Simutrans Help and Tips

Simutrans is available for Windows, Linux, Mac and plenty of other platforms including the iPhone.

To Install under Windows or on a Mac, first go and Download the Simutrans complete package which contains the app and a pak file for it. Unzip this where you want to run it and it is ready to play. Simutrans can also be installed on Linux this way, but if you want to manage it under the package manager then you may do it that way. It is included in the Ubuntu distribution.

To Install on the iPhone, go to AppTism.com and click Get App.

To get better graphics, you can go onto the Simutrans website and install additional pak files. This is not required, but optional, but the pak128 looks very good. Pak64 is the default, it has the most features and has had the most time put in so far. This is for good reason - the lead developers of Simutrans personally contributed to it.

This one is really important - before spending a lot of time playing Simutrans, it is really worth reading the Starter Guide thoroughly. It is a comprehensive guide, with a lot of very good info on getting players started with most of the tools and aspects of the game, and will save a lot of newbie mistakes. In fact the very first place a player should look for Simutrans Help is the Starter Guide. Even seasoned players may get something from refreshing this one from time to time - it is updated to reflect new features.

Simutrans Starter Guide

Some examples of the topics covered by the Starter Guide:

• What is simutrans - covered more comprehensively than my version


• Freeplay - avoiding bankruptcy, other startup options - disabling sound and music


• Saving and Loading Simutrans Games


• Using transparency to find things


• Introduction to the messaging system


• Building ports, rail networks, road networks, airports and trams.


• Bridge and tunnel building.


• Underground stations.


• Handling post (cargo type).


• Station expansion.


• Factories, economics, supply and demand.


• Vehicle scheduling, creating lines, buying vehicles.


• Using rail signals.


• Managing the corporations finances


• Adding new factories or industries.


• Enhancing simutrans.


• Metting the simutrans community

For a good start to building with trains, avoid train passenger services, and focus on on freight. Bus passenger services can be profitable, but take a lot of tweaking and maintenance - freight is a much simpler profit area.

Due to freight requiring whole industry chains to have their materials transported, start with something simple and high return - route coal or oil to a suitable power station. Read the next section for more on this.

If you do start with a freight, be sure to be able to make enough money of have enough capital to start building the other links so that you do not end up with one factory full of one input type, and not enough of the other to make anything, otherwise the one link there will soon stop moving.

Bus passenger services can make money. They take a bit more fiddling. First identify the largest city on the map. Look for some landmarks. Create stations near the landmarks (under the station coverage footprint) but try not to let their coverage overlap or be too close (pressing V will show a station coverage overlay). Also create a station near the city hall and factories/supermarkets nearby. You can identify the best by using the magnifying glass tool and clicking them - it will show the passenger numbers. 4 or 5 stations well distributed across the city near major landmarks is a good starting point. Do not build anything but bus stops, avoid building any new roads at all.

Then create a road depot somewhere on the outskirts of town. Look at the selection of buses it has to offer. Because passenger numbers will be low, look for the cheapest bus initially - cheapest running costs, not capital cost. Set up a route around the stops - either a circle line route, or a reversing line - by clicking each station in a logical route, and then clicking the "replicate backwards" link. Let this start to run, and the stations should start bringing in passengers. If you identify some stations with very hot numbers of passengers, before increasing station capacity, try running relief buses to take the strain. Watch these buses though, because as soon as the peaks are gone, you will need to repurpose them. The passenger routes often peak somewhere, then drop right off as peak demands are exchanged.

Passenger routes encourage city growth which further increases passenger numbers, in any game it is eventually worth looking at these.

I cannot emphasise enough that the first links you should probably make and not miss are those simple ones from power sources (like coal mines and oil fields) to power stations. These require no further links in a chain and are rapidly profitable. They are best served by trains, and many power stations will take as much fuel as the supplier can produce so it will not often wane.

As mentioned above, this can start with one station each end, a depot and a single train. Be sure to set up a schedule so that the train waits to be 100% full at the mine and ensure that the stations at each end are long enough to fully accommodate the train.

Now this has additional benefits, power stations supply electricity. If you connect this to other factories, including the fuel source, you will increase output. That means that as you build your network, if you find that there are certain supplies that are being waited for, you can link power to them to increase their output. This only works as long as there is power being produced. If you need to further increase the output, and there is enough power, then additional transformers can be added to improve the effectiveness of this approach.

You will soon find that the source of coal or oil has more cargo than the station can hold. To operate multiple trains on a line, read on.

Using signals well is important for even the most basic junctions, in fact anything involving more than one train requires them. Get to know them well.
There are many uses for signals - here are the main ones.

