Simutrans – Transport Simulator(simutrans.com)
simutrans.com
Simutrans – Transport Simulator
https://www.simutrans.com/en/
91 comments
I get it. There's a few things that just make trains the perfect storm of obsession. I think I can list a few.
1. The clockwork. The time tables and planning are like gears on a civilization scale machine. A gear so big that from the first person perspective you can't even see its a gear.
2. Infrastructure is politics by other means. Concrete and steel are the only things that outlive even the supreme court justices. What gets built dictates so much about where people will live and how they will live, and sometimes these decisions are the result of lengthy deliberations and sometimes they are the result of the selfish wants of an unaccountable planner.
3. The optimization problem of it all. It's so easy to obsess over the map, seeing all those cross town trips that would be so much easier if some existing line just went slightly further. Trying to understand why lines get built where they do.
1. The clockwork. The time tables and planning are like gears on a civilization scale machine. A gear so big that from the first person perspective you can't even see its a gear.
2. Infrastructure is politics by other means. Concrete and steel are the only things that outlive even the supreme court justices. What gets built dictates so much about where people will live and how they will live, and sometimes these decisions are the result of lengthy deliberations and sometimes they are the result of the selfish wants of an unaccountable planner.
3. The optimization problem of it all. It's so easy to obsess over the map, seeing all those cross town trips that would be so much easier if some existing line just went slightly further. Trying to understand why lines get built where they do.
4. Trains map to (what I suspect is) our genetically-programmed interest in large animals. My 2yo loves anything with wheels (i.e. feet/hooves), and trains are the apex predators. Then we anthropomorphize them (Thomas the Tank Engine, etc.) in order to "tame" them. My 0.02€, YMMV.
So, this is totally pop-evolutionary-psychology, but I think the relevant predisposition is towards hoarding. For 100,000 generations, humans (and our ancestors before then) have had to gather and store food and other supplies to see them through the winter (or other hard times). We are wired to do this because we would have died out if we didn’t.
Building games let you build up your hoard of stuff (whether trains, rails, buildings, tiberium silos, green circuits, …) in a tight feedback loop that repeatedly triggers the “this is my stuff, now I am safe” dopamine response.
This also explains collecting hobbies, and goes some way towards explaining the desire for wealth acquisition in general.
Building games let you build up your hoard of stuff (whether trains, rails, buildings, tiberium silos, green circuits, …) in a tight feedback loop that repeatedly triggers the “this is my stuff, now I am safe” dopamine response.
This also explains collecting hobbies, and goes some way towards explaining the desire for wealth acquisition in general.
Yeah, trains and trucks seem to tap into some built-in interest in megafauna. Dinosaurs do too.
Check oyt Nimby Rails. It’s a fascinating experiment in two ways:
1. It uses the real world map and tries to figure out population data too
2. There’s no grid. You control the rails with precise Bezier curves, that affect the train speed
Very young and very experimental/ bare-bones, but still something to check out if you’re into the genre
1. It uses the real world map and tries to figure out population data too
2. There’s no grid. You control the rails with precise Bezier curves, that affect the train speed
Very young and very experimental/ bare-bones, but still something to check out if you’re into the genre
I've put countless hours into OpenTTD over the years but once you learn how to maximise profits (move your cargo over a longer distance than necessary) you can basically print money.
Simutrans appears to work a bit different on that front, I'm going to have to take a closer look.
Simutrans appears to work a bit different on that front, I'm going to have to take a closer look.
Getting to the printing money stage is pretty easy in vanilla OpenTTD.
For added challenge, try the FIRS mod, which requires your production chains to be working from raw materials to production to retail. A lot more planning is needed to make things run smoothly and on time.
For added challenge, try the FIRS mod, which requires your production chains to be working from raw materials to production to retail. A lot more planning is needed to make things run smoothly and on time.
Perhaps the Cities in Motion series fits the bill? It’s made by the same studio as Cities: Skylines, but focuses specifically on city transit.
The sequel (Cities in Motion 2) is more expansive, but the original has its own charm.
