More disappearance

[michbret]

As mentioned in another thread I have 18 scenarios for the IOW including Island Day Liner Rover parts 1 and 2.

That's perfectly possible since, apparently, this problem doesn't hit everybody.

The carrier scenarios shows up with RW_Tools but not in the game since they are corrupted! I know I am not alone since I read several post on Steam forum on the same topic, some not later than yesterday.

I don't care about carrier system scenario and I have backup. What is worrying me is the fact that some people have thing damaged or destroyed when RSC update the game or its DLC.

End users and customers shouldn't have to:
- make constant backup of the game.
- perform cross-checking of what has been touched and what has been messed or deleted.

I have many games and programs that are managed on-line.

Errors or mistakes happens sometimes but they are very rare.
With RSC that's becoming quite common ...

[nigeltouatievans]

As mentioned in another thread I have 18 scenarios for the IOW including Island Day Liner Rover parts 1 and 2.

These are the 'standard' scenarios - the missing ones are the 'Career mode' versions of some of these scenarios that were added at the release of TS2013, but disappeared from the menu during the 10th of January update (along with 3 Career mode scenarios on the Munich-Augsburg route).

As mentioned above there are still files on disk for the scenarios but they are damaged in such a way that they don't appear in the game - to me there is not much difference between removing files altogether or changing them so they don't work any more.

The most disturbing thing about this whole incident for me is that RSC seemed to be completely unaware that any scenarios for those routes had been updated at all on that date, which shows some serious problems with their procedures for releasing updates.

[rgreenrail]

I have all of the Munich to Augsburg career ones, but none of the IOW ones...weird.

[michbret]

Send a ticket like me ...

You'll get the standard automated answer and what I love is the last sentence :

"If we do not receive a response from you in relation to this matter within 28 days we will consider it closed
however please do not hesitate to contact us for further support should you require it"

What does it means ...

We submit a problem to RSC ...
Some are very old like buffers in Glasgow on the WCML, wrong cab view on HST buffers, wrong skies on Allaboard route ... and so on.

They didn't do anything in the allotted slot of 28 days and the problem get dropped.

Clever. if I don't renew my report it will never get solved.

For some of these problems it takes me 10mn to solve it but the next update or the next file verification will erase my solution.

So many problems for such a long time ! Do you think they care their customers ?

Obviously not.

[Carinthia]

What does it means ...

What it means is that the majority of support issues are resolved by the solution they offer but users very rarely acknowledge the fact. This is common and typical in any support service. In order to maintain some semblance of order, it is necessary to close "dead" support tickets and that's how most support services do it.

If you respond further by saying that their solution did not work, the ticket remains open for further investigation.

It is not a RailSimulator.com plot.

The kind of things you refer to are not direct problems with how TS2013 works but a request to modify the product. These are things that RaiSimulator.com support cannot fix for you but need to pass to the developers of the product concerned (who may well be another department within RailSimulator.com but not necessarily so). I'm sure they get a lot of criticisms of products right down to trivia ("there's a fencepost missing") and I'm not justifying any lack of action but more important issues may well get buried in the sheer quantity concerned. Nevertheless I do not believe it is their support service is responsible for this failure.

John

[michbret]

What does it means ...

What it means is that the majority of support issues are resolved by the solution they offer but users very rarely acknowledge the fact. This is common and typical in any support service. In order to maintain some semblance of order, it is necessary to close "dead" support tickets and that's how most support services do it.

If you respond further by saying that their solution did not work, the ticket remains open for further investigation.

John,
You are right. That's a common issue and that's why I always acknowledge when a solution come out. But I was not talking about "personal" problems like "my game doesn't start" but more global issues that affect the product as you rightfully pointed out.

It is not a RailSimulator.com plot.

The kind of things you refer to are not direct problems with how TS2013 works but a request to modify the product. These are things that RaiSimulator.com support cannot fix for you but need to pass to the developers of the product concerned (who may well be another department within RailSimulator.com but not necessarily so). I'm sure they get a lot of criticisms of products right down to trivia ("there's a fencepost missing") and I'm not justifying any lack of action but more important issues may well get buried in the sheer quantity concerned. Nevertheless I do not believe it is their support service is responsible for this failure.

John

I never said that it was a plot from RSC (neither any conspiracy ).

