OpenTTD 16.0-Beta1
openttd.org
openttd.org
From the top of my head (haven't played in over a year) it would be: cargo destination for people, cargo prices reflect proximity of other productiosn, mono/maglev only has passenger cabs, regular rail still gets upgrades, no planes I guess, "automatic" public transport within cities - no need to build stops, just buses driving around (transferring people to train stations). And probably more I can't think of now.
EDIT: it looks like something like this is now in v16 as “collections”! I wonder if these can be shared.
Half joking because if you are really into TTD The Simutrans interface feels terible(It looks like TTD but does not feel like TTD, this is often why photoshop people hate the gimp so much) but...
I started with simutrans, and have a hard time with ttd. Their systems disgust me in a way that they probably should not but it is that same bugbear, it looks like simutrans but does not feel like simutrans.
If anyone does try it out, beware pak128. The paks are more like mods that change the goods and price ratios rather than the mere graphics updates that their name would suggest. As someone who plays the hell out of pak64 I can't make a functioning network in pak128. I almost suspect it is broken. The price ratios just never work out. pak192comic however, is easy, fun and looks good.
https://www.simutrans.com it is also free on steam, probably the easiest way to play.
If I had to describe the difference, it is that simutrans tries a little harder with it's systems, it take a little more care to make a functioning network in simutrans. Factories have specific destinations and storage sizes. for example iron ore to steel mill will jam full if you fail to deliver the steel to the car factory and no steel will be made if you fail to deliver the coal it needs. So freight network revenue is fragile until the entire chain is complete. Passenger service is tricky because the passengers want to go somewhere(exactwhere is not specified, you have to treat it statistically). If your network does not go there they won't take your trains. So the ideal is to have service everywhere, but you you have to start small and small pax networks make no money, thus why it is tricky. The money is made on the fast long distance routes, and you take a loss on the slow urban routes just to make sure you have their destination/origin covered.
It took me maybe an hour to learn the first time I played it. It's worth it! :D
Tho after finishing the game a few times it gets old.
Yeah cargodist's indeed broken. You could milk plenty amount of money by just setting up two airports far away.
Maybe try Simutrans. It's got actual economy simulation. I tried it and I didn't like it tho. I couldn't make a profit in that game and kept losing. :(
Simutrans requires a lot of care when initially setting up the network: get something small and profitable first, an industry chain that makes money. Then expand slowly, only when you have cash flow, connect everything for the passengers. If you find something is not profitable, sell the vehicles or send them do something else.
Wait... same like in real life you mean?
Took a break from it for a while and picked it up again, this time by not doing anything much feature-wise but pulling the code apart and de-C++-ing it. Bit by bit building a categorised code tree with single functions per file, deconstructing classes to plain functions and data structs, with the goal to convert from C++ to clear C. And then one day consolidate code to have for instance the same diagonal road options as current train tracks.
Might be pointless and take a long time to finish, but it's comforting to turn something overly complex into simple, small pieces and also create a unique code formatting style to visualise elements of a line of code for easier reading. Another fun part is reading about data design and coming up with a custom data container to replace the std::vector uses.
I suppose a 15 meter bus going 50km/h travels roughly its own length (13.40 meters to be exact) every second, so it takes 3 seconds to pass a grid square - checking out a YouTube video, it seems that's already the speed right now!
It was also quite easy to limit production (or passengers) in the code from 06:00 to 20:00 a day for a little extra realism with either emptying a station during the night or have no traffic servicing buildings. Even weekends are possible. Warehouses would be a nice addition.
I can kinda get why there are often news about Factorio, for example (it's not subtly related to programming), and there is nothing wrong with open source projects getting visibily even when they're not "yet another web framework" or "the last open weight LLM wrapper".
But why those games in particular ? Are the authors regulars of HN ? Is there an interesting forking history / backstory ?
Any way, kudos for the release, of course :)
While I don't play it often, I have been playing it for over 20 years.
It's impressive (again, at least to me) for its longevity if nothing else. Just seeing that it continues to progress makes me happy in dumb ways.
It has the competitiveness of games like Civ, The Settlers and so on. But with the world building aspects of games like Sim City.
There aren’t many other games that strike this balance as well.
I first started playing the original DOS game in the 90s and I honestly think OpenTTD looks and plays just as well now a the original did 30+ years ago. The level of detail in the pixel art is ideal for the type of game it is.
About the history of the project you better hear from the horse's mouth: https://www.openttd.org/news/2024/03/06/happy-birthday
Totally a self-inflicted pain with a ton of ways to solve it!
The music is uncommonly good in the original releases.
I couldn't workout the train signals though, there are 4 of them and they have a digit as well with them, not sure what's going on there. I'm probably not the target audience :)
This combo lets you set up an upline and downline with a terminal station: you have one way only signals on the line, and non-blocking signals on the station entrances pointing into the station, and a crossing between. Trains will get to the end of the upline, and wait to get a path to the end of the station. Then they'll turn around and wait to get a path to the downline.
That actually is nothing to do with path based signals, and could be done quite simply with purely vanilla TTD signals.
What path-based signaling allows is for multiple trains to make non-conflicting moves through a single block at the same time, which basic signals wouldn't.
Path based signals (nor pre-signals for that matter) didn’t exist in plain original TTD and constructing such track layouts was easy and straightforward.
And then, finally, hump yards?
> And then, finally, hump yards? I doubt a hump yard will ever be a feature because as far as I see it, it would need a complete overhaul of the way orders are set up and handled. Right now it's one semi-static order list for the whole train and a sorting yard needs dynamic order lists per locomotive and each wagon.