March 9, 2016 / admin / 2 Comments
Our Trucker’s Logbook #3 has me returning to Euro Truck Simulator 2 (ETS2) for some long-haul trucking. Even before the release of American Truck Simulator (ATS), it had been a few months since I spent any amount of time in ETS2. I did attempt to launch it over the Christmas holiday but it wouldn’t start and gave me an error about a mod issue with a previous game save. Come to find out this was because I hadn’t updated ProMods after an update to ETS2 was made available. After realizing the error of my ways, I have ETS2 working once again. As you can see from the map below, I haven’t spent as much time trying to discover more of the map. Actually, much of the map is new territory with the ProMods expansion into Romania etc.
While ATS is obviously my favorite, I do enjoy ETS2. My wife is from Belgium and we visit about every 18 months or so. We spend time in Belgium and England when we visit and I have really enjoyed exploring the ETS2 map.
Our job today is driving 22 tons of Canned Beef for Euro Goodies in Lille, France to Transinet in Pyce (Ruse), Bulgaria. Just to familiarize you with the truck I drive in ETS2. I own the Volvo FH with the Globetrotter XL Cabin and the 6×3 chassis. The rig has the massive 750 HP engine installed. She performs really well. The job is expected to pay €73,510 or €34.65/km. The trip distance is 2,104 km (1,307 mi) and should take approx.. 34 hours.
Our route will take us from France through Belgium, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Romania and then into Bulgaria.
We’re picking up the trailer just after 11 AM on Wednesday. We are due to delivery in Pyce no later than 01:04 on Saturday morning. We are fully rested and ready to go.
Day 1, it’s a beautiful day as we drive through France towards Belgium.
Taking an opportunity to stretch our legs, freshen up our coffee while we fill up.
I love how SCS Software gives us so much to look at as we drive. In the background an airplane is on final into Brussels EBBR.
Day 1 comes to an end as we pull over for a rest just outside of Nurnberg, Germany.
Day 2 starts early with a wet start. Rain is the general theme for much of the day. We do leave the rain behind in the afternoon and spend our second night on the road just outside of Budapest. However, we did have a minor fender-bender when a car hit our trailer. I blame it on the rain.
Day 3 starts well before the sun rises but we arrive at our destination on Friday afternoon.
Unfortunately the accident penalized use some XP and cash. But we will live to drive another day.
I then headed back to Bucharest, Romania to meet with a realtor and purchased a new garage.
I believe with our new Bucharest garage, this makes about 6 or 7 that we have in ETS2. All our ETS2 garages are just the small version and filled with three trucks and three drivers.
As we have just about covered all there is to cover in California and Nevada in the awesome American Truck Simulator, I’m probably going to spend more time trucking around in Europe and try to discover more cities. I’m also looking into adding RusMap which should provide 30 cities in Russia and 12 cities in Belarus. I’ll make sure to tell you all about it here.
Until next time…
Happy Trucking!!!
J
March 7, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
On Friday, I wrote about the World of Trucks (WoT) website and shared some basic background information about the site and provided some details on how you sign up and link EuroTruck Simulator 2 (ETS2) and/or American Truck Simulator (ATS) to your WoT account. This all needs to take place before you can proceed into the Job Market function of World of Trucks.
At the present time, the Job Market function is only available for ETS2. However, I read in the SCS Forums that there are plans to introduce the Job Market function for ATS at a later stage in 2016. So for now, the WoT Job Market is exclusive to ETS2.
When you first click on the Job Market link on the World of Trucks website, you’ll see a drop down menu listing a few dozen European cities. I don’t have a screen shot available to show you, but you’ll only see the drop down menu one time. Select the city you wish to operate your first job from. The city you choose can be the same city where your truck currently resides in ETS2 or it can be any other city. If your truck is not presently in the city you select, your truck will automagically be transported to that location at a later stage.
Once you select the city, you’ll see a listing of job offers available from that city. You can sort this list by several variables including distance, destination, time etc. I usually use either distance or destination. In the example below I’m using distance.
