Trainz: A New Era

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"Trainz: A New Era" is the first "totally new" version of Trainz since the first release in 2001. It includes a brand new game engine that totally replaces the "Jet" render engine which powered Trainz between 2001 and 2012. Most of the game code from previous versions of Trainz has been ported across piece by piece to integrate with the new engine and refactored to support multi-threading.

This means that while the game will look and feel familiar to existing Trainz users, in many cases it will perform better.

Contents

New Features

  • Per-pixel lighting (previously vertex lit in Jet)
  • Shader-based rendering (improved quality of lighting, normal maps, etc.)
  • 64-bit support (ability to efficiently utilize larger quantities or RAM, and improved CPU performance.)
  • Pervasive multi-threading (smooth operation of multiple tasks simultaneously, including background streaming.)
  • Procedural junction rendering.
  • Train vehicle motion simulation (track condition support, etc.)
  • Superelevated track
  • Multiple window support.
  • Realtime shadow-casting from all objects (including track, buildings, trees, terrain, etc.)
  • Physx support for pfx collision simulation.
  • "Test Track" real-time train physics analysis and tuning tools

Future updates will also include Track Blocks and Interlocking Towers for more prototypical signalling.

For more information on these features see: T:ANE_NEW_FEATURES

New Routes

  • Kickstarter County (Ficticious)
  • ECML Kings Cross - Edinburgh (UK)
  • Healesville (Australia)
  • C&O Hinton Division (USA)

Deluxe Routes

  • Avery-Drexel (USA)
  • Season Town (USA/fiction)
  • Warwick-Wallangara (Australia)
  • Bidye Traction (Model railroad)

T:ANE Release History

Following are links to the various major builds released prior to the "official" release of T:ANE on May 15, 2015. TANE_Developer_Release_Build T:ANE "Community Edition" V1.0 This version was release in December 2014. It was released to provide Kickstarter backers and pre-order customers a "sneak peak" at the current state of development of T:ANE and as a goodwill gesture since we had to delay release of the full version they were suporting.

This version included initial implementations of many of the new T:ANE features including shadows, train motion, procedural junctions, Test Track physics tools, multiplayer, pfx collisions and much more.

It did not include:

  • Superelevation
  • Interlocking Towers
  • Merge Route
  • In-cab controls (do not operate using mouse but hotkeys work)
  • Alt y and alt u (additional camera options in surveyor)
  • User Message (Driver reporting dialog)
  • Engine Features:
    • Post-processing effects (HDR, bloom, depth-of-field, SSAO etc)
    • New shaders to add animated water effects
    • Mirror reflections on water
    • Environment cube-map support for "basic" reflections
    • DirectX texture extraction (ie. screenshot)
    • Extended scene shadow culling
    • Differential shadows

A list of known issues was posted at: http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?116149-Your-T-ANE-Community-Edition-questions-answered-(Incl-Known-Issues

For people that understood this was not a final version of the product, it provided a great opportunity to see the work-in-progress and to help N3V Games identify the key issues that needed addressing.

T:ANE "Community Edition" V1.1 This version was released on Jan 28, 2015. It provided a huge list of updates to V1.0 (although a number of key features still needed to be implemented).

Updates included work on procedural junctions, content manager, shadows, basic post-processing effects, and a huge list of bug fixes and content updates: http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?117145-Community-Edition-V1-1-Update-Now-Available

T:ANE "Community Edition" V1.2 This version was released on Arpil 2nd, 2015 to our Kickstarter backers and April 9th to all pre-order customers. It continued the overall improvement process as we moved towards our release day version of T:ANE on May 15, 2015. This version delivered the "target graphics" feature set including per-pixel lighting, full world shadows, post-processing effects, water reflections and environmental fogging.

Highlights of the V1.2 update

V1.2. introduced a range of new graphical features and improvements including:

  • new post-processing effect (depth of field, SSAO etc)
  • water reflections
  • water shaders
  • shadow improvements
  • improvements to procedural track
  • additional track assets
  • improved headlight effects
  • removed draw distance limitations (no scene-load culling)

The full list of changes is shown on the [url=http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?118619-T-ANE-Community-Edition-V1-2-is-Ready!!]] T:ANE Kickstarter Forums[/url]

Updating to CE v1.2 There are two options available to update to CE v1.2 (build 74539).