The sequel (Cities in Motion 2) is more expansive, but the original has its own charm.
I think what you are getting at and what I really want is a multiplayer model railroad. Something that can have complexity but doesn’t force it like a simulator. I want a mix of transport fever, minecraft, and factorio with a multiplayer component.
Ive been toying around with trying to learn Unity or Godot to build something like this.
Ive been toying around with trying to learn Unity or Godot to build something like this.
You may be interested in Railroads Online: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1696810/RAILROADS_Online/
It leans less to the "model railroad" side of things and more towards the "Railroad Tycoon" economic simulator, but it does seem to have solid multiplayer support.
It leans less to the "model railroad" side of things and more towards the "Railroad Tycoon" economic simulator, but it does seem to have solid multiplayer support.
Minetest has a mod Advanced Trains that allows (but doesn't force) fairly complex builds with automatable scheduling, etc. and works in multiplayer.
https://vid.puffyan.us/watch?v=ZK1PM8jFRFo&t=18m33s
https://vid.puffyan.us/watch?v=ZK1PM8jFRFo&t=18m33s
OpenTTD has multiplayer.
there is a Czech game Mashinky which have multiplayer in development:
https://mashinky.com/
https://mashinky.com/
Played it. Love it. Still too much of a transport sim tho for what I am thinking of.
Surprised no one has said Transport Fever (and it's sequel). Solid game play.
Unfortunately the fixed goods demand and production sites make the gameplay too railroaded (!) for my taste.
I can understand fixed sites for natural resources. The coal mine is where the coal is. But historically, the sites chosen for manufacturing industry are determined by what is logistically feasible. The factory goes where the railroad is, not the other way around (most of the time).
I don't know if OpenTTD allows it but in the original TTD it was possible to plop down factories at will (but not mines, farms or oil wells).
I don't know if OpenTTD allows it but in the original TTD it was possible to plop down factories at will (but not mines, farms or oil wells).
This doesn't match your Minecraft brief but if you love trains have you played Railway Empire? That sucked me in like no other transport game ever did.
You will probably like the game Cities in Motion.
There's a lot of other stuff surrounding it, but Satisfactory does have trains much like Factorio, and is 3D like Minecraft. A caveat though is that it's still "less" of a game than Factorio, but fun in its own right, haven't played the latest patches though, so they might've implemented more stuff.
Here's some of the other similar games that i enjoy:
Suggestion: you should be able to pick up most of these on Steam IIRC, so feel free to look them up and wishlist them. I actually got TF1 in a sale for just a few euros a while back.
- OpenTTD: free, open source, has a variety of transport, even crashes, low hardware requirements, but personally the train tiles aren't easy on the eyes
- Transport Fever (1 or 2): lovely games that have really detailed 3D graphics, the UI/UX in TF2 is the best that i've every played with, however the train pathing doesn't appear to be dynamic, only simple signals present
- Mashinky: a mix like the both of the above, developed by a single person, allows switching between an isometric tile based build mode and 3D visualization, currently has a variety of trains and some road vehicles, switches are automatically placed (either chain or regular switches, really nice logic); some might dislike its economy system (some trains need certain resources to run, which you need to get through supply chains, possibly with other trains), but i really like it
- Railway Empire: focuses only on trains, seemingly the older variety too, has a large amounts of maps and interesting city growth mechanics but the UI isn't as good as TF2 and even though it has perhaps the best track building mechanics, managing lines becomes cumbersome when you have many
- Workers & Resources: a city building game with a rather nice transport system, the UI needs work, but it might eventually be up there with Cities: Skylines (at least based on what others say)
- Derail Valley: this one lets you actually be inside of a train and transport cargo, has crashes, simulates engine temperature for electric locomotives, even lets you use steam locomotives as well, really interesting
Suggestion: you should be able to pick up most of these on Steam IIRC, so feel free to look them up and wishlist them. I actually got TF1 in a sale for just a few euros a while back.
I've spent hundreds of hours on OpenTTD, the UI is not great and brings back some 90s user experience.