As you said, the kind of thing I referred are targeting the product. When I was talking about support, it was in a global perspective and not restricted to the "support service" which is the first level of interface with users problems. In fact I think that this "support service" is doing quite a good job. Most of the time, when I submit a problem targeting the product I get an answer telling me that the problem has been forwarded to the development team and that's perfectly sensible.

But that is also the beginning of a black hole ...

The problems I took as example are not falling in the category "the product could be better" like "there is a missing fence here".
- The wrongly positioned buffer in Glasgow station (WCML-N) broke some standard scenario that came with the product. In this way the product is functionnaly defective. That's a long time now !
- The HST buffer DLC was correct but TS2012 upgrade broke the cabview : there is a regression. TS2012 is out for more that a year !
- The sky in Allaboard legacy route (C&N and R&C) were correct but not since TS2013 is out. Another regression. TS2013 is out for almost 5 months.

Fixing them is easy when you know the game intrinsics
- WCML : update the tile under the world editor and update the product files in Steam.
- HST buffer : modify the loco bin file to add 10 xml lines (as shown here http://www.ferrosim.es/viewtopic.php?f=80&t=756)
- Allaboard sky : change the sky file to point to the correct one in the Steam product file reference as explained by the route author Rich Garber here http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/s ... ?t=2956137. I solved this months ago by putting the TS2012 version of Assets/Allaboard/Trackplan/TemplatesRoutes/Allaboard_template.bin

So 10 minute per problem but never officially solved. Ticket were sent, officially forwarded to the development team.

I agree, that these problems are not critical but they are accumulating. And RSC unchecked and unannounced updates are adding more regression.

[Carinthia]

As you said, the kind of thing I referred are targeting the product. When I was talking about support, it was in a global perspective and not restricted to the "support service" which is the first level of interface with users problems. In fact I think that this "support service" is doing quite a good job. Most of the time, when I submit a problem targeting the product I get an answer telling me that the problem has been forwarded to the development team and that's perfectly sensible.

Agreed!

But that is also the beginning of a black hole ...

The problems I took as example are not falling in the category "the product could be better" like "there is a missing fence here".
- The wrongly positioned buffer in Glasgow station (WCML-N) broke some standard scenario that came with the product. In this way the product is functionnaly defective. That's a long time now !
- The HST buffer DLC was correct but TS2012 upgrade broke the cabview : there is a regression. TS2012 is out for more that a year !
- The sky in Allaboard legacy route (C&N and R&C) were correct but not since TS2013 is out. Another regression. TS2013 is out for almost 5 months.

I can't speak for the latter two as I don't have them and don't know anything about them but the first illustrates my point exactly.

West Coast Main Line North was developed by a third party and is not a RailSimulator.com product although distributed through them. Your dissatisfaction should surely be aimed at him. There is always a possibility that developers retire, die, lose interest or just vanish into the mist but we know this one is still very active as our tongues are all hanging out for his latest route.

Quite why he can't or won't fix the issue is a puzzle. Like you, I would probably just fix it myself (I can't say I have noticed the issue myself but it isn't a route I use that much) but that is little help to those without such knowledge. It should be fixed and it is wrong that it isn't, but I suspect RailSimulator.com are as powerless as you feel you are.

Regards,

John

PS - I wasn't suggesting that you are submitting "the product should be better" reports - just that your report could get drowned amongst those they do receive.

[alanch]

West Coast Main Line North was developed by a third party and is not a RailSimulator.com product although distributed through them. Your dissatisfaction should surely be aimed at him. There is always a possibility that developers retire, die, lose interest or just vanish into the mist but we know this one is still very active as our tongues are all hanging out for his latest route.

Quite why he can't or won't fix the issue is a puzzle. Like you, I would probably just fix it myself (I can't say I have noticed the issue myself but it isn't a route I use that much) but that is little help to those without such knowledge. It should be fixed and it is wrong that it isn't, but I suspect RailSimulator.com are as powerless as you feel you are.

My recollection from the time that the West Coast update was installed is that Keith said he had supplied a correct version to RSC, but they had sent the wrong version to Steam - since RSC already have a corrected version, I don't think any blame attaches to Keith. Why RSC haven't sorted this out is purely down to them.

[michbret]

West Coast Main Line North was developed by a third party and is not a RailSimulator.com product although distributed through them. Your dissatisfaction should surely be aimed at him. There is always a possibility that developers retire, die, lose interest or just vanish into the mist but we know this one is still very active as our tongues are all hanging out for his latest route.