When you find a job that interests you, you click that job (example below is a job transporting chimney systems from Lille, France to Klagenfurt, Austria). A few things to note. The “Time Left” indicates the amount of real world time you will have to complete this job. Meaning, at the time I was browsing for job offers it was approx. 5 AM MST (in real life). The WoT Job Market is based on real world time and not ETS2 in-game time. As you know there is a big difference. Another point of interest is the “Est. Delivery Time”. Again, back to the image below…the Est. Delivery Time showing ~1 H 19 MIN is the approx. amount of time (real world time) it should take me to complete the job. Once you are ready to accept this job, click the “Sign Contract” button.
The next screen displayed will be the “Contract Signed” screen and will just provide you the basic information about the load. Click OK and return to the ETS2 Game application.
Back inside the game, click on “Job Market”. You’ll notice you now have a third option in the “Job Type Selection” screen titled “External Contracts”. Click the External Contracts button.
You’ll now be presented with the screen below showing your delivery job. Once again, take note of the remaining time. In the example below we have 21 hours and 11 minutes to complete this job. This is real world time and not in-game time. Click on “Begin Delivery”. Once you’ve done this, regardless of the location where your truck was last, it will be automagically teleported to the starting point and already connected to the trailer.
All you now need to do is drive….just remember, these external contract jobs work off of real world time. In the screenshot below, we’ve arrived in Klagenfurt and dropped off our trailer.
The deliver was successful (as shown below) and we’re close to earning our level 27 promotion. Want to do another job? Sure……
So we return to the World of Trucks website and click on Job Market. WoT now knows our truck is located in Klagenfurt and provides a listing of all jobs from this location.
Find a job which interests you, and sign the contract. This next job we are taking is a load of Copper Roof Gutters to Kassel Germany. We have 14 hours (real world hours) to complete this job and the estimated time required is one hour. Click Sign Contract.
Now return back to the ETS2 game and click on Job Market and once again select External Contracts. Then click “Begin Delivery”. Assuming your truck was still at the previous drop off location, it will once again be teleported to the next pickup location. So, if you need to discover the current city you are in, or if you need to repair your truck etc. and want to do this driving around with a trailer attached…then you’ll want to do that before you click “Begin Delivery”.
Not that you require proof, but I thought I would show you a before and after screen shot to illustrate how the time works with WoT Job Market. In the screenshot below, we have pulled into a rest area. We’ve parked and shut off our engine. Our in-game time is Thursday 11:03 and we have 13 hours and 41 minutes to complete this job.
We have now completed our rest. The time is now Thursday, 20:03. We’ve rested for our required 9 hours and we still have 13 hours and 40 minutes to complete this job.
We made it to our destination and completed another “Excellent” delivery and earned our level 27 promotion. This marks the 6th WoT Contact job we’ve successfully completed.
So, what happens if we decide to perform jobs from the ETS2 Freight Market? So in our example above, we completed our delivery to Kassel, Germany. Let’s say we opt to just use the ETS2 Freight Market and we select a job to Antwerp, Belgium. We complete that delivery and we go look at the WoT website. It will still show our location as Kassel, Germany. If you want to perform another job from WoT, you can either pickup an ETS2 delivery back to Kassel or just allow WoT to teleport you.
A few questions you might be asking yourself….
Why use the WoT Job Market? I think as it stands today, this is a valid question. As you can tell I also don’t exclusively use the WoT Job Market. While the extra step in logging into the WoT website to select a job is minimal effort and I’m personally not that bothered with it making me start in the last city I visited. I really would rather drive from previous drop point to new pickup point versus being teleported to that location. But I think the WoT Job Market has some wonderful potential down the road and I suppose having access to it now and using it as frequently (or infrequently) is really up to you.
Are the WoT Job Market offers similar to ETS2 Freight Market? I haven’t done a side-by-side comparison on each and every delivery. But I have spot checked a few and found the price per mile to be similar. If you are just starting out and every Euro counts, then you may have some concerns. But as I presently have over a million Euro in the bank…I’m more about the overall experience than I am on making sure I can pay my bills.
What do I see for the future of the WoT Job Market? Of course, I am in no way affiliated with SCS Software and I am not in communication with them. Any knowledge I have is completely public knowledge that I’ve obtained from public sources. But I think the potential for the WoT Job Market is HUGE!
