"New Technologies" to be announced by RSC in the next weeks

[PapaXpress]

yea... its broken.

[ArcticCatZRT]

Yes Donner Pass is still broken, but they are working on a fix for it, they said it would take a while.

I'm just gonna give up now, cause no matter what I say, RSC will be the devil to some people. Who knows, maybe I'm just another Facebook kiddie fool who throws money at RSC for no reason!

I just don't understand why some people hate RSC so much and still play the game?

[hertsbob]

But that's got absolutely nothing to do with this announcement...

What you seem to be bemoaning in this respect is that the team working on the core of the sim aren't also working on DP fixes at the same time...

Anyway, it's nice to see that the Wear Valley blog has made its way over to your side of the water, even if it is slightly out of context.

Cheers

Bob

[SMMDigital]

Yes Donner Pass is still broken, but they are working on a fix for it, they said it would take a while.

I'm just gonna give up now, cause no matter what I say, RSC will be the devil to some people. Who knows, maybe I'm just another Facebook kiddie fool who throws money at RSC for no reason!

I just don't understand why some people hate RSC so much and still play the game?

Kat, I don't hate RSC. I've stated many times its still the best game in town. The problem is, it is a GAME, and it looks like its going to keep going on that direction, even more so. And as others have pointed, anually, we get a glowing tease from RSC about mid-summer, we all get our hopes that just maybe this GAME is about to morph into a SIM that will finally allow us to put that other simulator to bed. But each time, when the big reveal comes, its more of the same. No fix to the AI. No fix to the lack of Multi-core. No fix to the elderly DX9. And I think
we are all still a little shell-shocked from the September update that brought almost everyone's computers to their knees, after hearing months of "if it runs RW2, it will run RW3."

I apologize if my cynicism has put you off. But after three years of summertime re-runs and deflated hopes, I believe I have a right to be. Also like I said, i'm hoping for better news tomorrow - interactive AI, multiplayer, true hardware leveraged gaming - but i'm not getting my hopes up.

[ArcticCatZRT]

First time someone called me Kat I actually had a british gentlemen call me "Pussycat" on Xbox Live a few years ago.

Anyway. I think the reason I may not be as upset at this game as many of people is that I don't play/develop with this game as much as you guys. In the past 2 years of owning the game I have logged about 370 hours, which is very little compared to many I would venture. I personally just don't run into the same, or as many of issues as others have been because of that fact. I also don't play the game as most other people do, I literally pick a free roam and just cruise/have fun so I don't run into AI issues. I also don't create content other than a reskin here and there so I don't run into any issues there either. The more I think about this, the more your view point seems more logical to me. If I would put the same amount of "love" into the game/hobby that many of people such as yourself do, I too would most likely express the same sentiments.

I also apologize for myself for acting a bit childish, but it seemed to me that lately there has been a lot of "complaints" against RSC for many issues by many different people. Tonight though I had a moment and snapped...obviously

[snowstorm]

I like the task thing, but along with joypad support it does seem to be low hanging fruit. Optimisation/reworking of the game engine is what I'd really like to see - the two core TS2012 updates didn't seem to do much on that front.

Kinda puzzled by the console speculation. The market for a train sim isn't there, except maybe in quirky Japan. People without a serious interest in trains play briefly out of curiousity - ultimately they want to know what happens if they crash the train, then they move on. Everyone argues DLC is RSC's bread and butter, and only enthusiasts will part with their money for that. It's also not consistent with the argument about RSC not having the resources to work on the game engine. What do you think a console port would take?

So it makes little sense. Maybe I'm wrong and they've got similar ideas to those that Microsoft had for "Flight", but I doubt it. It'd be an even harder sell.

[ArcticCatZRT]

The consoles are an interesting question, but I don't think we will see RW3 on consoles anytime soon. Personally I feel the game is way too demanding for the hardware to take it, and I also agree that most consolers are looking for facepace gaming, not hardcore simulators such as RW3.

