Trainz Magazine January 2010

Easy Switch Fix... Perfect for most cases!!!!

Mining, Logging and Fun….

How To Properly Back Up Your Route

Cover Story

Volume 2 Issue 2

January 2010

Fross & Canyon Cut Railroad

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Topic Page

From the Editor

Notes and News

Auran News

Routes, Chaos Theory, and YOU!

How To Properly Back Up Your Route

Easy Switch Fix

Cover Story

Fross & Canyon Cut Railroad

Top 5 Games

TM Business

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We all enjoy reading and looking at the beautiful screenshots that are posted on the Trainz Forums by some of our best route builders, but you can’t help but ask how do they do it?

It is a very simple answer to this that can be broken down to two parts. One, they use specific content and two, they have an eye for detail. If you look at most of these “master pieces” of screenshots you will see that the creator will re-use the same item over and over. Why? Because these creators are very picky on the items they use. The qualifications of these items are chosen based upon the following: texture, shape, and authenticity. These three values determine the objects use or not. Choose objects that have a good texture pallet, preferably textures cre-ated from real photographs of the real thing that the object was modeled after. The shape and the authenticity will be mostly decided by you.

What is the first thing you look at when you see a screen-shot created by these artistic route builders? You probably look at the ground, much to the contrary that many Trainzers believes the ground is probably one of the most important parts of a route, the tex-tures and how buildings, grass and trees are laid out. Look out your win-dow, do you see just plain textures outside, or do you see objects stick-ing up? You obviously see objects, there is no place on Earth that does not have some type of living organism. So when creating your routes keep this in mind to put grass that matches the textures as well as mix-ing grass colors in areas you think more sun would be and so on. Using this method is very intense for low end graphics card, I would suggest when using lower end cards to put tall and spleen grass following tracks, buildings, and rivers or in other words focus areas.

James Tell-

Epoche3bis4

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Send your news or notes to: [email protected]

2 bay Cement Hoppers By amtrakey

Hey Trainz Fans and Users. This is my first time building USA con-tent. For my Site I will be releasing these 2 Bay Cement Hoppers. Found on many Railroads. The first set of hoppers will be printed with the Maryland Midland logo on them.

New Payware Shop By JRT

Jankvis has recently opened a new Trainz Payware shop for her new 3D trees and grass that they have created. www.jvctrees.com

How to Add thumbnails to Assets By Gerbils

Thank you all but that’s not how i did it, you all left out one important step, so for all the people who look at this here is what you do. 1. go into content creator plus 2. right click on the map thing and click on the one that says thumbnails 3. click on the 0 under thumbnails which if you clicked right it should be under the kuid table things 4. go to the ... click on it 5. get your picture 6. set width to 240, height to 180. 7. save and exit the content creator plus 8. DO NOT REVERT!!! right click on your asset, and click commit, and it will commit the changes.

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TS2010: TUTORIALS COMING SOON... I've only had Trainz 2010 for a week or so, and every day I try something new in it, and it just keeps getting better and better. Reading comments like these on our forums has caused us to think more about getting the most from your Trainz experience. With this in mind we will be developing a series of tutorials to introduce you to elements of the simulation. Keep an eye on future newsletters for information and guides on how to use the many features of TS2010:EE.

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So earlier today I discovered a fun little way of coming up with realistic fictional routes I thought I'd share with you all. I had been making some little LDE tiles when I came up with the idea of using them in a game of '52-card pickup'.(For those who don't know, LDE's, or Layout Design Elements, are little modular pieces you can use containing various track and scenery objects you combine into a larger layout. I believe Slugsmasher used something similar on the Clear Lake Logging route.) What I did was take the stack of LDE cards I made and sprayed them all over the floor. What re-sulted was a completely random, unique, and semi-prototypical track plan. I simply only needed to rotate the cards in place on the floor to get them to somewhat line up with each other, and then did a little doodle of how I thought they'd fit together. Here's what I came up with:

Forgive the poor picture quality, my camera isn't used to tak-ing low-light interior pho-tos. I in-cluded the red squares as shown in the mockup image on the bottom to il-lustrate each of the individ-ual LDE pieces. Of course, I got lucky on my first try. You may not get every-thing where it should be right off the bat (like a roundhouse out in the middle of no-where, for example), but that's the nature of randomness, and part of the fun!

