NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.52 September 2021]

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PikkaBird
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by PikkaBird »

NekoMaster wrote:I can handle lack of regearing, but removal of generations means there will be gaps here and there with missing locomotives.
Bollocks. Let's look at what generational diesels are actually "missing", shall we?

EMD F Unit: The 1350hp FT and 1750hp F9 are both included in the new set, leaving out only the 1500hp F3. This "missing loco" is a mere 150hp more powerful than the FT, and 100hp less powerful than the Alco FA and RF-16 which are introduced around the same time.

EMD E Unit: The first generational upgrade for the E unit was merely graphical, with identical stats to the earlier model. The final E Unit generation gained a measly 250hp.

Alco PA: Almost identical to the E unit, a 250hp upgrade has been removed. Complete waste of space.

Alco FA: The 2.5 model is the more powerful 1600hp FA2. The "gap" created by the loss of the FA1 is four years and -100hp.

GE UB, GE UC, Alco Century: The choice of a different generation for each of these units means they're no longer quite such carbon copies of each other.

And that's about it. On the other hand, the addition of a GE Dash 8 fills a gap that previously existed, and there are still surely enough duplicate and pointless locomotives in the set to keep any foamer happy. :)
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by NekoMaster »

I Didn't see a EMD F9, I saw a FP9, but the FP9 isn't really ment for freight vs the F9

I was hoping before there would be an update for NARS 2.0 to fix a few bugs and maybe add new locomotives, but now I'm disapointed in the removal of features. I'm going to continue to use 2cc trains NML or the old NARS 2.0 until someone fixes something.

Like I siad before I'd fix this my self if I could, and I really wish I could, but something in my head makes it impossible to understand programming/NFO/NML
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by Supercheese »

I always thought that generational vehicles were more for gap-filling during the early steam era, rather than later diesels - there are gobs of diesels to choose from...
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by Spirit of Trains »

Me and my blabber mouth...
Yep, I'm sorry about the complaints. But seriously, what's the grand scheme in all this? I do kinda like rewrites of sets that were introduced a while ago, like this one. Plus, I'm that kind of person who likes to know things. Why's that, I do not know. Maybe it's that I believe that knowledge, instead of cash, is power. I actually kind of plan on doing my own US train set complete with some other features, but I don't exactly have the time, as I'm stuck in my Junior year at high school. It's a pain having to go to 8 different classes in one day, along with some REALLY annoying people coupled to it (oops, train pun). I guess I need to start scheduling (dang it, another one!) and work it out when I have the time. Anyways, great .grf, looking forward to another update sooner or later, and thanks for putting up 2.03 as free code!
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by Pack man »

Just a quick scan through the vehicle lists and I picked some pros and cons:

Pros:
More electrics
None of the fuel cells
Baldwin Sharknose got renamed to the RF-16
semi-adjustable running costs.

Somewhere in between:
No regearing. I really didn't use it much lately. But now it seems necessary to upgrade power, Which I like
Alco Century is the C630. Should come out a couple of years earlier if that model.
Mallet still really slow. Realistic, but IMO speed could be bumped up to 55-60 mph just to make it useable
Freight car speed as a whole seem to be more playable, but a few don't make sense to me (why 2 60' tank cars, container flat and double stack are kinda slow, something seems missing between the 2 livestock cars, large hopper seems to come out really early)
Glad to see the Challenger stayed, but I think it needed to be more powerful and maybe a little bit faster.

Cons:
Color schemes for locomotives are all over the place (would it be possible to have separate grfs dedicated to each of the previous 4 schemes?)
C40-8 looks like the C36-7 (I can fix that), and maybe speed could be set to 75 mph...
SD40-2 really could use an upgrade to 70 mph to make it competitive with locomotives made years before it (70 mph was a real common ratio for them too)
FT graphics are wrong, but that might be due to a complex coding issue with the "shorter" B-units.
GP60 is only the GP60M and GP60B???
Nothing I made is in. (shameless plug)

I'm not counting generational stuff... But FWIW, the F3 came out 5 years before the FA-2 (which is what the FA in the new NARS represents). IMO, making the FA the FA-1 (1946 with 1500 hp) would help things a lot. as the FA-2, RS-3 and Baldwin RF-16 are all really similar...

