a fairly thorough look at the title, though he never really provides a score, and his opinion on whether it's a good buy seems to have a lot of qualifiers.