By Xengeance

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Here is the method I use to get a complete backup of my routes. This will allow you to import the route again into a freshly installed TS of the same build or later than that which was used to create the route. This will work for TS2006 and TS2009. I don't recall how I used to backup in TS2004, but it is somewhat different. 1) Open CMP 2) Select the "My Content" tab 3) Left-Click to highlight the route and the session you want to back up. Make sure you also have the session for the route highlighted. 4) Right-Click on the highlighted route and select Save to CDP 5) Accept the default name or type in another. Select a folder to save your route. Note: Never save the route to the same hard drive as where you have TS installed. You want to be able to recover your route if the HDD crashes. I highly recommend a removable (USB, etc) drive. 6) Click the SAVE button to create the CDP file. This process can take some time if the route is large and/or complex. Now, you must also back up the route's Dependencies. If you fail to do so, you will need to re-download those that are not built-in content from DLS, or if you have created your own assets, you will need to find them after the route is restored. The method outlined below is much easier: 1) Again in CMP on the My Content tab, Left-Click to select the route you want to back up. 2) Right-Click on the highlighted route and select View Dependencies from the menu. 3) Click the button "View in Main List". This will open up the main list showing all dependencies for the route. 4) Click any item in the list, then press CTL+A or Right-Click and "Select ALL" to select the entire list 5) As you did for the route, Right-Click (make sure that all items are highlighted), and select Save to CDP from the menu 6) Type in a name for the dependencies. This must be a unique name, not the same as the name you saved the route as. I recommend using route name_dependencies as the file name. You should save the dependencies to the same folder where you saved the route file. 7) Click the SAVE button, and go have a cup of coffee, tea, or whatever you prefer. If the route is large and/or complex, this process will take some time. When you need to restore your route, you simply import the cdp file for the route (and session), and the one for the dependencies and you will have your route back the way it was before the crash.

By Fwassner

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I perform this operation about once per week if I am actively adding or removing content on my route, or less often if I am not. I frequently save my working routes to cdp on a separate hard drive. Always use SAVE AS when saving your route from Surveyor. Give each saved route a slightly different name so you know which one is the most recent. Each night I save the last 3 revs of the route I have been working on to cdp. Then, I delete all but the last three to save space and to reduce the number of routes I have to scroll through in the Surveyor menu to find my latest rev. It is very important to remember that you cannot restore a route to a previous version or build of TS. If you created the route in TS2009 SP1, build 38599, you will not be able to open that route in any build prior to 38599, but you will be able to open it in a future build. When you really want to create a permanent backup, copy your cdp files to CD or DVD. I hope that you will find this little tutorial helpful, and may your Trainz dayz be crash free!

Ever stumble upon a time when adding a turnout is not going to allow smooth operation? Have a large over-steer part where if the switch is hit, the train will go from curve to curve, not in a smooth transition? I have a reasonably realistic solution. I have included a few pictures for ref-erence to see if your doing it right. Now, on to the tip. As shown in fig. 1, the turnout is very messed up. To correct this, I first add another vertex point behind the points, as shown in fig. 2 to isolate the track I'm using as not to disrupt the rest of the track. Then, in fig. 3 I straightened the isolated track section, thus causing a smooth turnout meant for smooth operation. In fig. 4, the result of the "Quick Fix" is obvious.

Figure 1: After adding a turnout to a curve, I found the result was horrid.

Figure 2: Adding a vertex point before the points allows com-plete isolation.