I have an irrational love for that game, I discovered the original (TTD) as a teen so it will forever be "that game".
I also really love Cities Skyline, but I've got a grip about how car-centric the game is.
It's not possible to create a city that mostly bikes for instance, you _have_ to allow cars everywhere (or go into mods territory, not my thing)
I have an irrational love for that game, I discovered the original (TTD) as a teen so it will forever be "that game".
I also really love Cities Skyline, but I've got a grip about how car-centric the game is.
It's not possible to create a city that mostly bikes for instance, you _have_ to allow cars everywhere (or go into mods territory, not my thing)
I honestly love cities skylines for how car centric it is. It is the premier logistical challenge in that game, and it is a genuinely hard challenge.
There's plenty of games about building cities, but I've never played a game that really challenges you to understand the throughput and layout of road networks as skylines does. That said, I can see how people could get blindsided by it. You want to make a nice city and instead you're browsing wikipedia for how to make interchanges.
There's plenty of games about building cities, but I've never played a game that really challenges you to understand the throughput and layout of road networks as skylines does. That said, I can see how people could get blindsided by it. You want to make a nice city and instead you're browsing wikipedia for how to make interchanges.
The worst part about Skylines is that cars don't need parking lots/garages, they just magically disappear at the end of (many? all?) trips.
You can create car-free city with a single mod, the one that allows you to restrict the traffic types from each road segments... it's a giant pain though, cause you have to restrict cars from each and every road segment, if you forget some short path a car will appear out of nowhere and drive on it :) Surprisingly, it actually mostly works (although puts you in the hole money wise).
Although, unfortunately you have to have roads in front for deliveries, because there's no such thing as deliveries from the back. So, pedestrian-only streets are pretty much impossible if you want a city that actually functions.
You can create car-free city with a single mod, the one that allows you to restrict the traffic types from each road segments... it's a giant pain though, cause you have to restrict cars from each and every road segment, if you forget some short path a car will appear out of nowhere and drive on it :) Surprisingly, it actually mostly works (although puts you in the hole money wise).
Although, unfortunately you have to have roads in front for deliveries, because there's no such thing as deliveries from the back. So, pedestrian-only streets are pretty much impossible if you want a city that actually functions.
What do you find not great in the UI of OpenTTD? It's not perfect, but it's relatively great, compared to virtually every major build sim that came out in the next two decades. It's functional and fast. 00s UIs were plain horrible, and I don't think it got that much better.
Does OpenTTD not have A* track laying yet? It's such a bore doing it by hand all the time.
It doesn't. There's a single tool for laying tracks that you can click or pull, but only in a straight line. I'm not sure how could it figure out what you want between two arbitrary points. There's always other tracks, terrain, something in the way.
Yes, that is the reason they mentioned the A* pathfinding algorithm - to solve that exact problem.
"simulates engine temperature for electric locomotives"
As a first thought I imagined my laptop being heated up more when the locomotive does too... Technically even do-able I guess :)
Thanks for the list!
As a first thought I imagined my laptop being heated up more when the locomotive does too... Technically even do-able I guess :)
Thanks for the list!
Thanks for the list. I love trains!
Looks like a great game to try tonight! In the spirit of Transport Tycoon?
But man, there's something really off-putting about downloading from Sourceforge. I can't put my finger on it, but it seems scammy.
But man, there's something really off-putting about downloading from Sourceforge. I can't put my finger on it, but it seems scammy.
>But man, there's something really off-putting about downloading from Sourceforge. I can't put my finger on it, but it seems scammy.
They were caught adding malware to installers. As in the installers you downloaded were modified to have an extra "Do you also want to install yahoo toolbar" step when installing.
https://www.infoworld.com/article/2610419/retro-repo-sourcef...
They since stopped. But the reputation damage persists to this day.
They were caught adding malware to installers. As in the installers you downloaded were modified to have an extra "Do you also want to install yahoo toolbar" step when installing.
https://www.infoworld.com/article/2610419/retro-repo-sourcef...
They since stopped. But the reputation damage persists to this day.
