Here Come the Trainzes!

FAQ

Whence the name "Here Come the Trainzes!"?

Essentially the thought behind the name is threefold:

1. "Here Come the Trains!" is intended to convey enthusiasm about watching multiple trains.
2. Changing the spelling to "Here Come the Trainz!" indicates that this is made for Trainz.
3. Finally, while the "z" in "Trainz" suggests more than one single train, every single existing Trainz session we could find was about driving one single train. Thus, apparently, in the vendor's mind, "Trainz" is singular. To convey that our sessions are all about multiple trains, we needed a plural of "Trainz". If "Trainz" is singular, then surely the plural must be "Trainzes". Hence "Here Come the Trainzes!"

Why do you call this automation instead of "AI"?

Because this isn't AI. This is just a computer applying logic. The only intelligence involved is the human intelligence that came up with the logic and implementation thereof.

I've never heard of "Super Sessions" before. What do you mean with that?

In a typical Trainz session you run a train from A to B, and may occasionally see 1 or 2 automated trains in the background, to liven things up. To clearly indicate that our sessions take that concept to another level, we coin the term "Super Session". (Not "super" as in "great", but as in "above", or "beyond".)
Our definition of a Super Session is a Trainz session that includes at least all of the following:

• as many trains as is reasonably possible
• as many different scenarios as is reasonably possible (multiple trains may work together to execute one scenario, or one train may execute multiple scenarios)
• as much variation between different trains (locomotives, carriages/wagons and how those are combined into consists) as is reasonably possible
• as much randomisation as is reasonably possible, in order to guarantee as much unpredictability, and thus surprise and wonder, as is reasonably possible
• all shown through trackside cameras that take all potential activity into account

Why can I only watch trains? I want to drive a train amongst all those automated trains!

Yep, would be great if that were possible. The problem with implementing that, is that the only way to reliably automate trains, is through "enhanced Interlocking Towers", which involves creating uniquely named "paths" across junctions, which in turn means that junctions cannot be switched manually. For a user to drive from A to B, he would need to know which paths to select. While there does exist a mechanism to show the user a list of paths to chose from, for the user to know which one to select out of up to a dozen or so options at each junction, he would need to study and know which each one refers to. Which simply is not feasible. The only realistic option would be to assign a user train a Mission Code, resulting in the user getting assigned applicable paths automagically. However, it currently doesn't seem possible to assign Mission Codes to user trains.

Surely all that scripting – running this many trains simultaneously – plus the trackside cameras, has a massively negative impact on performance?

No.

• Execution of properly written scripts is what 'puters can do in their sleep
• The number of trains as such has no noticable impact at all.
• Trainz' lineside cameras can negatively impact performance, but this can be minimised to acceptable levels by knowing what you're doing. In our Super Sessions you will typically only notice slight momentary drops in FPS when multiple moving trains pass by a dynamically tracking camera. How much of a drop – how noticable – will depend on your hardware. If you can't live with that, there are plenty of sessions available where you run a single train, on a single track, not encountering any other trains, in cabine view, seeing as little of the terrain as possible, enjoying a perfect frame rate.
• The dropped frames you see in our movies, are generated by our screen capture software. Not by Trainz.

Why must this be installed into a dedicated data folder?

It must not. We merely advise you to install any route into a Data folder of its own. For several reasons:

• When you have any other routes or sessions installed in the same data folder, there will be the risk that one or more of those requires a different version of a dependency. (Although you can have multipe versions of the same asset installed, Trainz will always use the newest one.) Thus, there'd be both the risk that our Super Session will not work properly, and that something else you have installed will not work properly. This has nothing to do with our Super Sessions. It applies to any and all Trainz routes and sessions.
• Trainz allows any asset to overwrite any other. For example, when you install both the "Schwaninger Land" and "Niddertalbahn TRS19" routes, certain ground textures on the Niddertalbahn will be overwritten by ones from Schwanginger Land, resulting in Trainz drawing Niddertal's cows as grazing on golf courses, instead of pastures. This particular example is obviously not crucial, just fugly. In other cases, the conflict may very well be crucial. Given the many thousands of assets any given route or session typically relies on, the risk at such conflicts is high. Feel free to take the risk – we're merely pointing out how you can avoid it.

Why does the view sometimes change from lineside to cabine and back?

Mainly because in Trainz you cannot place cameras in tunnels, and its cameras have a limited range. The longer the tunnel and the shorter the train, the sooner the train will simply get out of reach of any cameras. Even when trains do remain within reach, you're likely to end up with a view of the terrain instead of the train. Changing to cabine view simply looks better.

Another reason is that route authors tend to place the odd camera here and there without considering that someone else might build a session for their route. Although you can change other people's routes, the vendor does not allow you to then distribute the result. Thus, the only way to mute cameras that are built into a route is to either place another camera closer to the train, or place a trigger to switch to cabine view. (Our advice to route authors is to simply place any cameras in a dedicated layer, which avoids such unnecessary problems.)

Why don't your Super Sessions work in the latest version of Trainz?

They do. Just not our Super Sessions for "Central Europe Mini" and "Niddertalbahn TRS19", because in TRS22 SP3, the vendor killed the signals on both those routes, breaking any session for those routes per definition.

If history is anything to go by, which it is, there's every reason to expect something like this to happen again in the future. Therefore, assuming you want to be able to enjoy tomorrow what you enjoy today, we advice you always keep back-ups of your old Trainz executables. (We currently have 6 different versions of Trainz installed. Takes up hardly any disk space at all. All it takes is to ensure they are all named differently, and do not share data folders.)

Why do trains spend the night at station's platforms? Shouldn't they move to an engine shed or something like that?

Yeah, they should do something like that. But Trainz' infamous "running out of resources" makes it hard to also implement that