Figure 3: Using the straightening tool will fix the over-bent rail.

The result is a smooth turnout.

By Santa Fe Buff

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By Jonathan Parrott (bigboy4010)

Mining, Logging and Fun…. Fross & Canyon Cut RailroadFross & Canyon Cut RailroadFross & Canyon Cut RailroadFross & Canyon Cut Railroad

I've just recently released the narrow gauge railroad Fross and Canyon Cut. It is a nice-sized map with a 30in (36in in another version) railroad that serves three towns and a mining branch. There is a fleet of six engines (soon to be seven and eventually will be at nine or more) re-skinned in the livery of the railroad. There is a standard gauge line that runs through the map and transfers supplies between the narrow gauge and itself. There is a also a short 2ft gauge logging branch with very steep grades and tight turns. The F&CC line follows a river through a forest and a canyon and out onto a grassy plain with aspens groves dotted on the landscape. The mining branch travels up a large mountain and visits several different coal mines, two of which are quite large. The whole railroad itself is quite a scenic ride, and with several different industries, it has plenty of operational opportunities.

The railroad and the re-skinned engines are available on my website, www.parrottrailroad.com. My Trainz name is Bigboy4010. Thank you for your consideration in putting this into the Trainz magazine.

This months cover story is written by Jonathan Parrott (Bigboy4010). He wrote a short review of his route that will be seen by hundreds of Trainz Members. Next month we want to have another user submitted cover story so let this be your chance to have your route as the Trainz Magazine cover story. Send your review of your routes or someone elses to: [email protected].

Engine #1 (originally made by Bdaneal) pulls out of Fross with the noon passenger service.

Engine #5 (originally made by David111767) heads away from the Canyon Cut sawmill with a train of woodchips and lumber, all for bound for Fross.

Zapperjet's shay makes its way out of the logging camp, while in the background the town of Fross is visible.

Prowler901's K-28 hauls a long passenger train up the canyon as a storm rages through the area.

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Thought of by many, Murchison 2 was proba-bly one of the best routes ever created for Trainz. This updated version created only for TS2009WBE allowed users to enjoy this route in Native Mode, which was one of the reasons it is number four on are list. The route included about 180 baseboards and more than 1,000 hours in the making.

A shooting game in Trainz Magazine? You saw right, number 3 on the Top Games by N3V Games is Killing Floor. Killing Floor is a Co-Op Survival horror allowing you to play in solo or multiplayer modes. You choose about 10 maps and shoot “species” in the amount of waves you set or the server sets.

Contrary to the many complaints you might read on the discussion forums, TS2010EE is one of the more stable games developed by Auran. With its new features and fixes TS2010EE makes it to number 2 on are list.

Number 1 on our list is the highly acclaimed TRS2004. Trainz 2004 is known for its stabil-ity and also having the largest amount of con-tent created for it. TRS2004 truly is the best version of Trainz.

Every one has a favorite game, they love one part of this or hate another part. The TM Crew has looked at the pros and cons of each of the games that N3V Games (Auran) has published or developed in their 14 years of business. Here is our list of the top 5 games we believe deserve to be mentioned. Next months issue of Trainz Magazine will include the results of The Best Route of 2009 voting, will be held later this month

Ship Simulator 2008 by Auran thought of as one of the closest relatives to the Trainz Fran-chise. Ship Simulator 2008 or ShipSim2008 allows players to roam around harbors in mul-tiplayer or single. In single, you also have the option to play in challenge mode.

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All content in Trainz Magazine is copyrighted by Trainz Magazine Publishing, Inc. owned and oper-ated by Tellman Enterprise. All ideas or comments in Trainz Magazine are those of the creator of the articles, summaries, etc. and do not represent the views by management of Tellman Enter-prise.

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Credits

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Copyright ©2008-2010 by Tellman Enterprise LLC

Trainz Magazine January 2010

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Transcript of Trainz Magazine January 2010