Hasn't ownership changed hands since then?
It has, but the damage is already done and building back a lost reputation is hard even when we 'know' that the people in charge now are not the same people that where in charge then.
Be that as it may, that doesn't make it appropriate to accuse the current team of bundling malware.
They are the ones who removed that, in a stated effort to put SF back on the right track. They don't deserved to be maligned for their efforts.
They are the ones who removed that, in a stated effort to put SF back on the right track. They don't deserved to be maligned for their efforts.
Nobody did that, though? One person mentioned it felt scammy for an ineffable reason. Another responded with that bit of history, including the fact it is only history. That's it.
I was thinking it was in spirit of https://www.openttd.org/, but looks like independent?
It predates OpenTTD by more than 5 years (i.e. early versions were more contemporaries to and in the spirit of the original TT(D)). I remember finding it on magazine a free-/shareware disc in elementary school and played it quite a bit back in the day and then off-and-on in later years.
The fact you had to explain this makes me feel old.
I tried downloading this at work, but our corporate filters claim malware in the exe and won't let me run it. I'll have to try the Steam version.
[deleted]
There is SO much potential in actual model trains. HO scale has standardized digital control (DCC) but the advanced high-end controllers (like Märklin CS3) are crazy expensive, and so are trackside signals. At this point any engine could be programmed for autonomous operation under the control of centralized signaling that implements a system-wide operating schedule... if you can just figure out how to cram the electronics into the loco body shells and wire up their internals. If anyone knows where to find the "state of the art" of distributed loco intelligence, please provide pointers !
Here's your productivity black hole of the day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACkmg3Y64_s
Although the exciting software is to remotely control the cars, written in Delphi, but they haven't published these (understandably). They're even working on an F1 race with cars that will decide to overtake themselves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVQa1DYJqBs (subtitles available), he said, 16 core CPU, well, there you go, 16 car brains!
Although the exciting software is to remotely control the cars, written in Delphi, but they haven't published these (understandably). They're even working on an F1 race with cars that will decide to overtake themselves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVQa1DYJqBs (subtitles available), he said, 16 core CPU, well, there you go, 16 car brains!
I made this a while ago, but still use a 2nd hand command station to program the loco addresses on the decoders for example.
https://github.com/hsanjuan/go-dcc
Digitalizing locos with DCC decoder chips is mostly possible and a good exercise.
https://github.com/hsanjuan/go-dcc
Digitalizing locos with DCC decoder chips is mostly possible and a good exercise.
It's probably a matter of time before the IoT space and the model train space converge. Can those high-end controllers be made into software and the required signals be output from a raspberry pi or esp32?
It's great to see a lot of people interested in transportation research.
In our lab we have a fully funded (~2,500€/month + allowance) opening for a PhD student at the Transport and Telecommunication Institute (co-supervised by Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences); starting in April or soon thereafter.
for more info; email me:
rubens.n at tsi.lv (p.s. I am one of the supervisors)
Damn, some of these paksets are insane! https://www.simutrans.com/en/paksets/
I was just about to say the same! The further you scroll, the better it gets:
Pak96.HD is an art of its own kind - It is completely drawn by hand using pencil and paper. Each image of each object was first hand drawn on paper to be later digitalised and become a real Simutrans object.
Pak96.HD is an art of its own kind - It is completely drawn by hand using pencil and paper. Each image of each object was first hand drawn on paper to be later digitalised and become a real Simutrans object.
I still use Simutrans soundtrack[0] to this day as background noise during light work. If you never heard it before it sounds like elevator music. I highly recommend it in case you want to fill the silence :)
[0] - https://youtube.com/watch?v=r9obpifVR40&list=PL8B83EB2119AE7...
[0] - https://youtube.com/watch?v=r9obpifVR40&list=PL8B83EB2119AE7...
Virustotal has some weird stuff on this exe. Heads up?
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/9b6ed99ae188657f24c26183...
You can view the source and build it yourself here if you're concerned: https://github.com/aburch/simutrans
It appears to be three niche AVs, two of which don't claim to explain what they found and the third which says that it's "W32.AIDetect.malware2" which appears to mean their AI model thinks it's malware.
Personally I wouldn't read much into that. Plenty of mainstream AVs have false positives on even commercially released software or open source built by trusted sources, and yet here they all agree it's safe.
It appears to be three niche AVs, two of which don't claim to explain what they found and the third which says that it's "W32.AIDetect.malware2" which appears to mean their AI model thinks it's malware.
Personally I wouldn't read much into that. Plenty of mainstream AVs have false positives on even commercially released software or open source built by trusted sources, and yet here they all agree it's safe.
Cool, thank you!
Probably some very suspicious behavior, like processing mouse and keyboard input and transmitting over the network.
Download version 123.0.1; never seen a version that high.
Version inflation is a real thing. Emacs brought high version numbers into the mainstream, and now Nvidia drivers and browsers are at the forefront of the movement.
Latest Ubuntu is 2021.10 :-).
If instead we consider actual releases, there are a few open source projects that are still in 0.xxx but for which each point release could be considered a an actual release. A sibling comment mentioned ClamAV, but there is also MAME (currently ad 0.240).
If instead we consider actual releases, there are a few open source projects that are still in 0.xxx but for which each point release could be considered a an actual release. A sibling comment mentioned ClamAV, but there is also MAME (currently ad 0.240).
> there are a few open source projects that are still in 0.xxx but for which each point release could be considered a an actual release.
This is called ZeroVer: https://0ver.org/ (most recent HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28154187).
This is called ZeroVer: https://0ver.org/ (most recent HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28154187).
I love clamAV version right now 0.104.2. But I remember see 0.96.19
few seconds after a corporet backed project two year old go to version 3.0
How does this compare with OpenTTD?
1. The UI is clunkier
2. The economic model is deeper (in the default paksets, which are like TTD's GRFs). The biggest difference is that it has what was referred to in the TTD space as "cargodest" cargo is generated with a destination somewhere on the map, so to get the most cargo you need to build a bigger network.
This is not to be confused with OpenTTD's "cargo distribution" which is a somewhat watered down version where cargo only chooses from destinations already on your network, so the routes are split among all stations you connect up. In OpenTTD, even with cargodist, if you only have two stations for a good to go between, 100% of the source station will go to the destination station. In Simutrans, you'll have a lower input volume until you connect up more.
2. The economic model is deeper (in the default paksets, which are like TTD's GRFs). The biggest difference is that it has what was referred to in the TTD space as "cargodest" cargo is generated with a destination somewhere on the map, so to get the most cargo you need to build a bigger network.
This is not to be confused with OpenTTD's "cargo distribution" which is a somewhat watered down version where cargo only chooses from destinations already on your network, so the routes are split among all stations you connect up. In OpenTTD, even with cargodist, if you only have two stations for a good to go between, 100% of the source station will go to the destination station. In Simutrans, you'll have a lower input volume until you connect up more.
Is there a way to get "cargodest" behaviour in OTTD?
There have been historical patches for this in other versions (most recently YACD[1]), but most have been abandoned.
The last one was abandoned in favour of cargodist because:
> - This form of routing cargo has a much different game play effect than cargo dist.
> - The current implementation is too expensive in CPU time, you'll hit CPU limits too soon (the current game already has this problem)
> - There is no easy road to reduce that CPU cost (at least nobody found one so far)
I'm not sure why it's considered too expensive for OpenTTD, but not for Simutrans. It might be because of the larger map size options, something inherent to the way the TTD map is structured, or just OpenTTD's desire to maintain it's "runs on a toaster" status.
You might find some patch packs that will work in the OpenTTD development forum that include YACD[2].
[1]: https://www.tt-forums.net/viewtopic.php?t=54253&start=380
[2]: https://www.tt-forums.net/viewforum.php?f=33
The last one was abandoned in favour of cargodist because:
> - This form of routing cargo has a much different game play effect than cargo dist.
