Minimalistic Long Routes

[bigvern]

There's been a bit of a discussion going on at TS - http://www.trainsim.com/vbts/showthread ... pretations. - regarding whether it is time to start looking at creating really big expansive routes with loads of potential for long drives and operations, but at the expense of most of the scenic detail? Both styles have their strong and weak points but I still have fond memories of driving from Euston to Glasgow in the old Train Driver 3 or similar programmes. The only way we are ever going to see that in RW is to adopt a much more frugal approach to scenery placement and terrain painting. So rather than trying to create individual towns and villages and every piece of woodland or small stream, use generic scattered buildings to represent towns etc. and focus on representing the infrastructure. Some compromise on track layout would also be inevitable - e.g. the yards at Willesden or Crewe South.

Another issue is performance - the best known long(ish) route is WCML North, a superb work of art but it can bring PC's to their knees and prone to SBHH crashes.

The 30 mile routes are okay but there is a limit to how many times you can drive an hour one way, then back again.

Minimal routes can still look good - BVE/OpenBVE is an example - and rarely is there any loss of immersion when it comes to the driving experience.

[partyspiritz]

Hi Vern

In the msts days I loved big routes and long trains good in cab audio from the radio. Nice line side detail. As you know there was some very good ones done.
Building one I think needs to be a team build. Fields in the us are as big citys the use of new textures could make it work


Regards


John

[bigvern]

Yes there were some ckassics. Thames Mersey was one of my favourites and a good idea of how compromise can work - the distances and gradients were accurate, but Euston and Camden Bank were much simplified. However you still felt as if you were driving in and out of the real Euston.

[Kromaatikse]

I think there is potential for a route like this, especially now that Area Fill scenery has been made easy - use that for your towns and forests! There probably is a minimum level of scenery required for reasonable immersion, but starting with a DEM, forests, towns and stations can't hurt - together with required track furniture of course. And once the main line is in place, it should be easy to add relevant branches and diversions.

There are already some "big network" routes for Railworks, but until RW3 they tended to scrape the upper limit of the engine's capabilities and therefore caused many crashes. RW3 seems to have improved efficiency in *some* areas so that these routes are less prone to problems. (Granted, not all areas have improved, but this is one of them.) One factor at play here is that the "big network" routes may have been quite liberal with the asset library required.

This is one of the areas where freeware holds an advantage - you know upfront that you aren't going to get any money, so the "commercial risk" factor falls away. It's just a matter of how much time you want to put into it.

[msey0002]

I certainly would. In fact, I would prefer such a route over the one currently available to us.

Edinburgh to Glasgow and GARL are by far my favourite routes. Why? Minimal scenery, great FPS, focusing on a great driving experience. One problem with them: too short and not much scope for scenarios!

[paulz6]

You do make some interest points in that thread Vern.
The problem with short but detailed routes is that they take a long time to produce. In the end, especially if set in the modern day, the scope for scenarios is very limited. People will enjoy driving it a few times, go wow that is good, and then get bored with it very quickly.
It's certainly the case that too much time can be spent on areas that even if visible from the cab, the effect is not that dramatic.
If the scenery is too minimalistic then people will not be impressed. Some may enjoy driving it more though.
I suspect the ideal answer lays somewhere in between, so I haven't voted either way. There is definitely room for both types in freeware, but I expect it is easier to impress no one than impress everyone.

[haddock1000]

There are some routes that can be justified to be minimalistic. One example is the london underground...

thanks,

haddock1000

[nobkins]

Why not a team project?

Best of both worlds. If one person can make a detailed route that is 20 miles long in 3 months. This is the theory behind TPR. In terms of the team approach TPR is very relaxed. People come and go as they please. As they are all volunteers I can hardly argue with that

However if a dedicated team of experienced builders were to get together then I am sure that progress could be relatively rapid.

I have often said that I am more than willing to help people with team route building (I have been doing it for a while and it is quite easy to do when you know how). Only two people have ever taken me up on the offer and they were more to allow 2 people to work together (a partnership) rather than a team.

Does anybody want to try and put a team effort together? If you do shout and I will help.

Jim

[haddock1000]

I will say, if someone wants a fast track layer, then I'm up for it. As long as someone gives me the info, then I'm off!

thanks,

haddock1000

[bigvern]

A team project was tried for the Blackpool Tramway but with minimal contributors coming forward... I guess it depends on the prototype.

As an experiment today I actually laid pretty much all the track from Oxenholme to Penrith (30 miles), barring the industrial and quarry spurs which can be added in as part of the scenery process. Obviously things get a bit more complex in some areas but on that basis I reckon you could lay out the track mileage from Euston to Glasgow in around three weeks, assuming some compromise and a "corridor" style approach. Which is why, as we were discussing at TS, it would actually be quite easy to give users a fully operational and functional Euston to Glasgow in, ballpark figure, three to four months using a minimal approach to scenery. Now try to apply full detail to that little lot and you're probably looking at around 18 months at a minimum to get it up and running.

Well I'll see how things progress with the project, it's something to occupy me over the coming winter months and I think I've had my fill of creating 20 - 30 mile projects so this is something to get my teeth into. Incidentally the plan if it gets to that stage is to do my own interpretation of Carlisle to Glasgow, it's not bolted on to the "official" WCML North, in fact at present it's not even ticked as a provider to avoid any potential issues using content from that route to avoid any accusations of plagiarism (though I would like to use the catenary).

[paulz6]

Have you tried to lay this with easements? I like your spirit. It will take time to do a better job than that is what is already on offer though.

[bigvern]

I'm sticking with conventional track laying methods, other than stepping the gradient changes... I've struggled to get my head around easements and failed so will leave this aspect well alone.

This is being done as something of a personal challenge and it's not intended to rival or compete with anything else, assuming it even gets to a stage where it might be worth sharing. I just want to see if it is possible to do a low detail - long mileage route, for the "thrash"...

[bdy26]

I voted no, but I applaud your efforts, that's quite a bit of track laying. I've been doing some surveying for Shap and was even shouted at by farmers at Low Gill, but the more railworks the better. E-G is a good way to do minimalism, but I think there's much can be done with textures and block placement.

B

[moranb]

It is probably fairly obvous from my Dublin-Cork route that I like to include a considerable level of detail in a route. But there is no doubt that this is extremely time-consuming. I began building that route in November 2007 just after the first release of Railsimulator and work in scenicking it is still ongoing, almost four years later. At this stage, 130 miles out of approx 180 miles has been completed. Of course, I work only on the route in my spare time, usually for a couple of hours in the late evening and weekends and I have also had to build from scratch the trains and most of the scenery assets for the route.

Frankly, setting out the track is the easiest part of route building. In my case, all of the track for Dublin-Cork was completed in the first three months of route building.

I doubt that I personally would be very interested in driving a non-scenicked route - or even a sparsly scenicked route. I seldom drive my own route beyond the area that I have scenicked. I find it hard to imagine how I could spend hours looking at a monitor watching the same unvarying green expanse pass by. But I agree that there is a limit to the number of times one can drive the same short route without an element of boredom setting in (though good or innovative scenarios can make even the shortest routes interesting). Perhaps the 'team' idea of building medium length routes (70 - 100 miles) would be the most sensible way to go.

BFM

[TractorBasher]

Great swathes of scenery rolling out to the far distance do not particularly interest me in a route. So long as the view from the cab is accurately detailed, I don't mind if there's nothing much beyond the railway boundary. Thomson's Edinburgh-Glasgow and GARL routes are perfect examples of what I would consider the ideal for minimal scenery. For me, and I would imagine the vast majority of others, RailWorks is all about the driving experience, so that should be the primary concern.