What Was The Point Bringing Gen 8 With Us?

Reading through the Dresden Leipzig article earlier, it mentions at the bottom that on gen 8, all services will be run by the 442. So this made me think, why bother bringing Gen 8 with us when it’s clearly on its last legs. You might as not well offer a route to Gen 8 if you’re going to severely restrict the gameplay. The consoles aren’t good enough. It’s no secret. The core of the game desperately needs fixing, and I wonder if needing to accommodate the older consoles is making that process more difficult? Either way, it should be blindingly obvious to every tsw player that gen 8 shouldn’t still be supported. This is by no means me having a go at the people who still play on gen 8 consoles, as there’s many reasons why people may still be using the older technology. But for tsw to seriously move forward, it doesn’t help making a massive and slapping one RE train with it and calling it a day. If I was on gen 8 I wouldn’t bother with the route because it’s going to be let down massively by its timetable. May even have been easier to just not bring Gen 8 along at all, than create a dedicated timetable.

 

They will continue selling TSW on gen 8 consoles while gen 8 owners are still buying. DTG have all the sales data and when it makes sense to them financially to stop supporting the older hardware they will do so.

Despite the limitations, the content must still be selling well enough there to keep it alive

 

It's even worse for Morristown

Poor Gen 8 users

 

This generation has had its day, it's torture to continue this.

 

That is pretty grim. With no AI layers and no ALP-46 services, it will just be Arrow EMUs in TT mode ? Im guessing the ALP-45DP will also be missing from the TT for SE/DX users

 

According to the FAQ Riviera will have the full timetable somehow but yeah 2/3 core routes lobotomized for Gen 8

 

It begs the question, what’s changed so much that makes gen8 now unable to even use trains that are core to the routes. IMO there’s not been that big a leap in fidelity, DTG said that route length doesn’t make a difference (I think this is the lie) & it’s not like the trains themselves have made leaps in terms of functionality.

I suspect the continuous degradation of core performance in the issue, with optimisation being at an all time low.

I do think it’s pretty pathetic that DTG will just throw away any sense of authenticity & genuine care about the railways, just to scrounge up what cash is left on gen 8. You know when EA drops them before you do, you’re really stooping to a new level.

I never really cared if gen 8 was dropped or not, it’s not like DTG will exchange the time saved into time working on bettering TSW - but when they’re at the point of not even being able to include more than one train model on routes, what is the actual point (rhetorical). They can’t realistically go anywhere else from here, but I bet they’ll surprise us with some master plan that removes something even more shocking for gen8 next year.

 

You are looking through the eyes of an experienced user. But imagine, newcomers on old consoles can come to the game. For them, the sixth part is their first game. They don’t even know that the schedule is cut here, There are not enough layers, they are just riding on a train.

 

The point is quite simple really; money

 

This is a bad thing in itself, new players do not know that they are being ripped off: paying the same price for a reduced route where other players pay the same price for a full route, will bug more than the 9th gen because the console no longer holds the game, will play Dresden-Leipzig with a single train and will see that the shorter Dresden Riesa has strangely many more trains and they will be confused, it's a good start for them...yeah...

And of course 0 refunds because we are on console

 

They don't know that the route is not complete. Many people are happy that they just ride the train. There is nothing to stop them from buying a 9th generation console or a PC if they want the full schedule.New players may be satisfied with what they have. They won't play even 100 hours in a year.

 

As I said before, being scammed without knowing it is not a good thing because the day they find out (by watching a video for example) they will be angry and that's totally understandable and honestly no one likes to being scammed

 

I think initially the financial inflation situation a few years ago made Gen9 consoles 'out of reach' for quite a few people and DTG quite admirably let Gen8 consoles stay until such a time that the Gen9 console prices come down in price and we're more accessible to people.

But years later, the Gen8 consoles are still going on even though they are essentially redundant technology as far as I'm concerned. At the end of the day as abysmal as the Gen8 situation is, aslong as it doesn't affect me i just let it be. I'm enjoying a fuller experience on Gen9 and aslong as it doesn't affect my/others gameplay experience I don't particularly care about it anymore.

 

What is the deception? I owned a car that in my home market did not have cruise control. In other markets it did. I was also deceived by the manufacturer, because in other markets the option is available and to install it you just need to replace the set of buttons on the steering wheel where the necessary buttons will be.

 

Just letting you know its not DTG, It EPIC GAME, If you want to be mad be mad at them.

 

What does Epic Games have to do with the decision to release on Gen 8 consoles?