What really has me wondering is the next gen Xbox. Supposidly it will have a form of Windows to run PC games. The only issue is that, this is just specualtion. Who knows if even the next gen consoles will be able to run RW3 or other PC only games.

[Shortliner]

Here's the problem I have with this XBox controller thing. I'm going to be very blunt, Train Simulator is a niche market, pretty much the only people who play with Train Simulators are people who have, or used to have train sets. So in all honesty, the whole trying to broaden the user base is a futile effort because the majority of gamers are interested in games like Portal, Half Life, MW3, CoD, or WoW. They're not interested in simulators.

So, seeing how the market for simulator is a niche market, the customer base in that niche market expects realism when they play a simulator. They want to actually feel like they're flying an aircraft or driving a train. I know that RW3 isn't a professional simulator so it'll never match that, nor do I expect it to. Honesty, when RW3 came out, I thought they were heading in the right direction, cab sway, more realistic atmosphere, etc.

However, they still haven't fixed several issues, nor do they seem to be making any progress in making this a simulator. The ones who are making it more like a simulators have been third party developers.

Finally, I don't really know of anyone who's going to use a gamepad to play RW3, and I wouldn't since I have RailDriver.

My

[OldProf]

RSC's post is only about new technologies.
I understand the need to fix the flaws in the existing code and data, however fixing old technology does not constitute new technologies.
These are two separate and non-exclusive activities. RSC has not stated that it will stop fixing existing flaws.

Appunto!, as the Italians say, meaning "precisely". I think I already brought up this point, but it cannot be said too many times. Carrying on about things that some folks percieve as "broken" has no place here, since Paul's message is about New Technologies, not about what already exists. Those who don't like the game pad approach can just avoid it, but they should be mindful that by adding it, RSC will reach new players who are accustomed to such tools in other games and that means more money in the till that cn be spent on further improvements and, yes, on enhancing and improving extant content. Even those who never use them will eventually benefit from features that increase RSC's income. A bit of selflessness, for once, please?

[TrainMaster1]

I may be in the minority here but my preference would be to find one sim anywhere that really tried to capture the physics and controls of actually being on the railroad. This is just another cute game addition that does nothing to address the serious issues this sim has when it comes to actually behaving anywhere close to the real thing.

Oh by the way, excellent point by Shortliner on the size and scope of the market.

Nick

[Shortliner]

I may be in the minority here but my preference would be to find one sim anywhere that really tried to capture the physics and controls of actually being on the railroad. This is just another cute game addition that does nothing to address the serious issues this sim has when it comes to actually behaving anywhere close to the real thing.

Oh by the way, excellent point by Shortliner on the size and scope of the market.

Nick

I think the first group to develop a true simulator will grab majority control of the Train Sim market.

[buzz456]

I love this thing and work with it all the time. It fascinates me warts and all. I have very few problems with it and just wish it wasn't such a computer hog. Having said that I think there is way too much bitching about what it doesn't do and everyone should try to enjoy it for what it is since it's the best one out there.

Buzz

[SMMDigital]

I think the first group to develop a true simulator will grab majority control of the Train Sim market.

That hit the nail on the head. The frustration is that RSC seems to be SOOOOOOOO close to breaking that barrier and burying the competition, but then for some reason they pull back. I mean really ,how hard would it be to put interactive AI and true physics in this thing? Aces studio did it back in 98', in a cave, with a bunch of spare parts they found lyin' around. Railworks is the red-headed step-child of that effort, so somewhere in the DNA there has to be a switch that can be turned on to enable this. Does RSC really realize what it would mean to do this? MSTS gets marginalized (never goes away because its free), Trainz dissolves like a fart in the wind, and Open Rails gets relegated to the hardcore programmers and hacks. It would also mean many, many more users, and that equals money.

But hey, we got gamepads instead (in this round anyway).

[Hawk]

I think it's time to lock this, before it descends into murkier depths.

[Hawk]

I had a few spare minutes this morning so I went through this thread and deleted or edited posts that had any negativity towards other forum members.

That done, I've unlocked it for further discussion about the new RSC technology announcements.

Let's keep the comments on that topic.