Category Archives: Steam Engine Simulator

Here it is! A basic overview of how to fire.

By “basic” I mean exactly that. There are more advanced ways and techniques to fire, also the engine is stationery which helps with learning the basics!

This took five years to make! Finally, the video tutorial on how to start the steam locomotive from scratch is here

One of the main features in the sim is that you can boil water. This is because the thermodynamics simulation is correct (or at least plausible). In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to fire on air, make the switch over to steam, and all the little details to get the engine ready for the main line. The real timeline to complete all the tasks is about 2 hours, but a lot of it is waiting for the water to boil and making coffee in the break room.

Today we have 2 new videos… in only 4 years! That’s a pretty good rate for contents, right?

First up, is a tour of the cab and all its controls. We only go into what they are, not quite on “how” to use them:

The next video is a bit longer. It’s my own review of… my own simulator. Here I talk and ramble on about what I think of the simulator, now that it’s over 5 years old I’ve had a bit of time to think about it. What I like, what I don’t. The first half of the video is a sort of half-donkey tutorial on getting the engine running:

Released in December 2017, the Steam Simulator officially turned 5 years old in December 2022.

A retrospective: computers and tech move fast, and a lot happened in 5 years. Apple released four iPhones since then, and game engines improved too. The Simulator was built on Unity 5, which was the latest at the time, and the Sim did look “mostly” photorealistic…for 2017. So, while I do think it looked good for its time, it is definitely showing its age when compared to the latest game engines.

To celebrate its big milestone birthday, the Simulator is now available at only $19.

I do not have any updates planned for the Simulator at the moment, and porting the Sim into a new engine is only a daydream for now. This new price also reflects its legacy status.

Maybe one day I will get back into rebuilding it “from the ground up” with the newest tech. But, at least now that it’s an older game, it should run pretty on most modern hardware!

It may be old, but where else can you fire and pull the original Disneyland Railroad engines, other than getting a job at the park?

I’ve been getting increasingly more requests for news on the sim, and that’s totally justifiable because the last news was over a year ago! The simple answer to why there’s been no news is because: there’s no news.

I haven’t worked on the sim since last year, and honestly, I don’t even have the development computer at the moment. The research of the historical Disneyland is daunting, as well as not having any free time, basically leaves the sim as is. I’ve looked into hiring outside help for modeling, but there really is no interests.

Sorry for the not so exciting news, but as it is, please do not expect anything new for the foreseeable future.

I’m glad to say though that I’m happy with the current state of the sim. The last update with the virtual fireman was the one feature I really wanted to have, and I’m happy it got released. I think the mechanics of the live steam operations as is are solid. Any future updates would be mostly cosmetic (like that map).

Meanwhile, I’m planning on one more video over the Christmas break just to revisit the sim, and talk trains. Stand by.

We demo the new fireman feature, both the expert and the novice guys, by taking a quick trip between the roundhouse and Main Street Station. We also cover tips and tricks, such as when to order commands, and why you might want to use the override commands:

Enjoy listening to me ramble on about configuring the new interactive fireman!

In the next video, we’ll actually take a quick trip with the fireman and see how well we do!

This is a non-mandatory update 1.0.2a to fix minor issues found in the 1.0.2 release:

• Fixed conductor and cab bell not resetting
• Fixed heat effect setting not being applied on ranch map
• Moved animated people away from tracks on ranch map

The update is now available, and you can get the latest version by re-downloading the Simulator as always.

The Simulator’s 1.0.2 update has been released! You can get it by re-downloading the program using the same link found in your original purchase email. For Windows, the installer will replace and update all the files necessary. For macOS, simply replace the old version with the new one.

Take a look at the release notes here for a list of updates and changes (there’s also been a couple of additions to the list since the original post).

Don’t forget that the manual has been updated as well to address the new features. From today, if you order the printed Sim manual, it will be based on this version.

Have fun running the engine with your new fireman! Remember to press the F4 key to activate the fireman menu.

This project started even before he was born, and here he is still pulling on the whistle on the weekends. It’s been quite a journey!

The test builds of update 1.0.2 are running well so far. Only one or two bugs were identified and are being hunted down this weekend. I’m finishing up with the packaging of both Windows installer and macOS images, and updating the manual, then we’re good to go!

When the update is uploaded and live, it will be announced here on this blog.

So now that we’re code freezing the update, here’s the final list of new features and changes:

VERSION 1.0.2, released 2019-06

• NEW! Added interactive fireman feature. Active by pressing the F4 key
• NEW! Added hydrostatic lubricator oil metering droplet effect
• NEW! Added camera motion blur effect
• NEW! Added smoke stack exhaust heat blur effect
• NEW! Added people and background sound effects through out the parks
• Changed out “auto firing” to interactive fireman
• Rolled “auto inject water” into interactive fireman
• Added clamp to smoke texture alpha
• Added texturing details at park main entrance tunnels
• Added a configuration option to allow user to reduce the texture resolution size for performance tuning/improvement
• Slightly tweaked the blue sky color (more saturation). Blue sky color is now also user editable.
• Updated/slightly tweaked the color grading profiles (less blue tone through out)
• Fixed the hydrostatic lubricator metering valve not outputting correctly
• Fixed target FPS setting not saving in Windows version
• Fixed bell cradle “drifting” off the yoke
• Fixed 1956 map crashing and mouse sensitivity setting not taking effect
• Tweaked many 3D sound effects (should now be slightly more immersive and space-correct)
• Fixed steam cloud exhaust bug in cold weather
• Fixed texturing issues on Frontierland Station
• Fixed inconsistent GUI (menu) fonts and minor GUI/menu improvements
• Numerous night lighting tweaks to DL 55-56 scenery
• Updated the manual

Some pictures from 1.0.2: