RS Worries

[paulz6]

Is everybody suffering a sense of humour bypass today.
If I have caused any offence, I sincerely apologise. My humour can push boundaries sometimes.
And the 'haven't got a clue' remark was a bit insultingly blunt, so I apologise for that.

[markjudith]

I've got a good idea......................

Let's play trains with Rail simulator

Bought it when it came out and I aint bored yet..............now that is value for money, cos I have hammered it, had lots of hair pulling moments, still learning and enjoying it. Thanks to those who have made the commercial add ons and a big thankyou to all those who have given us their models etc for free, and thankyou RS folks for producing the program, sticking with it and developing it further.

Mark

[Acorncomputer]

Perhaps Derek and Adam are actually just computers and do not get paid. The answers on the forums are really computer generated replies and RSDL is the name of the master computer controlling everything. That would explain the change of name to RailSimulator.com which is much more in keeping with the thinking an all powerful master computer which is probably located in the corner of some young lad's bedroom and he has no clue about what his computer is doing.

It'd be unprofessional of them to express any opinions in this situation. I think it's of value for them to get a feel of how the community is reacting to their products and, even if I have my doubts if RS will live up to what I was expecting of it (as much down to how the community's reacting as any decisions RSDL have made themselves), I'm pleased to see them here making an effort to keep us in touch with what's going on within reason and actually listening to our ideas. Comments like that aren't helping anything.

Actually on that note this thread seems to have gone off the rails a bit. I started it because the whole payware discussion that had been taking over the WIP screenshots thread got me thinking, but I felt it best to try and deflect some of that discussion over here. I have no problem with mods locking it if they feel the need.

Derek and Adam are definitely real people and both of them, and the rest of the team at RSDL/Railsimulator.com are truly passionate about this simulation and have been there answering our queries and helping us out from day one. I think I speak for many of us when I say that without their support we may not have got as far as we have today and there is no indication that their support is going to disappear.

I do not think it is right to expect free content for Rail Simulator, and I can see no evidence that RSDL/Railsimulator.com work on that basis either in the development of their product. We should expect to pay for good quality products but if people are happy to provide free content, then we all benefit.

I think we can expect a steady development of the product over the next few years and there may be paid for upgrades, but if this is your interest, then the relatively small cost will not be significant. I understand you can pay up to £30.00 just to see one football match these days which sounds a lot to me but no doubt does not bother true fans.

I have no worries about Rail Simulator. We have only seen a fraction of what it can do and it is only down to the imagination of those using it that will reveal its true potential.

Three cheers for Derek, Adam and the team for the enjoyment and pleasure that they have given many of us over the last eighteen months or so.

[AndiS]

Three more cheers and full support to Mark's idea.

Sometimes, you think that worrying about it is the greatest thing you could do with KRS, but I can tell you that pulling your hair out to take that game further is much more fun in the end; and if you are lucky, you may even earn someone's respect by it, which is very difficult to achieve by public worrying alone.

[dlljones]

I've enjoyed every minute of using RS and it has brought me an immense amount of pleasure in my retirement (far more than MSTS ever did). I'm currently building a route of a forgotten part of North Wales railways and it's giving me a lot of pleasure (too much according to my wife who thinks I prefer my computer to her at times!!). I'm a bit fed up with those who seem to be determined to destroy it with negative comments about this that and the other. Well, if nothing else was released for it I'd be content with what's there already and I'd continue to build my route and enjoy what those talented people have produced for us so far whether it is freeware or payware. To those of you therefore who want to destroy a product that brings pleasure to at least one person I say to you your comments are to me like water off a ducks back. To those of you who continue to provide us with excellent quality material I say keep up the good work and thank you very much - I for one appreciate your contribution whether I have to pay for it or not.

Frustratingly yours

Llew

[longbow]

Llew, you make an important point - RS is a lot more satisfying (not to say cheaper) once you learn to build your own routes and custom scenery. I spend less than 5% of my RS time actually running trains and I don't suffer the frustration of those who have to rely on others to provide new content.

[class43HS125]

hi,
I TOTALLY agree.

Ross
NZ

[NeutronIC]

I've got a cold and I can't sleep. So i'm going to inflict my sickness on you lot.

On Rail Simulator and Rail Works...

IMHO Rail Simulator was a very strong entrance, it had lots of issues but then two very comprehensive patches have made major improvements to the product and removed a few big problems and lots of little ones. They've reacted well to the feedback given to them in my view. Yes, what's left does still have some big issues (AI etc) but not so much that it destroys the ability to enjoy the product.