But if the code is simpler, maybe I can figure it out and add stuff to it. Would be nice if there was a program that could make a simple grf.

Edit, just curious, did you re-use the original NARS2 graphics for this set? Or did you modify them with the reduced height thing you mentioned in your blog?
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by Marshy »

'Quick' scan?

These replies are becoming quite the head scratcher for me, it has been re-iterated multiple times that you can refer back to the previous release if the 'new' updates aren't to a players liking, there is nothing stopping anybody from doing this and just because it's the latest edition doesn't force you to have to play it. I mean by all means, leave feedback as you will, but there are quite a lot of concerns and complaints being voiced here which is resulting in a pile of negativity for Pikka's efforts.

So yeah, the feedback could have a little more optimism about it, 'you get what you're given' as they say, and you were given a previous release with all the *now* missing features, and there is no reason why you can't keep playing that one.

(this isn't directed at any particular member btw, just at the general opinion and feedback on the new update).
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by NekoMaster »

I like Pikka Birds works, but recently Pikka has become more restrictive with their GRFs. While their GRF's are coded for add-on support, I'm starting to find more and more coders are becoming restrictive and "gameplay" oriented.

I want realism and options like real life railroads, not watered down toys.

I don't mean to be an arse but while this new update added some things, this is starting to feel like Windows 7 vs Windows 8
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by arikover »

Although I do not understand exactly why there are 2 60' tank wagons, I find NARS 2.5 a pleasant grf to use. Actually I prefer this version over 2.03. A good choice of engines, but not too much. Autorefit. Less restrictions. Autorefit. Different livery variations within one company. Did I mention autorefit?

For those who don't like 2.5 and still don't want to play with 2.03, the author has been kind enough to allow everyone to freely use his work. It takes a lot of time to code, but overall it is not so difficult.
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by andythenorth »

NekoMaster wrote:I like Pikka Birds works, but recently Pikka has become more restrictive with their GRFs.
I think you mean 'less restrictive'. :D Fewer BAD FEATURES to get in the way of playing the game.

Still, can't never please a foamer. There'll always be a misplaced rivet. :twisted:
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by PikkaBird »

Spirit of Trains wrote:But seriously, what's the grand scheme in all this?
Okay, here's the thinking, the future of NARS, the big plan!

I did this recode because, despite all the game-breaking "features", people are unaccountably still playing NARS. After all these years it's still popular, for some reason, and I wanted a better answer to the constant questions about why regearing broke full-load and industry sets, why locos got less powerful when you added cars, and why you couldn't autoreplace one generational loco with another, and why there was no refitting in stations.

I'm not planning to work on NARS any further. I have zero interest in it. 2.5 is a service to the community to fix that which was broken.
NekoMaster wrote:I Didn't see a EMD F9, I saw a FP9, but the FP9 isn't really ment for freight vs the F9
A freight geared F9 would be literally 100% identical to the GP9, so what would be the point?
arikover wrote:I do not understand exactly why there are 2 60' tank wagons
A black oil tanker and a coloured chemical tanker - same as in Pineapple. Refitting in stations means that it's less desirable to have vehicles change livery based on cargo (as they did in NARS before), but I thought people might still want the option. :)
Pack man wrote:did you re-use the original NARS2 graphics for this set? Or did you modify them with the reduced height thing you mentioned in your blog?
I did as little work as possible - I certainly didn't redraw every single sprite. :)
NekoMaster wrote:I'd love to be able to work on the set or an addon, but I just can't rap my head around NFO or NML, no matter how long I stare at tutorials or code.
The trick is to start, rather than staring and waiting for it to all fall into place. :roll:

This is the code block for an 8/8 diesel loco. It's really simple. All you'd have to do to make a new loco is change the sprites, the vehicle ID in a few places and the stats:

Code: Select all

 // 19 - SD9

 2101 * 13	 04 00 7F 01 19 "EMD SD9" 00

 2102 * 4	 01 00 01 08
 2103 SPRITES\na_set_basics\new_gp9.pcx 300 50 01 24 8 -3 -12
 2104 SPRITES\na_set_basics\new_gp9.pcx 316 50 09 17 22 -14 -9
 2105 SPRITES\na_set_basics\new_gp9.pcx 348 50 01 12 32 -16 -8
 2106 SPRITES\na_set_basics\new_gp9.pcx 396 50 09 17 22 -6 -9
 2107 SPRITES\na_set_basics\new_gp9.pcx 428 50 01 24 8 -3 -12
 2108 SPRITES\na_set_basics\new_gp9.pcx 444 50 09 17 22 -14 -9
 2109 SPRITES\na_set_basics\new_gp9.pcx 476 50 01 12 32 -16 -8
 2110 SPRITES\na_set_basics\new_gp9.pcx 524 50 09 17 22 -6 -9


 2111 * 9	 02 00 10 01 01 00 00 00 00
 2112 * 9	 02 00 c0 01 01 00 00 00 00

// Sound Effects

 2113 * 18	 02 00 33 81 10 00 ff 02
4d 80 01 01 // start
4d 80 02 02 // tunnel
00 00 // fail

 2114 * 14	 02 00 10 81 0c 00 ff 01 33 00 33 33 10 00  


// basic variable running cost (25% when loading). note two places to insert running cost value.

 2115 * 15	 02 00 0d 85 1a 40 \w42 \w0 \w4 00   //  (input running cost in this line)
00 00 // fail

 2116 * 17	 02 00 0d 86 b4 00 ff ff 01 // b4 = speed
0d 00 \w0 \w0 		// return running cost/4
\b42 80 			// return running cost (input running cost in this line)



 2117 * 14	 02 00 36 81 10 00 ff 01
0d 00 0d 0d
00 00 // fail

// callback 36 chains
 2118 * 14	 02 00 10 81 0c 00 ff 01
36 00 36 36
10 00

 2119 * 10	 03 00 01 19 01 ff c0 00 10 00

 2120 * 101	 00 00 \b40 01 19 // sd9

	00 \w0						// intro date
	2A \d1-1-1954				//long-format intro date
	02 \b20						// reliability
	03 \b30						// vehicle life
	04 \b60						// model life
	05 00						// track type
	06 0f						// climate
	07 \b5						// load speed	
	09 68 00					// speed
	0b \w1750					//power
	16 \b166 					//weight
	24 00 						//high weight
	1f \b40 					// tractive effort
	17 \b45 					//cost
	0d \b42 					//runcost
	21 00						// shorten
	22 28						// visual effect
	19 08						// traction type
	0e 30 4C 00 00				//runcost base
	12 FD
	13 00						//dualhead
	14 00						//capacity
	15 00						//cargo type
	08 00						// passenger engine
	18 00 						//AI rank (deprecated)
	1A 80 						// sort list
	1B \w0 						// addpower (no)
	1C \b0						// refit cost
	1d 00 00 00 00 				// refit mask (no)
	1e 81 						// callbacks
	20 00						// air drag
	23 00 						//addweight (no)	
	25 00 						//user defined bitmask
	26 \b20 					//retire early
	27 1a						//misc flags
	28 00 00 					//refittable classes
	29 00 00					//non-refittable classes
	2B \w185					//cargo aging period
	2C 00						//always allow cargos
	2D 00						//never allow cargos	 
I've attached a text file with some more NFO examples, and the framework you'd need to turn it into a proper .grf. Alternatively, you could find someone with experience and enthusiasm to turn it into an NML project.
NekoMaster wrote:I want realism and options like real life railroads, not watered down toys.
"Realism" is not the same thing as "historically accurate". NUTS is unrealistic; Pineapple isn't, despite being completely fictional. OpenTTD is a game; you're working in a fictional space, and you can build "realistically" with fictional vehicles. As for "options"? Is it realistic that, when introducing a new service, you have a smorgasbord of 40 years' worth of locomotive models to choose from? Of course not! Real-life railroads are caught up in politics and budgets and time constraints, real-life manufacturers don't like running more concurrent production lines than absolutely necessary, and real-life locomotives take time to design, to build, and to ship. Real-life railroads sometimes get vehicles designed for their particular needs, sometimes take anything they can get, and sometimes get oddball equipment foisted upon them. There's nothing even remotely realistic about vehicle selection in NARS that isn't also present in Pineapple or any other well-designed vehicle set. :)
Attachments
NARS Code Snippets.txt
(25.19 KiB) Downloaded 207 times
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by Pack man »

