NIMBY Rails News

Version 1.6 is ready to begin public beta testing, and it is available to download in the beta branch. Unlike past major versions, 1.6 is a smaller release with shorter development time. Here are the main new features and changes:

[h3]Multiplayer optimizations[/h3]
A big focus of the 1.6 private development has been to optimize multiplayer for better scalability. Not all goals have been achieved in 1.6, but it should still be more capable than older versions of playing larger saves in MP.

[h3]Track curve weight[/h3]
It is now possible to manually select the halfway point between two tracks, allowing to alter the curvature of tracks without moving their control points. This feature in turns makes split and tape tools possible.

[h3]Track split and tape tools[/h3]
The track editor gains five new tools: split track, track tape, promote tracks into platforms
(demoting platforms into tracks is also available in the track properties panel), building tape and parallel track tape. These tools have a different interaction mode compared to older tools, always working on top of existing tracks.

[h3]Track editor "hold" mode for keybindings[/h3]
This game option changes the way the track editor tool keybindings work. In this mode the track editor is always in selection mode. When pressing a tool keybind the editor switches to the corresponding tool, but only while the key is pressed. On releasing the key the selection mode is enabled again. Experienced players might find this mode a more efficient way to interact with the track editor.

[h3]Track editor optimizations[/h3]
Manipulating track selections involving parallel tracks and/or multiple stations should be noticeably faster in v1.6.

[h3]Path trace options in train window[/h3]
Two new options (accessed from two new buttons in the train window) make it possible to visualize the projected path of a train to its current destination, or to any point in any track.

Check out the October and November devblogs for more in depth information:
https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-october-2022/
https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-november-2022/

(NOTE: the "platform tape" and "station tape" tools have been discarded, replaced with the 1.6 "platform promotion" tool. You can get the exact same results as the "platform tape" tool combining the "track tape" and "platform promotion" tools. The original station tool remains in the game).




I'm now hosting a MediaWiki for the NIMBY Rails player community:

https://wiki.nimbyrails.com/

It's only a few days old and it has been mostly private until now, so it's very empty, but it will grow with time.

With 1.5 having been wrapped up in October, November was fully devoted to private development of v1.6. This version has the single goal of analyzing the current state of multiplayer, and trying to fix it up as much as possible. I did not succeed in applying the full set of fixes I wanted, but nonetheless it should be improved and after the betas give it a pass of bug fixing, it should be the best MP experience so far.

Additionally the tape tools started in October got more polished and two new ones were added. Tape tools will be the only user visible change in 1.6 when it releases, which I hope will be "soon" :). 1.6 will thus be a smaller release compared to the huge 1.5 changes, for a more manageable beta series later on.

https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-november-2022/

The second beta series for version 1.5 is now finished, and it is now the default game version. It includes a lot of fixes and some new features:

- Custom leg timing: set the exact time a train should take between two line stations.
- Better late train estimation: late trains are now capable of detecting they are late much sooner in their trip, accelerating earlier to make up for it.
- Conflict visualization in the platform table: highlights when two or more line stops happen at the same time in the same platform.
- Line services: create a new version of an existing line with private timings, which remains synchronized to the original line.

For more details on these new features check the October devblog:

https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-october-2022/

And for the full, detailed version changelog check the beta thread in the forum:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1134710/discussions/0/3321988498660991049/

October is ending so it's time for a new devblog. Most of October was devoted to the second beta series of 1.5. Important new features and UX was added to the 1.5 beta branch: custom leg timings, late train estimation, stop conflict visualization and most importantly, line services. With line services it is now possible to create multiple synchronized versions of the same line, with optionally disabled stops, but with custom timing in all line and stop aspects. 1.5 is ending very soon and this second beta will be made the default game version in the coming days.

1.6 has started private development. While there is only one major theme confirmed for 1.6 (a multiplayer review to try to make it possible to play larger builds in MP), I wanted to start 1.6 with some smaller items which were too risky for the already mature 1.5 betas. 1.6 now features track curve weights, track split and track tape tools. Read the post to see how these tools will make some track building tasks easier in 1.6:

https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-october-2022/

After one month of beta development 1.5 has been made the default game version. It contains many UI and UX improvements to the new order system, making it easier than ever to to give manual orders to a group of trains and to use depot gameplay. The auto run system is also improved, and 1.4 imported lines and new lines default to easy, hands off auto run settings.

The central, foundational rule of the new 1.5 system is: every train arrival and departure in a station has a fixed time in the week.



Create a line. Assign trains to run it in auto mode (the default mode). That's it, no more settings are needed. The game automatically keeps a timetable and calculates a fixed interval as you add or remove trains.



1) Create a line. The default time settings are okay, but since the trains running the line are going to have a daily downtime period, you can switch the duration to minimal, since it does not really need to perfectly fit any given period.



2) Buy a train and set it to manual orders on purchase time. This will be your train group leader or parent.

3) In the train editor, select the Orders tab for the new train, click "Append new order", and set it to run your line every day of the week, with a departure of 6 in the morning:



4) If you wanted to have the train run all day, you would be done. This setup is a bit inefficient since the line duration does not divide 24h and you are asking the train to run for 24h, so the run just before 6:00:00 is a bit longer, but it's not important since you are also going to add a depot line and that extra round up time will be spent in the depot.



5) In 1.5 "depots" are actually lines. This decouples the act of a train being in downtime from the physical location of a depot. A regular station which does normal pax service during the day is a perfectly valid depot at night, so we can just use the first station of this line as the depot stop. Depot lines are just regular lines with a service level set to "technical maneuvers". This tells pax to avoid this line, and tells trains it is allowed to despawn when they reach a stop (this can be disabled too).

To create a depot line, click the "Create depot line" in the line editor listing, then click on the station platform which serve as a depot.



6) Now go back to the train orders, and add a second order for the newly created depot line, configured to "arrive no later than" 1:00:00, and set to not loop until next order. By unchecking the loop setting, you tell the train to stay put until the next order starts in the morning. Since the selected line is in technical mode, this wait will be done with the train despawned.



And this is how the train schedule looks like after adding the new depot order:



7) You are almost done. Having only one train run these orders might not be enough to service the pax demand, so let's add some trains. Click in the Group tab of the manual train, select the regular line in the drop down of "Duration of", and then click in "Clone as copier" to add as many trains to the group as you want.



And this is it. Your train group now runs a regular pax line during the day, and spends a few hours stored away at night. You control this with exactly two orders in a single train, with all other trains in the group automatically copied and spaced in time.




It is possible to create stations to serve as dedicated physical depots if wanted. These are still normal stations, buy you might want to tone down some styling, like disabling buildings around the platforms.



The next step is to create a depot line. But this time we are going to add all the platforms in the station as secondary platforms:



To be able to select secondary platforms for a stop, you first need to select a path signal to serve as the platform distributor. This signal must be able to "see" inside all the secondary and the main platforms, without any other signal cutting the path. You can verify this with the signal editor:



When you use this depot line in your train orders, trains will prefer to pick a secondary platform, and remain spawned during the night, for a depot storage aesthetic:



Trains which do not fit in the available secondary platforms will pick the main platform and despawn there.



The journey to 1.5 has been long, check the summer devblogs for development progress and the new September devblog for the beta changes:

https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-june-2022/
https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-july-2022/
https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-august-2022/
https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-september-2022/