Driving with no navigation

[nautofon]

So I just made my first delivery in ATS while using driving directions written by someone other than myself. It worked great!

This turned out to be the Rail Export in Socorro, NM, which I already knew, but hadn't been to for a long time. I got off the interstate, pulled over, paused the game and looked up the directions. I'm sure I would have found the depot without help, but it was really nice not having to decide which traffic light I needed to turn at.

(Those directions are slightly incomplete: They don't cover the approach from Arizona on US-60 yet. Luckily, I came from the interstate, so that wasn't a factor.)

Now I'm even more excited to go to Utah and try the directions you folks have already added. The only problem is, I'm playing a profile with reduced income at the moment, so I kind of need to take whichever job pays best if I don't want to go bankrupt. (Hmm … maybe it's time to switch back to another profile…)

How about you all? Any new success stories while driving without navigation?


@Nic Kowalski About the OR-22: Sorry for confusing you. But looking at a map can't be a bad thing, especially in the context of this thread. FWIW, my main "problem" with the OR-22 is that the I-5 exit for it is signed with "Bend". I guess this is accurate IRL, but not in ATS, where only a short stub of the OR-22 serving Salem is accessible. Not that big a deal I guess. Again, this is one of the very few real problems with navigational road signs in Oregon.

For now the map is useful for planning a route because I still need to drive every road (I just passed the 50% mark), and I try to cover unseen places if it makes at least a bit of sense for the delivery I need to make.

Right. I tend to do the same, in ATS as well as IRL. On the topic of ATS percentages: I don't have exact numbers, but a good guess would be that I've seen around 10–15 % of Utah, and 97 % or so of everything else.

My main use of the ATS map is to locate rest areas. There are so few of those in the game that I don't see a good way to avoid using the in-game map for that at the moment.

I dunno... Can I hire you as my navigator?

Ohh, that sounds like fun! Not sure how to do that though, without physically getting together (which is certainly not a good idea this year).

[Reignman]

Hi all!

TL;DR: doing deliveries without the navigation tools and only by relying on in-game traffic signs and game map is fun! Maybe it's not for everyone, but if you've never done it, I guess you should give it a try!

Great minds think alike I guess haha. I just thought about this the other day. After about 300 loads and 160k miles I wondered if it was time for a new challenge. No GPS or maps. I feel I have a pretty good grasp on where all the cities are so I should at least get in the ballpark on most deliveries. If I got lost or if I'm late with a load, no big deal, the point/goal is to try to find these places on my own and learn, so I started a new profile to do just that. I'm going by memory and traffic signs alone, and so far it hasn't been too bad. Haven't gotten majorly lost yet, it's definitely a challenge and more immersive, as you said, and you certainly pay more attention to the signs and whatnot.

I mostly drive with game signs/just knowing the map, But I Do have the GPS in the background just in case. But I mostly know where I,m going before I even start the trip

Just in case? That's half the fun, getting lost haha. I don't even look at the map before I start, except on the job selection screen I remind myself which cities I should be passing through, since that's what most of the signs are about.

I ended up down a dead end in Las Cruces one time. I saw the "Dead End" sign, but I figured there'd be a place to turn around or something, but nope, just a XXXX road and an exit ramp to the highway. It was a 2 lane road that wasn't wide enough to turn around on either, so I had to back my trailer all the way to the nearest driveway a few miles down the road. I did that in the other lane so I was at least going with traffic and wouldn't have to worry about the AI blocking me. Thankfully I wasn't hauling a double xD.

I just look at the name of the city and the name of the company where the load delivers, and I usually already know where it is. The only time this can be a problem is when there are two of the same company in a city. I remember one time I had a delivery to the Kenworth Trucks dealer in Seattle, but I drove to the Kenworth Trucks manufacturing plant instead.

Ahh yeah, been there done that already. 2 of my first 3 loads were to a Walberts, one in Tucson and the other Las Cruces, and both cities happen to have 2 Walberts, and of course I happened to find the one I wasn't looking for first, in both cities. You get excited when you see the sign only to get there and realize there's no finish icon so you gotta keep driving around xD. Oh well, got to explore each city a little more.

SCS is doing a good job with more accurate road signage, and it is really useful for this sort of thing. They also usually post the little signs with the names of the companies in cities that point you towards the delivery points.

Yeah the signage is good enough to get you from city to city usually and it's a shame all that work has gone to waste. I've never bothered to pay attention to signs before. I haven't noticed these little company signs yet however. I'll have to keep my eyes peeled because yeah that's the most challenging part so far, getting to a big city and having to drive around looking for the company. I wonder how much fun it's going to be to try to find Sunshine or Bushnell farm, or a Coastline. Companies that are way out of town. Haven't had one yet.

The other annoying thing is the XXXX roads. I cornered myself a couple times already. I see a barrier straight ahead so jump into the left turn lane or something only to see that road is forbidden too xD. So then I gotta make a right hand turn from the far left turn lane, and the game doesn't always like that. Got a couple traffic violations already.

It's also difficult to see how sharp some of the bends are in the road. I had one major accident so far when I crossed over into the wrong lane on one of these particular curves and punted an oncoming police vehicle over a guardrail lol. Oddly enough I didn't get arrested. I only incurred an $800 fine, but I did suffer 22% truck damage and 5% trailer damage. I was able to finish the delivery, but the truck would stall periodically. It was a company truck so I didn't have to pay for the damages and they still gave me an "excellent" rating upon delivery lol.