Basically, if you are familiar with the concept of a virtual airline in the flight simulation hobby, then the WoT website and specifically the WoT Job Market can be just this. Yes there are VTC’s or Virtual Truck Companies. But without direct integration into the ETS2 or ATS games, (in my opinion) there is just too much manual work required. I don’t want to have to visit a website and fill out a manual job completion form to track my deliveries. This would be like the virtual airlines of 15+ years ago with their manual PIREP process.
Because WoT is owned and managed by SCS software, they have the integration into both the ETS2 and ATS game platforms. So further enhancement will only make this a better experience. As I mentioned in part 1, some of these future enhancements may allow for setting up VTC’s within the WoT environment. So that would be cool….
But here’s an idea I came up with in the shower this morning. Yes, I do some of my best brainstorming and thinking in the shower. But let’s say you start out in Europe with ETS2. You pick a job from Bucharest, Romania to Los Angeles, California. The job is a shipping container. You select that job through the WoT Job Market and you drive that container from Bucharest to Southampton. It’s delivered at the port of Southampton. Through the magic of web databases, the shipping container is virtually moved via container ship from Southampton to New York (or Miami or wherever). Then you start up ATS, pickup the container and drive it to its destination. This concept could be done via single player or even handled by multiple individuals as part of a VTC. Sound fun? I think so too…
In closing, while I’ll admit that the WoT Job Market may not be appealing in the current stage, I do encourage you to use it (even just occasionally). We need to use it so we can show there is an interest. To quote that famous line from Field of Dreams, “If you build it, He (WE) will come”.
Well that is just about all the time I have for today’s update. I think I’ll head down to my basement office and do a little trucking now. But make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed to get all the latest blog postings sent direct to your favorite RSS Reader. Or just bookmark the website and return often. You can also follow me on Twitter. I have also started streaming some of my gaming activities on Twitch. Drop by if you see I’m streaming.
Until next time…
Happy Trucking!!!
J
March 4, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
World of Trucks – Part One If you’ve been playing Euro Truck Simulator (ETS2) for any period of time, you may already know about the World of Trucks (WoT) website. However, perhaps you are brand new to the trucking sims by way of the newly released American Truck Simulator (ATS) and either just simply don’t know about WoT or want to know more. This blog post will be part one of two postings I will write regarding the World of Trucks website. Today I’ll introduce you to the website, the basic features, how to interface with ETS2 and/or ATS. During part two, I discuss the Job Market function.
I started playing Euro Truck Simulator 2 in the early summer of 2015 and joined World of Trucks very soon after. While the website has been in “alpha” mode for as long as I’ve been using it, the features and functionality have evolved nicely in the almost 8+ months I’ve known about it. The World of Trucks website is operated by SCS Software (the developers of ETS2 and ATS) and was launched in October 2013. I suppose in website standards, having a system remain in alpha for over two years may be viewed as a negative. But considering WoT is free to join and in many ways helps to bring our community together, not to mention the fact they are adding many new features, I think it shows a lot of promise.
Anyway, as I previously stated…World of Trucks is a companion website for both Euro Truck Simulator 2 (ETS2) and the brand new American Truck Simulator (ATS). With exception to the Job Market function (which I’ll cover in part 2), ETS2 and ATS function the same with WoT. Joining the WoT website is both free and super easy. If you purchased ETS2 or ATS via Steam, you can just use your Steam account information to join the WoT website.
Once you have joined the website, you need to link the ETS2 and/or ATS game to WoT. From inside the games main screen, look for the World of Trucks button. Just click that button and your ETS2 or ATS will be linked to WoT. It’s really that easy.
Now some really question why even use World of Trucks. Many compare and even liken it to Facebook, but for trucks. While this comparison may have been somewhat accurate, things have changed with regards to the job market function and all that is planned for WoT in the future. Some of the future plans for WoT is to allow the users (us) to create virtual trucking companies (VTC’s) and even shared multiplayer experience. Today, both VTC’s and Multiplayer functionality exist, but they are 3rd party applications and not official to SCS Software. But of course, these are future plans and there really is no ETA on when we might begin to see this functionality.