Quite why he can't or won't fix the issue is a puzzle. Like you, I would probably just fix it myself (I can't say I have noticed the issue myself but it isn't a route I use that much) but that is little help to those without such knowledge. It should be fixed and it is wrong that it isn't, but I suspect RailSimulator.com are as powerless as you feel you are.

My recollection from the time that the West Coast update was installed is that Keith said he had supplied a correct version to RSC, but they had sent the wrong version to Steam - since RSC already have a corrected version, I don't think any blame attaches to Keith. Why RSC haven't sorted this out is purely down to them.

I got the same kind of report from Richard Garber about issues with its routes when we acquire them through Steam (so through RSC). Corrections were sent to RSC but took age or never went to Steam.

So whether Keith and Richard are big liars, whether RSC is not doing its work properly.

[AndyUK]

West Coast Main Line North was developed by a third party and is not a RailSimulator.com product although distributed through them. Your dissatisfaction should surely be aimed at him. There is always a possibility that developers retire, die, lose interest or just vanish into the mist but we know this one is still very active as our tongues are all hanging out for his latest route.

Quite why he can't or won't fix the issue is a puzzle. Like you, I would probably just fix it myself (I can't say I have noticed the issue myself but it isn't a route I use that much) but that is little help to those without such knowledge. It should be fixed and it is wrong that it isn't, but I suspect RailSimulator.com are as powerless as you feel you are.

My recollection from the time that the West Coast update was installed is that Keith said he had supplied a correct version to RSC, but they had sent the wrong version to Steam - since RSC already have a corrected version, I don't think any blame attaches to Keith. Why RSC haven't sorted this out is purely down to them.

I got the same kind of report from Richard Garber about issues with its routes when we acquire them through Steam (so through RSC). Corrections were sent to RSC but took age or never went to Steam.

So whether Keith and Richard are big liars, whether RSC is not doing its work properly.

Perhaps an unfortunate choice of phrase in the last sentence but I see where you're coming from. I think the old saying 'If a job's worth doing it's worth doing well' applies in the case of the two gentlemen mentioned, but from time to time RSC have an unfortunate habit of not showing that they believe in it. Still as Steam Pipe is supposed to make updates easier we can live in hope.

Andy L

[gptech]

You can see that many xml tags are ill formed like <RBlueprintSetPreLoad /> : There is a blank between the tag name and the /

Luckily, this doesn't crash the game when it launches (a common issue with ill formatted xml files).

No, it won't crash the game as that is valid .xml syntax, so the problem would appear to be how the game reads the file.

[Carinthia]

My recollection from the time that the West Coast update was installed is that Keith said he had supplied a correct version to RSC, but they had sent the wrong version to Steam - since RSC already have a corrected version, I don't think any blame attaches to Keith. Why RSC haven't sorted this out is purely down to them.

If that is the case then perhaps both parties need their heads knocking together. I'm sure there must be contractural agreements between both parties concerning the provision of upgrades and fixes and if one or the other has failed on that front the opposite party should be chasing them up. I do not accept that the developer has no responsibility for such failings. If he finds RailSimulator.com do not play their part of the bargain to ensure his routes work as they should, why is he continuing to use their distribution system for new products? To walk away and say the equivalent of "they've done it wrong, its their pigeon" (which may or may not be true) is no way to treat customers.

John

[gptech]

Surely it's the publishers responsibility to roll out updates or fixes etc, with the proviso that they decide what and when. If a developer passes such an item to the publisher and the publisher doesn't distribute it there's very little the developer can do---you've mentioned contractual obligations, and probably the major one will assign all rights and ownership to the publisher.

[AndiS]

What we see here is simply the conundrum of our times: Great technical advances are made, however, they are connected to big money which comes from big companies which have big administrations which have big inertia. So while in theory, any fix could be placed in the right place without you even noting, in practice, a little content change from the subcontractor of one of Valve's clients, for a product that only sells in 4-digit figures, maybe, is the least of concerns for a company selling to the millions.

Therefore, unless Steam would not force the old, bugged file back onto your hard disk, the solution would be to download the few Kilobytes from the original creator's web page (assuming he has one). As it stands now, there is very little that we can do.

Maybe one day, somebody comes up with an auto-updater that is triggered whenever Steam verifies cache and restores those files which should not have been modified. Actually, you could achieve that with any backup programme, but it is tiresome to pick out all the files concerned, and only the right ones. That assumes that the original creators distribute their fixes themselves, of course.