Compatibility - I wouldn't expect an item built for RW to work in RS, to be honest I don't necessarily expect items in RS to work straight up with RW (though I believe they will) - i'm happy for a converter to be supplied. The biggest problem with compatibility is that it becomes a noose around your neck, you can't do advancement and you end up having to support buggy stuff that you can't rewrite to improve without wiping out a bunch of old models that depend on it working "wrongly". As long as compatibility exists in some form, for me that's good enough. In reality, i've read on here that some are describing RW as "RS Gold" - well, perhaps, certainly as far as I know it's an extension of the existing code rather than totally new stuff, so compatibility shouldn't be an issue. Extending the existing code however does mean that we're moving on, i'm hoping to see some decent sized problems rectified, perhaps new features and so forth. Essentially I am looking for RW to have its own identity, something that says "ah yes you're running RW" (other than just different graphics in the UI that is!).

On the way RS does things...
So, the route editor is much easier - I see that as a very good thing personally. Does it mean we'll see lots more "dross" routes uploaded? Well it hasn't so far, there's some great stuff. Even if it does, so be it, just use the top ten list at the top of the file directory to see what people are downloading most, or equally use the forums to see what people are enjoying.

Scenery all in one place... well, it's a mixed blessing, double edged sword, that kinda thing. MSTS was very wasteful of resources, but it meant that everything was self contained. Not having to run around getting permissions to release a route makes it easier to get it released but it makes getting it installed much more difficult unless you've got all the items. It means that there's less to download for the route itself, though the scenery will need downloading if you don't have it... if you do then there's a lot less to download. Packaging? Well remember that an RPK can contain numerous assets, so there's no reason that a route author couldn't do it the "old fashioned" way and seek permission from scenery contributors and then package up an RPK with everything you need. Personally I think it's good, the trick will be for sites like this one to help make it easy to find what you're looking for quickly... and I realise that right now we're not really doing the best job we can on that but I do have some ideas, so rest assured it's on my radar

On Payware...
Ok so i've grumbled about this frequently in the past and it's actually gratifying to see more people sharing the view - whether for the right reasons (IMHO) or not... my position is, I think, quite straight forward - Rail Sim is still very much in its infancy though it is growing now, payware will succeed very well when there's a larger ecosystem of add-ons such that one new loco will be used and re-used in countless ways on countless routes with lots of different stock behind it and so forth. Where MSTS payware developers were producing "complete" add-ons with stock and routes at the same time as a busy freeware community was producing extensive add-ons, which was really the best of both worlds, RS has been struck a double blow because the freeware is coming a lot more slowly and the payware developers can't really produce "complete" add-ons, meaning that RS is just a varied selection of odds and sods that people can put together themselves. It's a start and it's got to start somewhere and by all accounts there is some absolutely stunning stuff out there now both free and pay, to be honest I don't think there's much that's *not* stunning, it's all great. That's part of the problem, expectations are high and therefore the effort to meet those expectations is high. In my view, what's needed is for everyone to build a vibrant ecosystem around the product, get some quantity of stock out there and do whatever it takes to encourage and entice route builders and stock builders to get in to action. Once the ecosystem is throbbing away then there'll be a ripe market place for the payware vendors to make a lot of money producing anything from a single wagon to a whole route.

I suggested in numerous threads that my feeling was that the payware groups would be well served by kicking out some lower quality versions and I'm really pleased to see that 3DTrains have done this with their rural landscapes pack and Digital Traction have done so with the 25 (though I am not saying they have done so as a result of my suggestion, great minds think alike ) I think this is a really fine example of how to encourage things, the payware scenery items market is an odd one because people using it in their routes will force everyone that wants to use their route to get that scenery pack thus reducing their potential audience... but by producing the free low poly version as 3DTrains have done you totally eliminate that barrier, the pack can be used and will look fantastic but if you want a bit more you pay for the upgrade - absolutely spot on. Similarly with DT's loco - RS needs more rolling stock, more variety, there's loads of steam at the moment and much as that's my personal favourite the majority of train sim enthusiasts want *modern* stock like JustTrains' Voyager or the RSC Class 66 for example. DT's Class 25 is a great step in that direction and i'm sure that when they launch the highly detailed version with cab and sounds it will do well, particularly if they make it a "drop over the top" replacement so that it works like 3DTrain's scenery.

I'm a big fan of payware because I think it provides an opportunity to get highly skilled professionals working on add-ons in their day-time jobs which can produce not only great quality but also a lot faster than freeware, which can often match or even better the quality in some cases but will frequently take an awful lot longer to produce since it's being done as a spare time project.

