Coming up within the next few weeks is the much anticipated scales & gauges update! I'm announcing this now because the update is well into testing but still has a lot of work to do, and I want people to be aware of how this new scaling system will work and what to expect.
My plan is to release this update on July 20th!
The main feature of this update is that you can now fully customize how large the track, trains, props and player character are in the world. So it will finally be possible to accurately model real-world model railway scales in the game! Like HO, G, N, Z, etc.
You can make tiny N scale layouts all the way to huge G scale garden railways!
How does it work?
This system lets you customize two values, the "scale" and the "gauge".
The scale controls how large the map is in relation to the real world. So if the scale is 1/100 (one hundredth of the size of real life) then a 5m high building will be 0.05m high on your map (5cm tall).
For example, the most popular model railway scale "HO scale" is 1/87, which means that objects on an HO scale model railway are 87x smaller than real life.
Meanwhile the gauge is the distance measured between the rails on track. For HO scale this would be 16.5mm, and for the much larger G scale this would be 45mm.
Trains are automatically scaled to match the scale value, and their individual wheel blocks are scaled (only the width) to match the track gauge value. This means you can easily make narrow gauge track with a more narrow wheel gauge, while keeping the scale the same.
The game lets you customize both of these values, or choose from a range of real-world model railway scales (like HO, HOn3, N, Z, etc).
You can pick from a preset list or set your own custom values directly:
The "World scale' sets how large the player is in miniature mode, so if you are placing down N scale track and set the world scale to N as well, then you will be able to fit inside the cab and drive the trains. But if you set the world scale to HO, then your player will be larger and will not fit inside the trains.
Being able to change the player scale also means you can create interesting effects like ride-on live steam! (where the player is deliberately much larger than the actual trains, and can sit on top of them to drive them). Or you can just make yourself really tiny of big just for fun on any map!
What was the game's scale before?
Rolling Line has infamously messy scaling, this is because back when I first started making this game it was pretty much entirely a VR game and I scaled the trains and track to look best for VR. This was done entirely to eye, and was not based on any real world model railway scale.
Obviously this was a big mistake... because fixing a messed up scale is not something that is easy to do.
In order to keep compatibility will all previous mods and maps, the game still uses a default "RL" (Rolling Line) scale. This means that if you are not interested in using accurate real-world scales, you can completely ignore this update and continue making maps in the same way as before, you don't need to worry about scale at all!
But for those who want to use real-world measurements, you can start making your maps in one of the real-world scales.
For anyone curious, the default scale used in Rolling Line is actually pretty similar to "S" scale, but the exact measurements are a track gauge of 19.9mm, and a scale of 1/64 (roughly).
What will this mean for mods?
All previous and future mods can still keep using the default scale with no problems what so ever. But I've added the option to set the "default scale" for a train mod to any of the real-world scales available.
What this means is that you can make your mods using real-world measurements instead of needing to guess based on the strange default scaling in the game. Your mod will be correctly scaled automatically to all other track scales.
For example, you can set your train mod to use HO as the default scale, which means that your 3D model files should all be 1/87 of the size of the real-world train you are making. Just as if you were making a 3D model of an HO scale model train for a 3D print.
Here is what the AC4400CW and DX locomotives look like when setup with accurate size measurements, and how the look compared to their in-game official models:
As you can see, the AC4400CW is pretty much spot-on, but the DX is actually much larger in-game than its real-world size. This is because the DX is a New Zealand locomotive that runs on much narrower cape gauge track and is noticeably smaller than American trains which are much larger.
You can see this noticeable size difference in Brazil where both American and smaller cape gauge locomotives operate alongside each other:
For Rolling Line I chose to keep the size of all the official trains relatively similar just so that things looked better, since having such noticeably smaller locomotives alongside each other almost looks like a mistake!
Other information
This update is an important one, so I want to make sure everything is accurate before I make it fully public. Especially since after people start making maps using these new scales it will be really hard to change things again in the future!
Also please keep in mind that you will not be able to "scale" previous maps to fit a new scale, if a previous map was made in a set scale (like default "RL" scale) then it is stuck that way, at least for now. I am planning to make a system to change just the track on the map to a new gauge (e.g. replacing RL scale with S scale, which are both very similar, or HO to HOn3 to make it narrow gauge) but this will only affect the track and will not actually increase/decrease the size of the map or move any props around.
There will be lots more info coming when the full update comes out, which I'm aiming to do around July 20th (later this month). I'll also be making a Steam guide which explains the specifics of scaling in more detail.
Keep and eye out for more news in the coming weeks!
Thank you to all my Patreon supporters!
Current Patreons:
Slayde Forbes, WingoDingo, LunaFromSpaaace, EmperorSal, KANedTiger, EngineerSmith, Ilike Tra1nZ, DOLLIN, Taerom, Chloe Surett, Garst, Gustavo Sanchez, Gazzac100, Matthew Johnson, Teapop311, TrainTiny, Ábris Pataki, Thomas Merolla, Ben Burch, Detroit_, Don Willis, Jack Fruh, Lynk_Wyland, Nathan Perez, TrainMann, Outertoaster, KathalLasagna, Richard Prior, Michelle chan, Joblogh, Railraider, The_President, Matt, Trainiac 21, ItzAerozic, Microcosmologist, CAMOGUY54321, Jayton Hawkins, Jonathan Ginsburg, TheAmazingRyry, Rowan Mackenzie, Skilker, Helga Nordgren, HuskyDynamics, SmokeStream
Past Patreons:
Codebag Playz, Ethan Lamont, Rivet, Simon, Joey Drysdale, JohnR, Leto Gloas, Lutz, Carter Shew, Trackmeister, NESecretWeapon, Blake Prevett, Clae
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