Flag Stop! Wood Firing Field Research
Hello all! In many ways, we view Century of Steam as its own form of railroad preservation, with the goal of inspiring many new people to take interest in railroading history, and to understand and appreciate this bygone way of life for train crews in our titular century. Before we can teach, we must know how to convey it to this artistic medium, and to do that, there is no substitute for venturing into the iron dragons' den and awakening these great leviathans ourselves.
A lot of our team members work and volunteer first-hand at many surviving narrow gauge preservation sites across the country, but even so, access to wood firing is particularly scarce in an field largely dominated by coal and rapidly switching to oil. As a continuation of work behind the scenes on refining our locomotive firing and simulation, we've had the opportunity to send researchers into the field to once again get their hands on the Real McCoy, proving valuable testimony, observation, and data to translate the art of wood firing to a set of design documents that our software team can implement. Once again, our adage of "Touch Brass" shines through in this day out on the high iron, to deliver the best standard of authenticity that we possibly can.
A very special thank you to the fine folks at the Golden Spike National Historic Park for hosting us and allowing us to film and study on their equipment! All footage at Golden Spike National Historic Park was filmed on May 3, 2025.
--Studio 346
Comments (31)
Has there been any kind of timeline or roadmap released? I ask as an interested gamer but one that is not well-versed in this game and the dev’s plans.
From what the devs have been telling us fairly consistently. The public roadmap and timeline can roughly be summarised as: Roadmap: No early access. Releasing a feature complete V1.0 of the game including all mechanics, 4 maps, a decent selection (probably quite generous compared to other sims) of locos and stock. Possibly followed by updates, extra content etc. Timeline: When it's ready. That is, no confirmed date or public target date from the devs. We've seen fairly consistent development progress, and although there's no formal roadmap, we've been told the main outstanding systems to be developed (i.e. to internal working alpha/beta stages like the gameplay we've been shown, rather than initial technical trials) are, replacing physics engine (with one that'll enable them to do the things they want better), multiplayer, and the higher (tertiary - see previous devlogs), levels of gameplay (i.e. overall goals, objectives and storyline elements). I should emphasise that this is based on what we've been told and shown, various features could be quite far along in development, we mostly get to see development progress when it's at the alpha/beta gameplay stage.
Howdy CoS team! I'm very excited about wood firing! I've probably asked about wood firing more than anything else in this game... so this video made me very happy. That being said, I do have a question. Will the time progression within the game eventually force me to change fuel type from wood to coal, and then up to oil? The way I see myself playing this game is starting in 1869 and going all the way through 1969. (At least I think that's what the "century" in CoS is supposed to be.) I ask because I'd love to just burn wood all through-out the century. That would be crazy, yes, but I prefer wood as a fuel... depending on the locomotive ofc.
Quick Q&A question: With games today, one of the best ways to ensure longevity is to have robust modding support. Is modding something you are already thinking about at this stage of development? What sort of role do you see it having in the future? Best regards and well done to all you wonderful people!
I believe this has been spoken about a bit in some previous Q&A, if I recall correctly, the answer was that they would love to support modding, but they are unsure if it will be possible, since the Unreal Engine isn't very modding friendly.
of topic but... do any of the 346 team volunteer at Cerro Gordo? i know the road is in the game from one of the previous dev-Vlogs.