There's a place for both freeware and payware, everyone can work together and I think most in the community are happy to have both on their system, the only problem (as I see it, IMHO etc etc) is that right now it's all a bit small to really take full advantage of the commercial opportunities... I must admit, had I been in a position of power over at RSDL I would have had the team knocking out an unskinned moderately detailed, no cab, no sounds version of every class of uk diesel - let the community skin it and then when you see what's popular you focus on those as payware projects. Ok, so maybe that's not practical but I do know that an MSTS-quality diesel doesn't take too long to do, even for me, my Class 66 for MSTS was only a few days spare time work including the two reskins I did for it and I am about the most inexperienced amateur at it you're going to find... The end-result is that by now we'd have a low poly version of all the diesels done, probably hundreds of community reskins out there and who knows what would have spawned off as a result. Heck, if i'd been in a position of not having to work for someone else every day i'd have a go at knocking them out, even if all it did was encourage others to say "oh thats awful, here's a better one"

Finally, without wanting to curtail peoples freedoms on what they want to say any more than the rules already do, can I just request that people are reasonable about their posts regarding RailWorks. We just frankly don't know the details yet and we likely won't until it's released and we can play with it. If you want to know about whether it will or won't do something and if that will be a deciding factor then simply wait until someone has it and confirms for you or not. There are lots of people on this forum that range from those predicting doom and gloom without facts to those predicting boom and glory equally without facts. I would say, be positive, but let's keep ourselves in check - it's only just around the corner now and then we can talk about the real thing and see how it handles.

Right, I think i've just about bored myself to sleep now, so i'll sign off.

Matt.

[paulz6]

I hope you get well soon Matt, and that it is just a cold and not this 'flying pig' flu (I call it that as it is a mixture bird/swine flu!). If you have any children in the house you are probably better off being on the safe side as it seems this is where the potential danger lies.

I think you have made some very well balanced points.

I position myself between the optimists and the pessimists when it comes to expectations about what RW will bring. I'm not going to expect too much because I am being realistic about what a small team can achieve with complex software. I'm not going to expect no improvements either as that would be failing to give RSC any credit.

[RSAdam]

Some great feedback coming through after all the armageddon prophecies

One thing I'd like to note from a comment by Matt:

I must admit, had I been in a position of power over at RSDL I would have had the team knocking out an unskinned moderately detailed, no cab, no sounds version of every class of uk diesel - let the community skin it and then when you see what's popular you focus on those as payware projects. Ok, so maybe that's not practical but I do know that an MSTS-quality diesel doesn't take too long to do, even for me, my Class 66 for MSTS was only a few days spare time work including the two reskins I did for it and I am about the most inexperienced amateur at it you're going to find... The end-result is that by now we'd have a low poly version of all the diesels done, probably hundreds of community reskins out there and who knows what would have spawned off as a result.

Is there any reason why this comment is aim at the official development team? Surely the latter parts of the above quote clearly indicate that such a direction is open to anyone/group in the community and thus really, it should have already happened.

There is a feeling sometimes that alot of people are waiting (and getting impatient about it) for the official development team to undertake and complete stuff (fixes and updates to the core software aside). Whilst it is still a new situation for this and other communities to be in, where by the developers have daily contact, there must be an acceptance that just because we are around and listening, we arent going to do everything people want. There still needs to be self motivation to build that favourite train or route (Check out my blog to see that even I am doing just that). This is your hobby after all, so why wait to be spoon fed.

There is a growing collective who already feel this way, and im sure they'd all be proud for more to join them. Dont sit on the side line, join in!

Derek has just arrived in the office so I must get back to the grinding wheel!

[NeutronIC]

Hi Adam,

To be honest the only reason it's (gently!) directed at the official dev team is that currently, as far as I know, they're the only ones doing RailSim stuff full time, all the other commercial groups have either disbanded, stopped doing stuff or are not full time. Additionally, the only ones who have a vested interest in RailSim being the most kick-. simulator known to man are RSC themselves, everyone else is out to brutally and mercilessly benefit from that success but one thing i've learned from working at numerous companies is that you cannot rely on anyone else to build things, you have to make it happen. RSC want a successful franchise in order to continue to exist and to grow in to bigger and better things and *my view* (which I am always happy to be told is a load of old hogwash ) is that one way to achieve a stimulus of growth is to flood out some basic models that cover the majority.

Community systems like the ones you find in these simulators need to be nurchered to get them to grow - MSTS benefited because it was really the only one of its kind, it drew people in to find out what the fuss was about and it was new and spangly. It meant lots of people learning something new so they did and they enjoyed it - the result was a load of pretty poor (by todays standards) models but it meant that a lot of the bases actually got covered quite quickly and by a broad range of people, and then over time those units have been replaced and upgraded by various other people or groups to get to where we are at today. I think that Rail Sim has a much harder time of it, it doesn't have most of those things because it's come along third in the genre (MSTS, Trainz, RS) so there aren't so many of the folks that were flocking to learn to build trains, they already know and now they have to decide to build for a new simulator (which I still don't think is as much of a challenge as many people seem to think it is, RS is *not* hard to export to).

I must stress i'm not just sitting here demanding everything for free, if you are only reading that aspect of the post then you do me a dis-service, please re-read it and check your cynicism

It's a challenge, who *can* offer up this injection of life to the franchise? RSC are the obvious candidates as those who potentially have the resources with the skill and a group who obviously are the ones that want it to succeed by any means possible. Who else is there? JustTrains, well, that's not really practical - they don't have a lot of resource at all and with so little being produced by them (don't get me wrong, it's all fantastic stuff, but the top quality stuff takes a lot of time) they need to be seeing a return on everything produced in order to continue justifying it. The other payware groups are all part time if I understand it correctly, so that's not practical. Sure, the freeware community could do it - but then the very problem we're trying to solve here is how to get more response from the community and speed things up a bit. Site owners such as myself are the only other ones with the right impotus, we want the product to excel and do well even if only for purely selfish reasons... but then most of us either aren't great modellers (my hand up) and/or don't have the time.

So i've mentioned the freeware community again, how selfish of me... but in reality, one of the things that happened over and over in the payware field for MSTS was that the vast majority of payware developers *came* from the freeware community. People built up a reputation and a lot of skills working on free stuff and then moved on to producing work that commanded a fee. There aren't many freeware developers that didn't extend to payware or move entirely to payware - so I guess my point here is that by expending some effort in the freeware side of things you're encouraging more people to get the skills in order to take part and do their bit, and then that might encourage a later onward feed in to the payware groups.

Incidentally, I wasn't necessary suggesting that all those diesel models be entirely free or locked to free - put them out as individual units that require work to make them releasable, folks can then learn how to do that and apply the skins, physics and so forth. Payware groups could release skin-sets the same as freeware folks could. You could release the 3ds files for a fee so that payware groups can take them as a starter and build on them to produce higher detailed versions, thus giving the payware side of things a kick start as well.

I appreciate that it's probably too late for any of this now but I just wanted to express my view about how *I* would have done it and why and i'm not moaning about the fact that it wasn't either, I think everyone at RSC does an absolutely fantastic job.

Matt.

[RSAdam]

Hiya,

I still think far to much emphasis is being placed on the official development team spoon feeding the community. We've already survived the on slaught for 18 months (despite many hailing we wouldnt last 6!) and yet there are still claims we're the ones who need to put the effort in. I think (and this is my oppinion not that of RailSimulator.com) that if the community wants more out of RailSim, the community needs to put more in.

RSDL and now RS.com have not been idle for the entire 18 months. We have produced a fair amount including routes, trains, scenarios, reskins, documents, support and thats ontop of fixing, improving and enhancing the core software at the same time. We have proven it can all be done (scenarios included!), and we continue to lay the foundation from which the community can move forward.

The likes of Ben Laws is an amazing influence. He is trying to do stuff way beyond what is provided out of the box, and his enthusiasm and determination to just get on with it encourages us to seek out solutions if he needs any help. Now, be sure, we are not at his service, but even the small addition of his effort does generate community progress. I have always said that the community working with us will always be beneficial to all.

[RSderek]

Never mind Ben( sorry Ben)
King Kevin Martins!

He showed users what could be done from day one.

That man needs to be sent some biscuit medals.

just my random thought for a Wednesday morning.

Adam, get back to work.

[Blackpatch]

Glad to see that RS.com can maintain their sense of humour despite reading the world is about to end. Perhaps for some its holiday time, with summer approaching, may lighten the mood whilst I busy myself in an already immersive Rail Simulator world. That reminds me I must restock the fallout shelter - we can't trust Putin!

BP

[simuk]

The likes of Ben Laws is an amazing influence. He is trying to do stuff way beyond what is provided out of the box, and his enthusiasm and determination to just get on with it encourages us to seek out solutions if he needs any help. Now, be sure, we are not at his service, but even the small addition of his effort does generate community progress. I have always said that the community working with us will always be beneficial to all.

Not specifically picking up on the reference to Ben Laws, as it could apply to anyone that is doing something "new" or "different" and pushing the boundaries, and whilst I'm on the disclaimers, they're my thoughts and not those of Just Trains: I think the problem is that whilst there may well be people with enthusiasm and determination doing things "way beyond what is provided out of the box", it's only those who have worked out how to do that who are able to make any progress - everyone else needs showing that it can be done, and HOW it is done. It's doing that (demonstrating it is possible, and showing what needs to be done) which seems key to getting (more of) the community on board and trying things for themselves. Much like when RS was originally released and lots of things seemed confusing, even simple things like creating a scenario seemed a bit confusing - but people worked out what needed to be done, read the devdocs, and pieced it together and then got that info out to others.

It has always felt to me that a lot of users wrongly think that "it can't be done" or "it doesn't work properly", because they've not seen it (whatever that may be) working, or haven't seen it working the way they were expecting or how it worked in another product - so maybe it does work, but in a different way from Trainz or MSTS for example. Until people know that though, they're understandably going to think something isn't possible, isn't supported, or simply isn't working.