TML World of Subways Imminent

[OTTODAD]

http://www.forum.aerosoft.com/index.php?showtopic=19704
http://www.world-of-subways.com/?id=209&L=1
http://www.world-of-subways.com/index.php?id=172&L=1
http://www.world-of-subways.com/?id=208&L=1

I am counting the days ! ;)

O t t o

[eaglefan9727]

Looks very good...Im looking foward to it as well.

[jfinney]

Beleive i'll count the day's with you Otto!

[TrirailF40PHL]

Excellent graphics, but I do not understand why it has such a gritty, foreboding appearance to it.

-Kurt

[mestevet]

Excellent graphics, but I do not understand why it has such a gritty, foreboding appearance to it.

-Kurt

Have you ever been to New York? ;)

Please, no flames, I LOVE New York and Northern Jersey, but ya gotta admit, it's got plenty of "grit".

This looks awesome, I saw a teaser elsewhere and it definitely has my interest.

Steve

[CRQ5508]

ya know, I used to have no interest what-so-ever with subways and the lot. But this actually looks interesting. I just may have to get it to try it out... And yes, while New York is a nice city, there's a lot of the city that is pretty rough. Especially the subway system. It's old (the oldest in America, and one of the oldest in the world) and sees enormous volumes of passengers every-day. It may not be the most comfortable form of transportation, but compared to NYC's buses and kamikaze taxis, it's the cheapest, and one of the most reliable forms of public transportation in the city.

[NJCL4343]

I've been following this one for a while, and it looks really excellent.
Unfortunately, according to the system specs, my computer will explode before it will install the game.

[TrirailF40PHL]

I don't contest the grit, but it has a surreal look to it. The lighting makes some objects glow which should be shadowed, while the a good deal of the rest looks as if it was run through some sort of dirty filter a-la the movie Fight Club.

-Kurt

[mestevet]

I don't contest the grit, but it has a surreal look to it. The lighting makes some objects glow which should be shadowed, while the a good deal of the rest looks as if it was run through some sort of dirty filter a-la the movie Fight Club.
-Kurt

I was looking at some of the graphics features they're touting on there. I wonder if the effect you're mentioning with the "glow" has to do with the "specular-map" shader they say they're using. I played around with that a little bit in MSTS (there's a tutorial at the Steam4me site, I'm not fetching the link right now) and I noticed that it has a tendency to make things glow when they shouldn't.

Also they mention real time lighting sources (the example they give with lights in a subway tunnel looks cool to me), but I wonder if the lighting sources could also help produce the "dirty" look - high contrast. Just a thought.

The other thought I have is that graphics engines for these types of 3D simulations probably share a lot in common with gaming software and a lot of those things have a distinctly gritty look just for the same reason as Fight Club - it sells to the target audience. I mean if you're playing HALO, do you want bright cheery colors around?

One more thing I'll mention that seems in common with popular gaming software - looking at the other screenshots on that website, they show lots of "citizens" populating platforms, etc. - there's not a fat, dumpy person in the crowd! Most of the women are seriously well endowed and wearing short dresses and the guys are all in suits. While there are certainly plenty of folks like that in the NY area, I'd say that a good portion of the population that's riding PATH is going to fit into the "too many value meals" category (just like me!). Plus where are the guys with t-shirts wearing Yankee hats? That would be like modelling Philly and not having a hot pretzel vendor on every street corner.

Even saying that though, I gotta say I'm impressed with it, and it does look like the New York area to me.

Steve

[Vince]

The pics appear to show the Port Authority Trans Hudson trains in scenes around Newark, New Jersey and do run alongside and in some places, share the Amtrak ROW. Note the catenary and the PRR position light signals in some of the shots.
These trains run between Newark, NJ, Downtown Manhatten, Jersey City and New York Penn Station.
The tunnels also are a very good model of what is really there. You woulden't believe the extremely tight radius curves these tunnels make.
The show why the line used to be known as 'The Hudson Tubes' when the PRR was running them.

As to the comment on "grit". Heh...if anything, they're not gritty enough. :p
Now if only they could capture that unique 'tubes' odor! Somewhere between dank and damp, a bit of mold with a hint of stale urine.

Flashback, Summer 1979:
Scene in the Pavonia Avenue PATH station waiting for the train;
A large rat walking the tracks paying absouluty no attention to the approx 30 waiting passengers.
I'll estimate about 18-20 inches including the tail. :eek:

This sim is on my list.