For the gameplay modes related to firing the team have discussed variations on the themes of (from simplest to most complex), A: Permanent max boiler pressure, B: Auto fireman (boiler physics simulated controlled by computer), C: Fully manual firing with full boiler simulation. My thoughts were that maybe the most simple mode could perhaps be a "Max steam generation" mode (A2), or that it could be an additional mode somewhere between A and B . The general principle of this mode would be that a maximum steam generation value would be set for each boiler (based on it's calculated steaming performance), if steam consumption rises above the generation rate, the pressure falls, if steam consumption is reduced the pressure rises at a rate matching the difference between consumption and max generation. It could be something simple, a bit like Steam and Steel without the shovelling. The thinking behind this would be that there would be a meaningful difference between a 2-8-0 and a 2-8-2 with the same nominal tractive effort, but different steaming capacities, even in simple mode, (otherwise with fixed max boiler pressure they'd be able to do the same work). It would also teach players some of the basics of how to set their controls, rewarding them for learning to set the controls more realistically (in preparation for more advanced gameplay/firing modes), allowing them to progress and develop skills within simple mode, without there being too many variables for them to consider (they could still jump in throw some levers and get stuff done - works in Steam and Steel). The max generation value could be something like 90% of that possible in manual mode (i.e. representing an average high steaming rate, but not the maximum), to account for things like use of injectors, and allow players to optimise loco performance in manual mode (e.g. by managing water level, timing of injector usage, and anticipating steam demand, etc.). This isn't so much as to handicap players on simple settings but to reward players for mastering the systems, rather than never being able to achieve the same performance on advanced settings as on simple settings. Additionally if firing/loco simulation difficulty was a global setting rather than a per player/loco setting, then needing to consider overall steam generation and usage in a simple mode would make it more interesting for players able to run on higher difficulty settings when playing on servers set to simple settings. Ideally difficulty could be set on a per loco basis at run time, allowing players with different skill levels or preferences to play together, but there's always the trade off between development time needed and how widely used or desirable a feature might be.
This game looks like more than I could hope for. I couldn't help but pitch in!
Really enjoyed seeing this! I’m glad wood firing is finally about to be shown off. I’ve been waiting for that for a good bit now lol. I have a question. Will the wood firing sim be shown on a conventional locomotive or a Shay?
Is that a new harmonica song in the outro? Or have i just been living under a rock (I love the Wings and Strings soundtrack to death so far)
So coal burning engines typically didn’t have dampers? Interesting, that’s something I’ve never really noticed before.
I think that really depends. Some might others might not, the super powered engines switched to other forms of draft control for some of them. I know engines in Europe and the UK utilize them more on larger power than the US did.
I wonder if using wood burners would allow buying wood directly from a local source if you’re on a map with a logging operation like Ponderosa
Ooh, that'd be really neat. Especially if we're operating as primarily a logging railroad, it'd make sense for the lumberyards and timber operations to give us at least preferential pricing on wood to use as fuel.
An excellent addition to the game, Studio346. I and many others in the comments here eagerly await for further updates, and hopefully the release of Century of Steam.
I was lucky enough to arrive just in time to watch them put the engines away at the end of the day. We didn't even know it wasn't a static display when deciding to go till we got there and we got so lucky as we lived in Maryland and were just passing through.
There shall be 3 types of firing and the answer shall be 3.
:D an entire flag stop about wood stacking. Yippie!
Are the automated subtitles in Japanese for anyone else? Otherwise can’t wait to be touching brass digitally🚂🚃🚃
will there be a way to play in vr
From a previous Q&A, its not currently in scope as much as they would all love to.
Start pitching wood!!!
Keep up the good work guys! We know that CoS will be the best train simulator out there. We just know it.
Lizard. Lizard. Lizard. Lizard. Lizard. Lizard. Lizard. Lizard. Lizard.
Super exciting gentlemen. That's the last firing option complete! (Once it's done I know 😊) Well I don't plan on running wood on my railway. I would absolutely love to see what the system's going to look like. Again, keep up the good work gentlemen 🙂🚂
I’m not sure but you might be forced to use wood at the beginning. I honestly have no clue how common coal burners were in the US in 1869. The US barely mined coal until the Civil War necessitated it.
Finally! My Florida hillbilly self feels right at home. Our L&N sub had woodburners in local freight service until the 1930s!
More videos like this please. A few 30 second clips of where your getting sounds would be cool.
2nd this. We don’t need anything perfect or long winded. Just some research videos or videos showing the bug of the week would be nice, but focus on progress, not presentation.
As a traction engineer who prefers wood over coal for what I do, I’m looking forward to struggling to keep a wood fired 2-8-0 happy on a steep grade. Also, happy third anniversary of public dev studio 346! Looking forward to the game but as always, take your time and do it right!
LFG!