Simutrans Guide
Simutrans Extended Updater Updater application for Nightly builds of Simutrans Extended written using Java 9. The full nightly bundle of Simutrans Extended is several hundred megabytes. Simutrans Tikiwiki This website would like to place cookies on your computer to improve the quality of your experience of the site. To find out more about the cookies, see our privacy notice.
| Original author(s) | Hansjörg Malthaner (initial, left in Spring 2005) |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Markus Pristovsek 'Prissi' (current head of development) Simutrans Development Team |
| Initial release | March 6, 1999; 21 years ago |
| Stable release | 120.4.1 / September 23, 2018; 18 months ago |
| Repository | |
| Written in | C++ |
| Operating system | Multi-platform |
| Platform | Cross-platform |
| Size | 10~400 MB |
| Available in | Multilingual |
| Type | Construction and management |
| License | Artistic License |
| Website | simutrans.com |
Simutrans is a cross-platformsimulation game in which the player strives to run a successful transport system by constructing and managing transportation systems for passengers, mail and goods by land (rail, road, tram, monorail, maglev), air (airplanes) and water (ship) between places. Like OpenTTD, Simutrans is an open-source transportation game based on the Transport Tycoon idea.[1]
Development history[edit]
Simutrans was originally written by Hansjörg Malthaner in 1997.[2] Around 2004 he retired from development,[3] and an international community of volunteers took over the development.[4]Simutrans was developed internally as a closed source game until 2007,[5] when the software was relicensed under the Artistic License.[5]
Simutrans is ported to Microsoft Windows, Linux, BeOS/Haiku, Mac OS X and AmigaOS 4.x which make use of several graphics libraries such as GDI (Windows only), SDL (all versions) or Allegro (BeOS only). It is portable to any architecture using GCC and one of the aforementioned libraries. Simutrans has also multilingual support.
Currently the stable release of Simutrans is version 120.2.2 as of April 1, 2017.[6] There is a popular branch of the code called Simutrans-Extended, which aims to extend the basic game.[7] Simutrans-Extended was formerly called Simutrans-Experimental, but changed its name to Simutrans-Extended on February 13, 2017 to make clear that it is a distinct fork of Simutrans and not a testing branch.[8]Nightly builds for Simutrans and the main PakSets are also released for both standard[9] and Extended[10] versions.
Overview and features[edit]
The main goal in Simutrans is to provide an efficient transport system for passengers, mail and goods to be transported to their desired destinations fast and with minimal transfers and at the same time making the company grow avoiding bankruptcy or administration.
Simutrans has a number of factory chains that are interconnected with other chains, for example, a coal mine produces coal for a coal power plant, and an oil rig produces oil for an oil power plant. The goods produced by these factories may be distributed to smaller factories or shops, such as gasoline to a gas station, coming from a gas storage facility, which retrieves the gas from an oil refinery, and so on.
Supplying a factory with electric power will increase the production and allows for fine-tuning the economy. Passengers and mail are transported between different cities and tourist attractions, and may use several methods of transportation to reach their destinations. Gunz the duel server.
The Simutrans executable can run many different paksets, which is a package containing files called paks. Paks are files with graphic and data files that Simutrans uses to determine the objects in the game, it determines things like their resolution, appearance and behaviors. Gaming experience is therefore very dependent on the PakSet used.
Simutrans currently features 12 AI players, and has an online capability similar to OpenTTD since version 110.0. The terrain in Simutrans is freely-modifiable, and different layers like tunnels and bridges can be stacked, allowing for subways or highways to be possible. It has a day and night cycle, different climates and seasons. Nearly all modes of transportation exist in Simutrans. At least buses/trucks, trains, and ships are always provided. If defined in the PakSet, aircraft, monorails and/or maglevs can also be used.
Customization[edit]
The Simutrans executable must load a PakSet which contains the game's objects. Over the years several PakSets have been created, an overview is given on the official page.[11]
Simutrans can easily be expanded or modified. Simple modification can be done via editing the personal config file. Since the objects in the game just consist of a simple image and a short description file, it is very easy to create a house or add a train. Thus many contributed objects for all graphic sizes exist. The user can also add height maps and citylists which add city names into the game. Even deep modifications of the game mechanics are possible via the config file, like a setting to prevent stockpiling at factories or changing the economic model simulation.[12]
Critical reception[edit]
GameDaily's Big Download considered Simutrans to be one of the best freeware games, highlighting the logical system of routing passengers and freight to their destinations, decent AI opponents and the support for custom aesthetics or rules-sets. However, the sometimes unreliable vehicle pathfinding was criticized, particularly with respect to alternate routes and switches for train lines. The sound effects were deemed to be unengaging, and new players may be baffled by the range of transportation possibilities.[1]
Another review from Amiga Future came to very similar conclusions (apart from the lack of sound support on Amiga OS). In particular the depth of simulation and the stability were highlighted.[13]
Between 2007 and June 2017 Simutrans was downloaded from Sourceforge over 5.6 million times.[14]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^ abJames Murff (November 21, 2008). 'Freeware Friday: Simutrans'. Big Download. GameDaily.
- ^'A short History of Simutrans Development'. Archived from the original on October 31, 2010.
- ^about - History on simutrans.com
- ^'Simutrans Tikiwiki : Thanks'. Archived from the original on 2011-12-27.
- ^ ab'Simutrans's Artistic License, SourceForge'. Archived from the original on 2010-07-06.
- ^'Simutrans 120.2.2 r8163'. forum.simutrans.com. Retrieved 2017-10-01.
- ^Simutrans Experimental
- ^'Simutrans-Extended is the new name for Simutrans-Experimental'. forum.simutrans.com. Retrieved 2017-02-13.
- ^'Simutrans Nightly'. Archived from the original on 2008-11-06.
- ^'Index of /downloads/nightly'. bridgewater-brunel.me.uk. Retrieved 2017-02-13.
- ^'PakSets'.
- ^'Release of Simutrans 120.1.1'. forum.simutrans.com. 2015-11-20. Retrieved 2017-02-18.
- ^'Amiga Future review'. Amiga Future (82): 20–21. December 21, 2009.
- ^Simutrans - stats on sourceforge.net (June 2017)
External links[edit]
| Wikimedia Commons has media related to Simutrans. |
- Simutrans on SourceForge
- Simutrans Iron Bite on SourceForge
- Simutrans-Extended on GitHub
Simutrans Extended UpdaterUpdater application for Nightly builds of Simutrans Extended written using Java 9.The full nightly bundle of Simutrans Extended is several hundred megabytes. However, every night only a small subset of that, usually under 20MB, is changed and requires redownloading.
This application efficiently detects what files have changed and only downloads what is needed.There are two applications that are used to achieve this functionality. There is a command line tool run on the server which builds the manifest file of SHA-256 hashes used to detect file changes. Then there is the client which downloads this manifest file from James’s server and compares it with the existing manifest file (if any) to determine file changes. The client then automatically downloads the changed files from James’s server.The client will not only update existing Simutrans Extended installs, but also can download new clean installs as well.
For more information on how to use see the official forums @.Both were written quite quickly and roughly to make Simutrans Extended more accessible for testing. Personal testing has shown the client application to be reasonably reliable, updating successfully over several weeks. Over time code quality may improve.Vaguely reusable components include the SHA-256 manifest generation system as well as a very crudely written asynchronous URL to file download system.
The asynchronous URL to file download system is required for a reasonable download rate as the updater might have to download several thousand very small files.