First is to separate two track areas, so a train operating on one does not block the whole line and prevent another operating on it. Beware though - try not to create situations where a train can end up facing in opposite directions either side of a bidirectional signal.

Second is to make one way areas, ensuring trains follow a particular route and avoid jams.

Others are to get trains to chose platforms, and to avoid multiple trains entering a long block. Read on to see how they can be used.

Do not be afraid to start a game that you use to experiment with - try junctions, building underground and so on with. This can be done without effecting a game you are mainly working on and you can observe maintenance costs and other things in a game. This should probably be done using the freeplay mode so you do not run out of money.

When trying out junctions, interesting bridge combinations, or even just a new transport form like airports or canals for the first time, it is easier to use an example and not think about the finances while just getting the hang of the tools and their limitations. This may also mean you shake out bugs - so do let the community know.

Experimenting with structure means you do not even necessarily need trains, stations or industries if you are just trying to build spaghetti junctions or new transport modes to see them working. Although I'd strongly recommend running trains on an interesting junction before building it in a game you've been playing for a while, just to make sure you catch any smooth running problems. Experiment with the number of trains the junction can handle, and the length of them - these tend to be the two bottlenecks, as many trains may cause queues, or worse still deadlocks. Very long trains can also cover more than one signal causing queues and deadlock situations. This also gives you good practice in coping with such situations which can arise from time to time in games - like adding in a temporary depot and sending trains to do it - this is a neat, but expensive relief valve for any junction/station problems.

Even on the main game, ensure to save before making a big change, so you can roll back if you made a big mistake. The Z key does not hold a big history.

Every extra square of track laid will cost money, but more importantly has a maintenance cost. Extra, unused or under utilised track means wasted money. Getting multiple trains to use the same area of track is a great way to save money. Going from one trains to two requires some investment and increase in maintenance, however, once the multiple train infrastructure is there, using it for four or more trains starts to get great returns.

Also remember that different track types allow different train speeds. There is little point putting in expensive fast track when you would not be able to buy trains or carriages that will use it at the high speed. Unless you are upgrading a profitable service or carrying cargo that is very sensitive to speed, use the cheap rail.

Running a long train may be cheaper and simpler than running many trains, but long platforms need a lot of space, and cost maintenance. A long train will also run slower as the weight of the cars effects the top speed of the locomotive pulling it. Slower trains mean fewer deliveries, which reduces your monthly proceeds. You may need to upgrade to bigger more powerful loco's, which are more expensive to run, and depending on the era, may require a tender to run, further extending the train. Generally it is best to keep trains at no longer than 5 squares. The longer you make them, the bigger your junctions may need to be to avoid jamming.

One other note - remember that while raising land with ramps/filling is pricey, it has no maintenance cost, unlike using bridges or tunnels which are quite expensive. The long term expenses are the real killers.

Bridges are cheaper than tunnels, and can be built without carving up the land as much, but being able to build complex structures underground can save space.

Two trains can operate with one station at each end and one main line fairly well, as long as there is a bypass route along the way.
Building a bypass route is simple. First find a spot along the line that is roughly in a straight line, at around a trains length + 2 squares long. Build another track parallel to the mainline. Be careful (using control and dragging) not to merge it with the main line yet. Then join each end of this branch line with the main line.

Now the best way to use a parallel line is to set up a simple one way system, where the mainline goes in one direction and the bypass goes in another. As we start to get into dual line systems (which will come in a big way), having a rule for one way systems makes a lot of sense, and saves problems linking up parts of a network later.

My rule of thumb is to always place the signals on the outside, since each side has a different direction.

Choose the signal tool. Start on the bottom most square of the main rail before it merges with the bypass, clicking once will place a two-way signal. Clicking again will make it one way. Check if the signal is on the outer side of the rail (the side furthest away from the gap between the parallel rails) - if not, click it again. Now place a signal going the opposite way on the parallel rail. Repeat this at the top most squares. This should mean that the whole dual rail section is made of two one way sets. Trains can now pass each other either side on this section.

You may want to ensure your depot is designed as below to avoid depot jams. You can now go to your depot and start a train.

The trains may queue at one side of the bypass waiting for the other to hit the area too. To prevent this, either extend the parallel track or add another bypass further along the track. Make sure you use the same one way directions (on the outside). Eventually, you may end up with most of the line being in parallel. It pays to ensure that when you lay track you plan to have a parallel track later by leaving space.

Sometimes, when playing with signals you will get into a bind with deadlocked sections of track, junctions, or two trains stopped facing each other. Hopefully it happens only when cashflow is good enough that it does not kill your profits.