  • Full install - this will be available via your MyTrainz login
  • Patch from build 73706 (4MB) - start build 72079 and you should be prompted to download the Trainz patcher.

You will be advised via email when you are able to upgrade to the latest version.

Trainz Patcher The auto patcher appears when a new update is available on the patch server. If you cancel this the first time, you will need to manually trigger the update by clicking Launcher > Trainz Settings > Install > Check for T:ANE Updates You will be notified if a patch is available. Click OK to begin the process.

Once the Trainz Patcher is downloaded, it will begin the updating process.

  • Waiting for Trainz: A New Era to safely shut down... (this step may take a minute or so. If tane.exe does not close in the first few minutes, you can close it manually and the patch should then continue)
  • Checking for available disk space for patching.
  • Searching for patches...
  • Downloading patch file... (this step depends on your Internet speed - a 4.4GB patch may take several hours to download)
  • Unpacking patch file...
  • Patching from xxxxx to xxxxx... (this step depends on your hardware and will take from 10 minutes to an hour or more)
  • No (more) patches at server for version: xxxxx
  • Updating Trainz asset database... (this may take several minutes)
  • Patch Complete

If you do not receive the Patch Complete message, your update has failed and you are likely to have problems. We suggest that you reinstall the game and begin the process again.

You may also get some error messages such as: TADClientHandleNotification> unsupported notification code 0x7 IsAssetAccessorWithinBuildFilepaths> ignoring bad filepath: C:/Program Files/N3V Games/TANE - 73706/Resources/builtin/base/content/kuid 30501 1009.tzarc

As long as the patch shows as Complete, then there shouldn't be any problems with these errors.

V1.2 Known Issues

  • Installer shows as "Not responding" for 10-30 minutes during install. Please be patient - it is working.
  • "Starting TANE..." window appears for 1-3 minutes on first "Start Trainz" (compiling graphics shaders for chosen performance settings)
  • Game pauses occasionally for 10-30 second when first loading a session or when moving to a new location or placing a new loco (this is due to compiling new material shaders which is done only once for each new material type in the scene)
  • Performance can vary dramatically from one start-up to the next (for some hardware configurations using the same settings each time). We are looking into this issue as a priority but encourage users to check for more information on performance tuning at Help:Video_Settings
  • Procedural Junction currently supports single turnouts only (the basic 1 track in, 2 tracks out junction)
  • Still some minor issues with blade gaps, blade length, sleeper spacing, level of detail, moire effect that we are fine tuning
  • Speedtrees not lit by train headlights
  • Session loading can stall for several minutes (this is usually fixed on subsequent loads).
  • Superelevated track is supported but not included in built-in routes (additional tools to come)
  • TS12 built-in content that is NOT on the download station cannot be imported into TANE due to file formatting issues. We will be updating the DLS with additional TS12 content to ensure broad compatibility
  • Older DLC items are not supported yet but we aim to have most existing DLC supported by release day.
  • After downloading the Deluxe Routes you may need to exit the game window and click Start Trainz to see all the content in the Routes and Sessions menu.

System Requirements

T:ANE has a number of hard minimum requirements which sets it apart from Jet-based games in terms of the supported hardware. These include:

  • The OS must be 64-bit.
  • The GPU must support DirectX 11 (Windows) or OpenGL 3.3 (Mac OS X.)

PC: Minimum: OS: Windows 7 64bit, Windows 8 64bit CPU: Intel i-series, AMD K10 or higher with at least 2Ghz Dual Core GPU: NVidia GT 430 or ATI 5550 or better, at least 1GB dedicated VRAM supporting DirectX 11 Memory: 4GB Hard Disk: 30GB free space Soundcard: DirectX-compatible Internet connection required

Recommended: OS: Windows 7 64bit, Windows 8 64bit CPU: Intel i5 3330, AMD FX 8350, QuadCore 2,3 Ghz or better GPU: NVidia GTX 660 or AMD HD 6950 or better, at least 2GB dedicated VRAM supporting DirectX11 Memory: 8GB Hard Disc: 30GB free space Soundcard: DirectX-compatible Internet connection required

See Also

Help:TANE_General_FAQs

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