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@supersobes: Where those company signs exists, they certainly are a big help! The area around the port of Seattle is a good example for that.

But as you pointed out, these signs really can't solve the problem for larger cities. You would need to know at least which exit you need to take from the interstate. For example, take the Tidbit in Portland. I'm sure that as many others, you and I both know from memory exactly where it is and how to get there from any direction. But finding it without any help might take people hours of simulated time. Having driving directions available (e. g. "take exit 24 from I-205, turn West, then left at the first signal") would be interesting I think.

I know what you mean, Las Cruces had 3 exits so I had to just guess and guessed wrong, so I had to come back around and try another one. They have those blue info signs in real life with a short list of restaurants or whatever near exit ramps, so it would be nice to have those in game for these companies.

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I'm considering adding the directions to the ATS Fandom Wiki, as "subpages" to the pages of the individual companies. That should make it easy to look up directions for a specific delivery location whenever needed.

Oh neat, I'll have to give those a look if I really got lost or frustrated. So far I haven't minded getting lost and haven't needed to peak at the map yet, but that could change down the road xD. Getting lost is helping me learn these cities better lol. There's a certain satisfaction in finding places without any aids.

[supersobes]

I haven't noticed these little company signs yet however. I'll have to keep my eyes peeled because yeah that's the most challenging part so far, getting to a big city and having to drive around looking for the company.

They look like this. A lot of the larger cities have them, but some of the smaller ones do not. They aren't actual road signs, but rather just signs placed along the road if you know what I mean. I guess one may say they are more like advertisements, but they are definitely helpful for those of us who don't reply on GPS.

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[Reignman]

Ahhh ok, yeah I remember seeing some of those. They're not utilized in enough cities so I don't think to look for them. That one in Seattle is very useful however. I wish they had those entering every city, Walberts this way, Sell Goods that way etc.

Right now I'm sticking to a single area until I get familiar with it. The Phoenix, Tucson, Las Crucas, Albuquerque, Flagstaff loop.

The one thing I'm missing now is a compass lol. I'm still doing quick jobs, so they spawn you at the company when you accept a job and that gets you disoriented quickly. It would be a great help to know which way north was etc. I have to go by shadows, but that's not always reliable. I couldn't find the highway north out of Phoenix the other day xD.

[supersobes]

The Mack Anthem has a working compass built into the dashboard computer, which is really nice for things like this too.

[Airbus05]

I tried ATS without navigation. I bought an Anthem without Navi Display and I must say, I really enjoyed it!

@nautofon Your effort is really welcome. It brings a new level of immersion to the game.
I would really love to see an ATS Version of Rand McNally. Did you consider this?
For example, a simple road layout (wide map) could be made, with not even the deepest details like your Tucson example from the other thread, but to plan a route from A to B.
Then, there could be city layouts with a little more detail and even the Logos of the companies.
Think of how cool that would be ..

I wonder, which tools you used for the Tucson map. It looks damn professional.

[nautofon]

@Airbus05: Thanks for the kind words. I'm still adding new directions now and then, but there's no way I'll ever get close to completion by myself. You're most welcome to help fill in the blanks!

For the maps, I use Illustrator. But any vector graphics editor would work, and there are free ones, such as Inkscape.

I would really love to see an ATS Version of Rand McNally. Did you consider this?

You mean, like in the bottom right here? Yeah, but it's nowhere near ready for release. And since I started driving with the paper Rand McNally, I've made no further progress on it.

Doing a proper map like that is difficult due to the enormous scale variations in the ATS world. There are also many inconsistencies in the road network that are tough to resolve. The idea has its charm for sure, but you're frankly much better off with a real-world Rand McNally and some custom highlighting.

[Reignman]

I tried ATS without navigation. I bought an Anthem without Navi Display and I must say, I really enjoyed it!

Yeah when I first tried it I was surprised how different the game felt. I was paying more attention to landmarks and signs. And trying to keep a mental north/south bearing. The sun helps in the early morning or evening, but mid-day it's no use haha. Taking the wrong exit sure makes things interesting lol. Or even thinking you took the wrong exit. I remember I thought I was on the wrong road once and was going to turn around at the next opportunity, but the next opportunity had a sign letting me know I was actually in the right spot xD. So far I've done about 40 loads with this profile and I haven't been late yet. I haven't ventured outside of Arizona or New Mexico yet though. Going to master those 2 states before moving on.

I'm still adding new directions now and then, but there's no way I'll ever get close to completion by myself. You're most welcome to help fill in the blanks!

I still haven't decided if I'm going to use maps or even directions with this challenge. I'm trying to do it all by memory. I haven't even glanced at a map yet. So far so good, but I haven't tried any long hauls yet.

I almost don't like using the GPS on my main profile now either, but I drive all over on that one so I can't give it up yet. I'm thinking of trying just a map and directions on that one to see how it goes. I don't want the GPS on that one to help me cheat on my no GPS profile haha.

[nautofon]

I'm thinking of trying just a map and directions on that one to see how it goes. I don't want the GPS on that one to help me cheat on my no GPS profile haha.

Sounds cool if you do try it, let us know how it goes!

[Skoot]

I use only the in-game map in my hauls - plan the route at the company that loads the truck and occasionally use it mid-way if in doubt. I can already do some routes by memory only.