Get out of trouble quick
As mentioned above, a depot can act as a quick relief spot by sending trains to it. Just don't forget that trains in a depot are no longer making cash, and do not retain their cargo - you may loose a load this way.

You can also send trains to a nearby station, but this will occupy a platform, and means interfering with the trains scheduling - the send to depot command applies only once in the schedule and disappears after the train has made it to a depot.

Troubleshooting these
First - if you are setting up a one way flow system, be sure to use standard signals in one direction and not the one way signal type. The one way signal types do regulate the direction of trains, but they do not serve to split up a line so trains further back can progress.

This gets worse when the lines are connected with loops - as then the signalling suggests the line ahead is closed due to the tail of the very train using it. Everything will stop.

The answer is to use a standard signal. Place it once to make a two way standard signal, then click again to make it one way either side. This type - a standard signal made one way, will split the line and prevent jams.

Using the train-booking mode
Trains in Simutrans book a route. Pressing "b" will show train bookings in red. You can click those bookings to shorten them, thus preventing a jam or prioritising trains. You should then investigate the signals in the area to stop it happening again.

Junctions being too short
When trains get longer, if the junctions, station exits and other signalled areas are shorter than a trains length, you may have problems, including that where the tail of the train is causing signals to prevent the head moving. Always be sure to make junctions and signalled areas of track long enough to be more than the longest train. This means that if you go on platform expansion projects for longer trains, you should rethink signals too.

It is a usual newbie method to just pop one square of rail out and put the depot directly on it. When building trains in depots, one problem is once you have set up the schedule or line and hit start, the train says "line block in use", and you have to wait and time starting the train later. Wasted time = wasted money here. So to easily ensure you never have these jams, depots need to be planned a little. 

To make this work better, build a branch line off the main line, with at least a trains length + 1 and then add the depot. Then place a standard two way signal between this line and the main line.

This way, when you start a train, it is able to leave the depot, and wait at the lights for the rail block to be freed.

screenshot 25Stations are a natural queuing spot for trains. If there is only one platform, then each train has to wait for one to leave. Worse still, this can cause a jam.

Station jams can be costly - maintenance is being paid on the track, but the line backs up, goods may stop being produced or ferried and income is cut off. It is critical you spot these and deal with them, or as you start to send more than one train to a station you pre-empt and prevent them.

The simple answer is to create two or more platforms, so each queuing train can go to a separate platform, or at least multiple trains can be handled. This can be achieved as shown using a platform choice signal. Use the track choice end signal coming back out - this is important otherwise trains will behave strangely on the rest of the line. To keep things smooth, have a separate entrance and exit track.These can link back to a single track after at least a trains length without causing jams.


However, with more than two trains, this setup can jam. If all the trains to these tracks are supply, or all are ferrying away produce, then they will keep on moving, maybe a waiting a little. In fact, they could be served until queues get annoying by just one platform. However, if there are both types of trains (produced freight and consumed freight) then it can get stuck. If you have two platform, and a train waiting to load freight at each one, but the factory can not produce any goods until it receives raw goods from trains queued behind them, nothing can move, and a goods out train will need to be sent out to a depot or something to clear a platform.

There is a simple rule of thumb for this - always have one more platform than there will be trains taking things away from a station if it also has supply trains operating on the same set of platforms. This ensures you can never have such a deadlock. Adding a third platform to the setup above is easy.

This article will be expanded on, and may even be expanded into a set of articles.
I do not really have professional sounding names fro my junctions, but have planned some myself, and adapted some from other sources.

Topics to be covered:

Long train jams
Junctions - basics
Junctions - avoiding deadlocks
Junctions - high speed

More images will be added, along with some diagrams of these methods and systems. Individual junctions I have built and got working, along with pitfalls or jam situations will be covered.

If you've ever clicked in the wrong place, and found that you've wasted a huge amount of money or eaten up space you didn't want with a bridge or tunnel to nowhere, the Z-key is a life saver! "z" means undo in Simutrans.

This one is really important - Save your game! Forget this, and you'll learn it the hard way.
Save before going and making big changes, save after playing for a few hours and save before leaving the game.

've now added a section to this article about dealing with problems when trains get stuck.There are generally a few simple areas to troubleshoot, but if you get into a bind, feel free to use the feedback area to ask me how to sort it out.

Simutrans - Help! My Trains are Stuck!

Now I have become familiar with Simutrans and been playing a while, I have started collecting up the tips and tricks I have found, and I will be adding diagrams of rail junctions I have built in the game as well as other resources.