I tried using grfmaker to do a quick "test" project. Turns out the output is incompatible with OTTD... Of course that was after spending a whole day to figure the thing out... ;(

I'm gonna take a look at what you posted pikka. Maybe I can figure it out and come up with something. I just wish it was a simple as the code for some games I've messed with before...
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by Pack man »

Well I've been tinkering around trying to get a very basic newgrf file. Unfortunately I still get nothing. GRFcodec gives me a .new file. GRFwizard keeps giving me a message about not using PCX files...

I've followed the tutorials as best as I could. I'm probably doing something wrong (I'm a mechanical engineer, not a computer engineer), but I am beginning to wonder if my computer (the very last HP anything I will ever purchase) is capable of even running these programs right.
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by PikkaBird »

Don't use grfwizard or any of those ancient half-baked programs. grfcodec and nforenum (included in the grfcodec package) are all you need if you're going to use nfo.
Pack man wrote:GRFcodec gives me a .new file.
If it leaves the .new file, that means it's running properly but hitting a problem which means it can't finish encoding the grf.

Run nforenum on your nfo before grfcodec to find any obvious code errors. If you run grfcodec from a command prompt (personally I use old-fashioned bat files) which won't close when the program finishes, you'll be able to see grfcodec's error message and pinpoint exactly what the problem is. And you can always start a thread in technical discussions or graphic development if you need help. :)
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by kackofant »

is the runningsound one of the "bad features" which has been removed?
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by PikkaBird »

It is. :)
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by kackofant »

unschöne entscheidung! (this can not be translated to english, it has to be read and understood in the mothetounge of hitler to describe my discontent with this decision. even if i respect this and downgrade to 2.03 silently... may your browser break while trying to encode the 'ö'! >_< ).
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by PikkaBird »

A user has asked for access to all the NARS sprites, for add-on making purposes. Here they are. :) As far as I'm concerned you may use these sprites for any purpose, but please do credit myself and DanMacK if you do.
Attachments
na_set_basics.zip
All NARS sprites to date. There's a lot in here that's very out of date, so good luck!
(2.29 MiB) Downloaded 551 times
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by jimmydanny »

I was looking for a list of all the locos, and was referred to the PikkaBird area of the Wiki, which was filled with PHP errors and notices. Please fix? :?

Also, I was a bit sad to see the regearing go, but then again, it isn't strictly needed, and using the same loco with different gearing on the same stretch, then autoreplace those two sets (Say the GG1 with 160 and 177km/h, first for regional/local and second for express), when you autoreplace you'd lose the gearing that was set, so you would have to basicly regear all locos again. Without an option to regear it when autoreplacing, there was no point in having it either, not with todays kind of play with 100s of trains, FF and daylength patches.

The one thing I do miss, is the fact that it doesn't say what loco uses what kind of propulsion. I have NO clue about US locos, I know Norwegian ones just by a splitsecond peek, but US, nah.

So, can you bring back the parenthesis with engine type behind the name like 2.03?

EDIT: Oh, and what is the point of the heavyweight passenger car when it is more expensive, slower and takes the same amount of people? Either that is a f**kup, or I am in a period where lightweight was just introduced (I am in 1939, which is when I deleted all my trains and swapped from 2.03 to 2.5), and the heavyweight gets an upgrade the coming years to be better again?
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Re: NARS2 - the North American Railway Set [2.5 - Nov 4th 20

Post by Eddi »

jimmydanny wrote:when you autoreplace you'd lose the gearing that was set
autoreplace tries to keep the cargo subtype, but the set needs to be coded in a way that autoreplace understands what has to be matched with what, which this set (2.0 version) likely doesn't do.
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