ProMods

Hello guys.

TSM was a popular map before. Their highlight was Africa, and they expanded to France, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Italy and probably some little more.

I was wondering what happened to TSM these days? Progress has been slow and they just kept releasing compatibility and small updates. Plus their forum is mostly German, so I can only understand very little on what they are saying. Anyone know?

In comparison with promods they lost the quality "battle" and beside the SCS Map there is maximal room for one total conversion Map.

As a mapper you could do a 1:1 scale Map or an Add-on Map such as Rusmap, SR etc and you're "safe" because you don't compete against SCS.

That's life - the better one wins

Why don't you ask the question on the TruckSim Map forum?

We don't really care about TSM


TSM was indeed a very popular map, but it was mainly because they released a lot of new content. (or at least, existing content with a new name on a new location)
That was their strategy, copying existing cities, and give them a different name.

They were the biggest map, so for players why just wanted a lot of content, TSM was great.

TSM has lost 'the biggest map contest' to us since ProMods 1.90 or 2.00. Besides us being the mod with the most cities, we also have the better quality.

In the past our progress was quite slow. The reason being, we were a small team back then, and we didn't really copy-paste our cities. Adding to our buildtime.
Now we've got a lot more devs, and we've got a lot more experience, so progress is quite a bit faster now.

I heard TSM team saying like this:

"The Guys of TSM have a Job as well as a private life and Family... This is a hobby of them. So please be patient, you know it's worth waiting for. Knowing the SCS updates it might take a while since the SCS stuff is usually full of errors. Instead of always asking this and or that.... sit back and play the 1.27 edition (TSM 6.6) Let's give the Good fellas of Trucksim-Map some time to update " (This was the reply when people asked when will TSM will be released for the v1.28.)

"... The backgrounds of map making and converting, how life time consuming this is. We do not ignore these wishes, we know these very well, but we are consistent. And this for many, many years. You must see both sides. Be patient. And please stay patient."

Seems that explains why. Their team is not that big anymore (no offense) and yes I also heard some map developers in TSM that have left the team. That's why progress has been slow compared to you guys, in just a day the compatibility update for ProMods has been released.

I missed those days where I travel my Scania in Africa in great landscapes. I mean Africa is beautiful in TSM. Also Greece, but the copy-paste of content just destroys the fun, IMO. Again no offense, but that's the reality. Until now, TSM is still active, just slow. Who knows when will be the next big update?

TSM has some key differences compared to ProMods that puts them in a less favourable position than they are now

One of the most influential differences here is language. As you may know, ProMods has a very diverse international team with members from all over the world. This is not a coincidence; from the very start, the lingua franca of this team has been English, even when the vast majority of the team was Dutch. TSM, on the contrary, was mainly German and their in-team and community communication was also mainly German. English was an extra service, not their main language. This difference in primary language has a great effect on how the team grows and keeps involved with its community. English transcends borders, while German keeps your community and potential new developers isolated.

This leaves TSM with a smaller team. Such a small team can only release a product on a regular basis if their members stay loyal and devoted. Unfortunately, neither seems to be the case, especially after Harry Piel passed away (may he rest in peace). Other than that, I've seen some of their better content creators leave the team after a while (including the guy who did a decent job on Western Spain and Portugal) and I've heard they are having major struggles within the team. I've not seen much more new content from them. Meanwhile, ProMods has grown a lot in size and it has become an alliance of map modders that knows no equal in size within the community. And now that I work at SCS (eight months already, geez!), we learn a lot of mapping optimisation and "clean mapping" tricks, while they learn some bits of modding trickery and hacks (not that they always apply them, but just to know that they exist).

Finally, TSM started to expand very quickly, but not with much detailing and with a lot of copy-pasting. As a consequence, they have never learned (or learned too late) how to properly build cities and roads. And it shows. If you have seen their latest content in Africa, they actually managed to make things worse instead of better. They also have started to do more rebuilds in Germany, but I think they already lost the competition with ProMods on that front. And at the moment, they are saddled up with a lot of content that has being outclassed by their competitors, both SCS and ProMods. "They were first, and now they are the worst"*

So, I hope this explains what happened to TSM.

*) Courtesy to Jay Foreman for that quote.

I see. So sad to see the fate of TSM. It was one of my favorite maps before you guys, ProMods, showed up. At least Trucksim map is not dead.
Well that's really the reality.

MandelSoft wrote: ↑

20 Aug 2017 11:57

Unfortunately, neither seems to be the case, especially after Harry Piel passed away (may he rest in peace).

I remember playing with his map mod in German Truck Simulator years ago... I had no idea that he passed away. May he rest in peace.

TSM 6.6.1 for ETS2 1.28: https://ets2.lt/en/tsm-map-6-6-1/

Jay Foreman for the win