So for now, if you are interested in World of Trucks, go sign up, then link your ETS2 and/or ATS games to the site and customize your profile.
Until next time…
Happy Trucking!!!
J
March 3, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
Looking to get a little better weather in American Truck Simulator? This mod may be what you are looking for.
What is the Featured Mod and what does it do?
This mod is the Default Weather Update. It produces brighter sunrise and sunset and a much darker night. It updates the color and reduces the yellow tint.
How can I get this mod?
The Default Weather Update mod for American Truck Simulator is available here.
How do I install this mod?
Please see my blog post “How to Install Mods in American Truck Simulator” for complete instructions.
Until next time…
Happy Trucking!!!
J
March 2, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
Earlier this week SCS Software shared these four images from the much anticipated Arizona DLC package from their Twitter account. I don’t know about you, but these images are truly amazing and only making me want Arizona NOW! I really only see two problems.
First, this Arizona DLC is not yet available.
Second, looking at the second image (Grand Canyon Caverns Inn) they have included another impossible intersection (similar to the one in Tonopah, NV). SCS really needs to make this a stop light controlled intersection. Either that, or another modder will need to fix it similar to how they fixed the intersection in Tonopah.
These images are the property of SCS Software and posted here as a newsworthy source. If you are interested in purchasing American Truck Simulator, please visit the American Truck Simulator Steam page.
I really can’t wait for AZ to be released.
Until next time…
Dreaming of Arizona!
J
P.S. I really hope they have modeled Winslow, Arizona on their map. I’m looking forward to hearing “Take It Easy” while driving through Winslow, Arizona
March 1, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
This was a little cartoon tweeted from the SCS Twitter account earlier this week. Yes…this very much describes ATS as well as ETS2, FS2015, CMS2015 etc. etc. etc.
I also don’t understand why I can’t stop playing either…
Until next time…
Happy Simming!!!
J
March 1, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
This week not only do we celebrate our week four progress of ATS, but we also celebrate the one month anniversary of this wonderful games release. Yes, time really does fly by when you are having fun. American Truck Simulator was released on 2 February. It’s been a great month! If you don’t own it yet, go get it now!
Our fourth week has been just as productive as all the others. After we completed our Coast-to-Coast (and back) run, we expanded our San Diego garage, purchased two new trucks and hired two new drivers. All paid for by cold, hard, cash we’ve earned. Our little trucking company now owns 13 trucks and employs 12 drivers. We have reach a point where bank loans just won’t be required. It’s a good feeling to know we have enough operating capital to purchase a new garage (or expand an existing one), purchase enough trucks to fill it and hire drivers. Of course, I’ve spent over 80 hours playing this game.
The goal for this week is to go ahead and expand our Las Vegas garage to accommodate five trucks. We’ll purchase the two trucks and hire new drivers. This will bring us to 15 owned trucks and employing 14 hard working drivers. At this point in time, I’m possibly going to hold off on opening any new garage locations until the official Arizona DLC is released by SCS Software. While I certainly don’t have any “inside” information on exactly when this new state will be released, I’m thinking it should be very soon.
This week I’ve mostly been driving the Kenworth W900 (as shown above). I purchased this truck for one of my drivers and after tricking it out with all the nice chrome and a powerful engine, I decided to drive it a bit. I’ve really enjoyed the change from the new Peterbilt.
Also, as I’m sure you read from my blog posting last week…I did upgrade my GPU to the awesome 980Ti. ATS/ETS2 performance is rock solid. I’m running with max graphic settings, not having to use any tweaking from Nvidia Inspector and get 60FPS in all areas of the game. It was money well spent and I’m very happy.
Finally, I added a new simulation based game to my Steam library. I had added Car Mechanic Simulator 2015 to my Steam watch list and when it went on sale last week, I pulled the trigger. You can read my “First Impressions” blog piece on Car Mechanic Simulator 2015 which I published last week.
Finally, Finally….I started streaming some of my game play on Twitch again. I don’t have a set schedule, but if you want to visit my Twitch page and Follow Me, you’ll be notified when I go live. I will mostly stream Car Mechanic Simulator and American Truck Simulator for now.
