Is Chris taking advantage of his die-hard fans?

[Pinkyoz]

There have been NO patches for RCT2, there were several for RCT1.

(Actually that isn't true, there was an RCT2 patch to fix a problem with the CD copy protection making the game unplayable of some drives.)

Most worryingly, the well documented 'peep' pathfinding bug remains in RCT2.

But as for these complaints about having to repair every single vehicle one by one, and place track on tile at a time, isn't that one of the points of the game? It is after all more a micromanagement game than others in the same genre. Sure in RRT3 I can upgrade all my trains at once, and lay miles of track with a single mouse click, but I don't get to place signals and design sophisticated junctions.

(I don't remember TTD so well. Could you mass upgrade vehicles in that?)

It's like comparing apples and pears.

If I remember rightly I think you had to do vehicles one by one before, but the problem was a bit more contained, because you were limited to 80 road vehicles, and replacements were about 15 years apart and there was no speed-up option in TT.

As for Micromanagement, Its the scourge of the genre, every decent strategy game has some, and some games handle it better then others, I don't think there is an enormous amount in Locomotion, but I guess that’s up to the individual, what you find annoying may not be as annoying to me for example.

I guess we wait and see if anything changes, and hope for the best.

Pinkyoz

[wozzar]

Yeah, but which sim is now defunct? :roll:

Yeah but there is a new Train Sim coming out by Raildriver called Trainmaster 4.

And dont be surprised if Microsoft enter the train sim game in the future. The graphics in MTS were very good how ever it did cause a lot of lag which is caused by there graphic engine.

[Realgar]

This is how it is in Loco :

You create a train on year X, with 90% reliability, it constantly drops and in around 5 years it's around 50%, you have to change the machine then, so in 5 years you had an average of 70% reliability and HAD to change the train.

In TT (look it's ->TT<-, not even patch or deluxe) :

You create a train on year X, with 90% reliability, it does a delivery, and go for maintenance before the next one (this is how I played anyway), so it's reliability would drop around 5%, with it varying from 90 to 85. Average reliability 87.5%, and you only had to change trains every 15 years or so.

Now in TTDPatch :

Just like in TT, except you don't need to renew it every 15 years as it is automatically done.

How I think he should have made in Loco (I REALLY expected that):

Just like TT, with change to depots as they'd not be 1 square buildings, but you'd have to make them like you make stations, and they would need to be as long as the trains to do maintenance/build trains otherwise you'd get the little red screen error. As train designs get old, so do the maintenance in depots cost more and running costs too, that way there are advantages to change to new designs, but I wouldn't like to see max. reliability dropping for trains or designs ages, rather a higher and higher maintenance cost based on design age again (and of course maintenance costs wouldn't raise for the last train design of the game so that you can play forever in a map). Also, trains wouldn't get old or very old so that you only had to change the machine for another that is exactly the same.

This depot would also help when creating trains, whenever I had to create a train in Loco I had to constantly check it's size against the station cause there's NO indicator at what size your train currently is, and sometimes this was very annoying as the other train on the line would come close and the little "shadow" of the train I was creating wouldn't appear, to make it worse train engines and wagons all have different sizes.

With that on the game I'd say that this game would be generally better than ottd or ttdp (even with the amazing amount of minor things that could be better/are missing), as the game would at least be playable, right now, things like road vehicles are a joke, they transport little amounts, are slow, and having to change 40 of them every 5 years only makes them more and more annoying and useless.


For the people saying we shouldn't compare loco to ttdp, as I already said, this is a poor argument, unless you really think that it's alright for CS to lock himself in a box and don't look around for better things, then what I have to say is that you're all his fanboys and will eat anything he throws at you. Somebody said he will give ideas for RCT3 in some thread, if that's really true I guess RCT3 team is actually only going to use his name on the game to see if they can sell more, cause Loco clearly shows how much he is able to "add" to a game.

[Pinkyoz]

Somebody said he will give ideas for RCT3 in some thread, if that's really true I guess RCT3 team is actually only going to use his name on the game to see if they can sell more, cause Loco clearly shows how much he is able to "add" to a game.

I said that, but I certainly didn’t mean it like that.

My point was that CS has both strong and weak points in developing games. Unfortunately, unlike graphical prowess, a lot of what he has to offer is buried within the gameplay itself.

Have you ever heard anyone complain about a lack of information in the game? Of course not! CS is well known for his ability to display the complex interactions of a business simulation in a simple and accessible way, his games are always filled with charts, graphs, reports and messages that are designed to keep players informed without being overbearing.

He also has a flare for level design, always creating a challenge for users from the low to high end of the scale, his general interface design is clean and friendly, and he has developed very powerful world editing tools for previous games, so I expect that the world editor here is also of top quality.

These are all great game qualities that are worth passing on to developers, and hopefully some new ideas through the collaboration of minds brought round from his roll on RCT3 will allow him to try different approaches and spawn new ideas so that the games he produces go from good to great.

Pinkyoz

[Realgar]

I know you didn't mean it like that, sorry if it seemed to be, I was acutally being a bit sarcastic on that part.

But even though you think he is great at giving players the information they need, this also doesn't happen on Loco all the time, for example:
you can't check the reliability of a vehicle model until you buy it;
you can't see the lenght of the train you're adding wagons;
if I remember correctly, there's no information about the wagon capacities after you build the train by clicking on the train, you need to go to the "new train" window to check wagon capacities;
you can't tell whether a station will accept/produce some type of cargo until you build a road to, then, have the option to place the station and check the cargos;
something minor, but for beginners doesnt help, is that way the type of cargo a station you want to build will accept is displayed, by very small simbols, some text would be better imo

[Pinkyoz]

But even though you think he is great at giving players the information they need, this also doesn't happen on Loco all the time

I checked out a few of those things, your right, that is a bit annoying, I barely even noticed it when I was playing. Possibly I didn't notice that because I played enough TTD to know what to look for, but for beginners that stuff could be a real pest early up.

I still stand by my comment about the info, but I have to agree, its not as strong as it was in previous versions. Thanks for pointing that out.

Pinkyoz

Edit: I checked out the thing about finding capacities after puchase, they are there in the load section, but they arent evident like they used to be. you have to hover the mouse over the carrage in the load screen to get the capacity.

[teeone]

you can't check the reliability of a vehicle model until you buy it;

Yes, but in my playing so far I never once needed this information. I actually never noticed this until a forum member pointed it out. I'm not that hardcore i guess, I just buy the newest/faster train or vehicle.

you can't see the lenght of the train you're adding wagons;

Ah. THIS one i noticed, and i found the best way to match trains' size is to open up your trains list, and the ones you have just created will be at the bottom. MUCH easier than trying to match the size of the trains on-the-fly.

if I remember correctly, there's no information about the wagon capacities after you build the train by clicking on the train, you need to go to the "new train" window to check wagon capacities;

I also noticed this, minorly frustrating.

you can't tell whether a station will accept/produce some type of cargo until you build a road to, then, have the option to place the station and check the cargos;

This is pretty frustrating, it takes A LOT of time/work to even figure out if a medium size town accepts mail, food or goods.

something minor, but for beginners doesnt help, is that way the type of cargo a station you want to build will accept is displayed, by very small simbols, some text would be better imo

I could not understand why to use a icon/symbol system but never explain whats what, OR have a rollover text to tell you what they are. For the life of me I could not explain why CS would not incorporate this rollover along with the rest of the rollovers in the game.

[brianhed]

For "thirsty" people we sure are picky about our "water"....lol

I'll I wanted was a version of RRT or TTDX that would run on XP without any patches or fixes. Thats what I got so I must be content. Sure, I expected a lot more but I remain satisfied for now. I really just wanted the original game with better AI and more stations/vehicles.

My feelings:
Major
The controls are excruciatingly tedious (just like Transport Giant). It wears me down significantly.
Minor
Mouseovers take forever to appear. Setting up multiple items is painful.
Good
I did not want or care for better graphics, sound, or packaging.
Fair price.

[Pinkyoz]

For "thirsty" people we sure are picky about our "water"....lol

Here Here! I guess we do forget that sometimes, but everyone has an opinion, and I really do think the general forum would be pretty empty if we couldn’t comment on the game.

Pinkyoz

[LionsPhil]

Finding fault with a game doesn't mean that you hate it -- merely that you have an idea of how it can be better. Good developers will take heed of such.

As for the "if you think it's so bad, write your own better one, THEN you can complain" argument...geez. There goes either a hyprocrite or someone who has never, ever complained at Windows for crashing, his car for failing to start in the morning, or a sportsperson for missing a shot/goal. Inability to do better does not prohibit polite expression of fault.

[chevyrider]

Five month's now after the release and still no european patch

[LionsPhil]

I've applied the US 1.76 patch to my UK copy and it seems happy enough. Not sure if I've lost the "translation", or if there wasn't any there in the first place.

Perhaps make a ZIP/RAR backup of your Locomotion directory and give it a try?

(Oh, and sorry for digging up an ancient thread. The search feature doesn't seem to sort by age.)

[chevyrider]

Thanks, it now has become an us english version nr 4.02.176
That's allright, but it isn't a shocking patch yet.

[punar]

Actually I think the original European version is newer than the original US version, and that is why Europeans havent had a patch yet. Most of the cruicial things that the patch fixes are allready working correctly in the European version.