> - The current implementation is too expensive in CPU time, you'll hit CPU limits too soon (the current game already has this problem)
> - There is no easy road to reduce that CPU cost (at least nobody found one so far)
I'm not sure why it's considered too expensive for OpenTTD, but not for Simutrans. It might be because of the larger map size options, something inherent to the way the TTD map is structured, or just OpenTTD's desire to maintain it's "runs on a toaster" status.
You might find some patch packs that will work in the OpenTTD development forum that include YACD[2].
[1]: https://www.tt-forums.net/viewtopic.php?t=54253&start=380
[2]: https://www.tt-forums.net/viewforum.php?f=33
That would be definitely great for passengers, mail, goods, but I think for raw materials it should just pick the nearest factory? Or at least have it as a preference.
Also I would also love for cargo being able to be transferred between competitors. Ideally natively (for passengers at least) if the stations are near enough.
Also I would also love for cargo being able to be transferred between competitors. Ideally natively (for passengers at least) if the stations are near enough.
> Or at least have it as a preference.
It's a setting in the config file (you can also modify the connectedness, i.e. how many partners a factory picks when it's generated).
There's also a "cheat" tool to manually force a connection in the game.
It's a setting in the config file (you can also modify the connectedness, i.e. how many partners a factory picks when it's generated).
There's also a "cheat" tool to manually force a connection in the game.
I’ll definitely have to give this a try. I enjoy the model train set feel of Transport Tycoon. I tried OpenTTD, but I never could get the text to look right, and something always felt off with it. I do like they have smarter routing algorithms though.
If you have the original TTD assets, OpenTTD can use those graphics: https://wiki.openttd.org/en/Archive/Community/Base%20graphic...
I couldn't figure it out. I wish there was a tutorial screen or maybe I missed that too. Even though I love RCT, transportation tycoon which are super intuitive and has a similar UI.
Is there a strategy to manage screen resolution on linux with old fixed size graphics like this? Even a modern laptop it's all too teeny to read or distinguish icons.
My first intuition would be, to run the game inside gamescope and use a 2x (or higher) scaling factor.
https://github.com/Plagman/gamescope
https://github.com/Plagman/gamescope
Very nice, thank you!
A slightly sarcastic answer but OpenTTD :)
The number of hours I've lost to this game are uncountable.
Wow, this is awesome. I remember playing a lot of transport tycoon when I was a kid.
I usually don't play on my computer nowadays, but I guess I can make an exception.
I usually don't play on my computer nowadays, but I guess I can make an exception.
Ah, the memories. I used to play this a lot as a kid. It took a while to learn the mechanics as there was no in game tutorial those days. Looking at the screen caps it seems the game is totally different now (as you can assume after 15+ years). Maybe I should give it a try again but I'm a bit afraid of spending rest of the day, or week, optimising my supply chains :)
I haven't played in a while, but providing it still exists, the Simutrans-Experimental "branch" solves a lot of weird economic issues in the main game. Once you're into Simutrans, that one is worth a look.
wow, 1.3GB required space for something which looks like TTD clone which I played on 386 in 90s and didn't even dream about such HDD capacity :-O
I wonder how does it compare to OpenTTD so I downloaded it and complete OpenTTD takes 23MB
TTD, Sim City 2000 and UFO: Enemy unknown were probably my most favorite games ever
I wonder how does it compare to OpenTTD so I downloaded it and complete OpenTTD takes 23MB
TTD, Sim City 2000 and UFO: Enemy unknown were probably my most favorite games ever
This is one of my favorite ways to waste time. I’ve spent hundreds of hours watching pixel trains move around.
Where was this game hiding away from me all this time? How did I miss it on Steam?
The aesthetic of this is jaw dropping. Real comfy 90's DOS vibes.
No bikes? The Netherlands will be sad.
Is it still locked to some incredibly low unpleasant framerate? Something like 15 or 20?
What I would really love is for something like a Minecraft but for building trains/managing transport systems. All the games I’ve played treat trains/transport as tools rather than the central focus. But this looks like it’s something along that line; definitely going to check this out along with openttd.