Here are my current stats for American Truck Simulator
Level 26
Total Driven Distance – 63,578
Total Driven Distance (On Duty) – 60,246
Total Free Roam Distance – 3,331
Roads Explored – 90.29% (No, I didn’t start over. I installed the coast-to-coast map)
Deliveries Finished – 100
Deliveries Cancelled – 0
Total Game Time Spent – 107 Days, 20 Hours
Play time – 59 Hours
Don’t forget to bookmark the site and/or subscribe to the RSS feed. Finally, please follow me on Twitter.
Until next time…
Happy Trucking!!!
J
February 26, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
When I first built my current gaming machine, I purchased and installed the GTX 780Ti (3GB) GPU. At the time I believe more powerful GPU’s were available, but they were also well over $1,000. Two years ago, the 780Ti was approx. $600. My previous gaming machine had the GTX 460 (1GB) model, so I felt the 3GB model would be fine. At the time I was only using my gaming machine for Flight Sim. Both FSX (and P3D) are more CPU intensive programs and really anything over 3GB would be overkill.
But then I began to play other simulation based games such as Farming Sim 2015, Euro Truck 2 and in the past few weeks I’ve been burning up the highways in California and Nevada playing American Truck Simulator. My 780Ti began to show its age with both ETS2 and the new ATS. I really had to dial down the graphics settings to keep my frame rates high enough for the games to be playable. Things seemed to get worse with a recent update to ATS when they introduced the new Kenworth W900 DLC. I’m not the only one that noticed the loss of FPS.
Now having spent so many years flying FSX and now P3D, FPS rates in flight sim just aren’t the same thing as it relates to other games. Gamers may demand FPS rates well above 60 FPS (or even into the 100+ range) with many games. We’ve just never been able to experience that in FSX/P3D. Especially when flying the more complex, payware aircraft (like PMDG) and using add-on scenery, weather etc. etc. etc. But at times when I would drive through the city areas (like LA, SF etc.) my FPS rates would drop into the teens. It was especially noticeable when turning. It was like watching a bad slideshow.
I was able to keep FPS rates in the low 20’s with some tweaks using the Nvidia Inspector. This of course is an old trick we would need to do to get more from FSX. But it still wasn’t to my liking. Plus, when monitoring my GPU, the GPU was running constantly at 99%. The more I thought about it, the more I was leaning towards upgrading my GPU.
Well…I finally pulled the trigger and purchased the GTX 980Ti SC+. This beast of a GPU offers me 3x the performance and 3x the memory of my old 780Ti and it really shows when playing both ATS and ETS2. With max graphic settings, the GTX 980Ti SC+ works at less than 50% capacity. My FPS rates are steady at 60 FPS (even in cities). I’m very pleased.
At the moment I know I’m mostly playing ATS, ETS2 and FS2015. I will return to P3D and I’m hoping for even better performance and visuals with that application.
Until next time…
Happy Simming!!!
J
February 25, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
Hmmmm, Pizza!!! Similar to the review I posted last week for the real world branded gas stations, this mod will re-brand the in-game billboards with real brands such as Pizza Hut, Coca-Cola, Napa Auto Parts and even McDonalds.
What is the Featured Mod and what does it do?
This mod is the Real Brands Billboards mod for American Truck Simulator. It simply re-brands the in-game generic billboards with real world American brands of Pizza Hut, Coca-Cola and more.
How can I get this mod?
The Real Brands Billboards mod for American Truck Simulator is available here.
How do I install this mod?
Please see my blog post “How to Install Mods in American Truck Simulator” for complete instructions.
Until next time…
Happy Trucking!!!
J
February 24, 2016 / admin / 0 Comments
No, it’s not April Fools and No, I’ve not lost my mind. It is now possible to drive from the west coast of the USA (California) all the way to the east coast in American Truck Simulator with the help of a new map mod released last week. You may remember, last week I introduced you to a mod developer named Mantrid and his Speed Limit Fixes (and more) mod. Among other things, this mod corrects two really big issues (my opinion) with the default ATS map. It adds a traffic light intersection at highways 6/95 in Tonopah and removes the traffic lights on I-80 in Reno.
