Railworks America

Anybody know the secret that prevents Railworks from reading .ap files? I've had this problem on RW for quite a while. It survived through the update from Windows 7 to 10. It is becoming a problem since my game disk is getting full. What I have to do whenever I get anything from steam in an .ap file is run RW_Tools and have it unpack the file. Until I do that, no new DLC shows up in any RW menu. Most recently noticed with the acquisition of the SN route but it also happens with any steam RW DLC. So my game disk has two copies of everything.

It must be some entry in the Windows registry. My laptop which is also running Windows10 does not experience the problem. I was hoping for a simple fix. I got nothing more than an acknowledgment of a query from DTG support.

A re-install of Windows 10 on my desktop just does not appeal to me. I know I'd be looking at least one whole day but probably more to do that and get all my apps running as they are supposed to.

It would be something in the game's core program.

Make a backup of your Content and Assets folders, then do a complete delete and reinstall of Train Simulator 2017. Then use the backups to reinstall your mods, routes etc.

I should have mentioned the things I've tried already over the last few months without success.

Move everything in the steam folder to a separate disk and delete the folder and everything in it. De-install Steam. Reboot. Re-install steam. Let Steam re-download everything into an empty folder. Open RW. Only a tiny fraction of stuff available to play. Not completely empty of routes and equipment, but mostly. Open RW_Tools. Let'er rip unpacking all .ap files it finds. Open RW again: Viola! All my DLC is there once again.

It has been a few months since I last did this. I can try it again. But isn't that the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing again and again expecting different results?

I thought it was the definition of marriage.

Anyway, also try to remove in Windows any file association to the .ap file extension.
I'm really grabbing at straws here, I know.
Throwing science at the wall and seeing what sticks.

I think Eric's idea is different from what you have been doing. In other words only save the asset and content to somewhere else then do your new copy of TS. Then put your old Asset and Content folders back into the new TS and everything should show up.. I've done it that way several times now and have never had a problem with anything not showing up.

buzz456 wrote:I think Eric's idea is different from what you have been doing. In other words only save the asset and content to somewhere else then do your new copy of TS. Then put your old Asset and Content folders back into the new TS and everything should show up.. I've done it that way several times now and have never had a problem with anything not showing up.

Thanks, but not quite the same thing. The recent purchase of the SN reminded me once again of this problem. After it was downloaded and installed, neither it nor any of the included equipment appeared in any of the RW menus as being available. Not until I unpacked the two new .ap files that comprised the SN route and equipment did anything about them show up in the RW menus.

In the past, Steam and DTG (or RW) has issued an update to some route, equipment or core code and, without notice or fanfare, deleted all the unpacked files and replaced the .ap files with new ones. It was only some days, weeks or months later when I started up RW to find some of my stuff has gone missing that my thought process becomes: "I thought I bought that route/engine/kit long ago. Did I imagine it? Maybe I didn't? What happened to it? Oh yeah, now I remember, there must have been an update so I have to unpack ap files again to get my stuff to show up". The RW_Tools ap file manager often shows a whole bunch of .ap files listed in red meaning they hadn't (yet) been unpacked so they are the ones that got updates. It gets old. But, worse, is it is gobbling up too much disk space.

What I'm trying to say is that something is probably borked in your RailWorks folder. That's why doing what Eric suggested copying and saving your Assets and Content folder somewhere then delete your whole RailWorks folder. Reacquire that through Steam and then put your saved Assets and Content back into your new installation. Normally Railworks can read .ap files with no problem.

buzz456 wrote:What I'm trying to say is that something is probably borked in your RailWorks folder. That's why doing what Eric suggested copying and saving your Assets and Content folder somewhere then delete your whole RailWorks folder. Reacquire that through Steam and then put your saved Assets and Content back into your new installation. Normally Railworks can read .ap files with no problem.

I believe he s talking about rw tools not railworks if I read the original post correctly.

I agree with Buzz, something wrong with the OPs version of TS2017. Another thing if the OP called RW, TS which it is now called would save people confusion when you also mention RW Tools. I don't have to unpack my AP files for TS to work and I would imagine all of us here don't either. Hope I'm on the right track here.

To the OP
I would do as Eric suggested
Just a thought, I would also delete the RVDBCache.bin and the SDBCache.bin files and the corresponding .MD5 files from the \Railworks\Content folder.
When TS opens it will rebuild both these databases.
This would remove any "corruption" in the route and scenario databases (and these files are not changed by cache verification, but are produced/scanned when TS2017 starts).
Before I started I would also remove any Workshop scenarios - just in case and reinstall them later.
If you don't want to do any serious editing in RW_Tools just extracting the routeproperties.xml folder is all you need and that is a much smaller option.
Regards
pH

robbit wrote:

buzz456 wrote:What I'm trying to say is that something is probably borked in your RailWorks folder. That's why doing what Eric suggested copying and saving your Assets and Content folder somewhere then delete your whole RailWorks folder. Reacquire that through Steam and then put your saved Assets and Content back into your new installation. Normally Railworks can read .ap files with no problem.

I believe he s talking about rw tools not railworks if I read the original post correctly.

If he's talking about RWTools he's not making himself very clear.

He's not.
@Stresstool: PeterHayes' solution sounds really good to me.

To be clear, I have already done as other has suggested.

I moved the existing files to a temporary external disk and deleted all the files in the working steam folder. Then I un-installed Steam completely. Then rebooted. Then re-installed Steam. Then let Steam re-download all the Railworks files into an empty folder (it takes a few hours). No extra cruft in there. Should be fresh as it would be on a brand new system. Then I start RAILWORKS and only see a very tiny subset of things that should be there. It is not completely empty of routes and engines, but none of my purchased DLC is present and not even all the default stuff is in there. I take note that even though all the DLC is present in the steamapps/common/railworks folders, only the things that are not present in .ap files show up in the Railworks menus as available to use or play.

So this is where the application RW_Tools comes into play. I open that tool, and let its .ap file unpacker loose on the freshly installed Railworks files. Once RW_Tools is done, all the .ap files have been unpacked (and taking up twice the disk space which is the main problem I want fixed). I can open Railworks and viola!, all the default stuff and all my purchased DLC is right where it is supposed to be.

Since, it seems, both Steam and Railworks have been de-installed from the registry and re-installed along with all their files into empty folders, one would expect whatever cruft that might have been leftover in the registry (if that's where this problem lives) would have been flushed out during this procedure. But it seems that isn't the case.

In any case, it appears nobody here knows what is going on and nobody at DTG support has any idea either. Thanks anyway. I'll keep struggling with it until I bite the bullet and re-install Windows 10.

ST

(and taking up twice the disk space which is the main problem I want fixed).

Did you try just unpacking the "routeproperties.xml" files only and not all of the .ap files?
Does that work?

In the "assets" folder there are several .ap files for locos/assets for routes, etc are any of these visible in the TS menus or do you have to extract these as well?
pH

To the OP
Have you tried adding the Steam folder to your security exceptions and given it a firewall exception?
I'm thinking at this point, that something is actually blocking the opening of .ap folders.