Well, Mantrid also created a coast-to-coast map mod which allows ATS truckers the ability to drive from the west coast all the way to the east coast of the USA. You can download this map mod directly from the SCS Software forums. Now before I proceed, allow me to get some finer points out of the way. First, this map mod is a Work In Progress (WIP). Mantrid’s initial interest in creating the coast-to-coast map was simply to be able to drive from one side of the USA to the other. So as the map stands today, it is pretty basic. So basic that he only included a handful of cities along the way with just one primary highway route. The cities along the route are Phoenix, Albuquerque, Amarillo, Oklahoma City, St. Louis, Indianapolis, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, New York and Boston. The highway route is basically I-40 all the way to OKC, then I-44 up to St. Louis, then I-70 to Pittsburgh, then I-76 etc. See map images below.
Again, I say this map mod is a work in progress. The other point I want to make, is much of the terrain areas don’t necessarily match up with the real world. Yes, you’ll probably notice palm trees in New York City. There are also a few mileage signs which appear to be in the wrong locations. An example is just out of Boston I saw a mileage sign for Bakersfield or Fresno. Anyway…just remember, this map mod is a WIP.
This blog post will be both a Trucker’s Logbook and Mod Review all rolled into one. If you are interested in downloading this new Coast-to-Coast map mod, visit the SCS Forums via this direct link. Also, as this is a WIP, make sure you check that thread for updates to the map. Oh…before I forget. You don’t need a massive amount of Long Distance skills to pickup jobs with the coast-to-coast expansion. All you need is one skill of Long Distance and the jobs should appear.
It’s just after 9:30 AM on Wednesday, and we are looking at picking up a job hauling for Walmart from LA to Pittsburgh. The load is 27,500 pounds of clothing. The expected delivery time is Sunday between the hours of 6:03 PM and 7:33 PM. The pay out isn’t the best in the world at only $22.44 per mile. The trip distance is 2,501 miles and our GPS is telling us that is a little over 65 hours of driving. A perfect delivery should earn us just over $56K. Let’s do it!
For this coast-to-coast run, we will be driving our Kenworth W900. I purchased it last week for one of my new drivers and at the time of purchase I tricked it out nicely. In the image below, we have just picked up our trailer and have 2,501 miles to go. We have approx. 300 gallons of diesel, plenty of coffee and snacks and a bladder the size of a camel.
While the amount of cities are few on this massive map expansion, the fuel and rest stops are plentiful. At least they are when you have the luxury of 300 gallon diesel capacity. I was able to drive from LA to Albuquerque on the first day. Unfortunately, the only state line sign I noticed was crossing into New Mexico (see below).
After a hot shower and wonderful New Mexico Truck Stop breakfast, we are ready to hit the road once again.
The weather on our second day of driving (Thursday), remained mostly cloudy but no rain.
Another full day of driving, we pull into another truck stop along the way. This one is somewhere between OKC and St. Louis.
Our third day (Friday) finds us hammering down I-70 as the sun rises in the distance. We are well ahead of schedule and should complete our delivery on Saturday morning.
We spend our third night in another truck stop along I-70 just near Columbus. This will set us up to make the delivery with over 24 hours to spare.
What’s this? A California Ambulance all the way out here in Pennsylvania?
Our on-time delivery of clothing items from California to Pittsburgh is appreciated
This job bumps us up to level 25.
I applied my new skill point to the “Fragile Cargo” category. The next earn point will go in “Just In Time Delivery” to level it out.
But of course, LA to Pittsburgh is not USA Coast-to-Coast. So while in Pittsburgh, we found a job hauling Lay’s Potato Chips to Boston.
Another on-time delivery from GrizzlyBear Trucking.
While I discovered a garage in Boston for purchase, I decided against buying it at this time. I’m not 100% sure how owning a garage on this un-finished map will work. I’m sure there will be upgrades to the map, so for now I’m just going to pickup a load of seeds and head all the way back to LA. This job pays over 100K. See you back in LA.
Until next time…
Happy Trucking!!!
J