 

Or, keeping it simple, TSW still has enough players on gen 8 to make keeping up those builds worthwhile, so DTG continues to put out what gen 8 can handle rather than pointlessly drive away a still-significant chunk of the player base. When enough people have moved on that a gen 8 version is no longer viable, it will be dropped.

Are the millions who buy a stripped-down Switch port of a PS/XB console game at the same price also being scammed by those publishers, or are they also a customer base being served as best as possible within the limitations of their chosen hardware?

 

There are probably still hundreds of players who love to play with virtual trains but who simply cannot afford a 9th gen console.

They're entitled to enjoy whatever version of TSW DTG can make available until they can't.

This thread is just mean spirited. Those who ride on their high horses on PC, PS5 or the MS equivalent should quit verbally belittling the PS4 players.

Their continued enjoyment of TSW doesn't affect you.

Let them be.

 

Gen 8 owners will upgrade as soon as they can I should imagine or get left behind. They’ll be driving rural branches lines on the busy routes!
I recommend they ask for new rigs at Christmas.

 

Maybe you grew up in a comfortable family. Personally I know what it's like to grow up with struggling parents who did their best but could not afford expensive Christmas gifts.

 

+1.

For years growing up I wanted a Hornby “electric train set” (or a Scaletrix racing car set) but my parents never had enough money for that. So I ended up with a clockwork trainset, though one year did get the Big Big train Zoo set (!). Never did get the slot car racing, just a few static Matchbox vehicles to play with.

 

About 10 years ago, having heard my story a thousand times, my wife, bless her, bought me an electric train set for my 65th birthday.

 

Ironically, the cost of model railway equipment these days is challenging even to people on a good wage or pension.

 

I remember when I was in my early 20s being able to get a lovely Hornby or Lima class 50 for about 30 quid, these days it would be nearly 4 or 5 times more expensive. World is bloody nuts when it comes to prices now.....

 

To add I saw a class 158 being sold by Hornby for about £150+ and it was only 2 car with no set

 

You think that's bad... Go check what they charge for HST power units, no MK3 coaches included

 

That's what is called normal or even cheap these days......

 

I do wonder why they bother with Gen 8. Even the newest Gen 8 consoles are 8 years old now.

Is anyone on PC using an 8 year old machine to play TSW? Mine dates from Feb 2021 and I'm going to be buying its replacement in the new year. If you're using a PC for gaming you're really pushing your luck if it's much older than 5-6 years' old, so why DTG are accommodating the 14 year old Gen 8 tech is baffling.

 

That's why I've moved more into buying and building Lego and Lego like trains....

 

Me!

My potato is probably over 10 years old now, it had a GPU upgrade and some more RAM plus an extra hard drive. However the motherboard (Z87K) and CPU I7 4770. Hoping to replace later in the year as it’s not really Windows 11 compatible but I’m quite fond of the old thing really.

 

In the late 90s I decided that I was going to indulge my childhood dream and bought myself a Scalextric for Christmas.
Worst decision I ever made as around 2010 I had over 200 cars!
I still have the Lima D9003 Meld plus 6x4 board and layout my dad got me for Christmas 79. I added to it a few years later with 50043 Eagle (£12)
Admittedly its grown, been relayed a few times and is now home to a plethora of imacculate Bachmann Deltics but nothing beats those battered old Lima's!!
I baulk at the prices now! I haven't bought anything for either for close to ten years as it's gone so stupid.

 

Was 120 for GWR hst set but I get your point

 

Is it?, I know a few people where I can get some of the older stuff for like £15 to £40 per train

 

Me tbh.
My PC dates back to December 2019 with the launch of Radeon 5xxx series GPUs.
There's still some juice left in my R7 3700X (stock Wraith Prism RGB cooler W/ Noctua NT-H1 Thermal Paste (Max Temp 85 Celsius) - 5500XT 8GB - 2x8GB DDR4 3200MTs - 970 Evo Plus 1TB NVMe (for the games I play, the Graphics settings I use from High to Ultra (when Possible) FPS Ranging from 55 to 120 max it's fine, although I'm still hoping in 2026 to 2027 to move to a new Socket/CPU/GPU/RAM (Basically everything).

For 8Gen, there's not much juice left in them, but all comes down to Money. As long DTG gets money from players buying DLCs in Gen8, they will keep supporting it.

 

That's a nice class 66

 

A bigger issue if they buy something like Rapid Transit, which is still sold for 30 bucks.

 

You make a good point that my post didn't consider, if you get a PC you can at least upgrade it incrementally. I've only had to add extra RAM to mine and that's because I play MS Flight Simulator and 16gb wasn't enough.

If I wanted to keep this rig running for another 5 years I could probably get away with it if I got a better power unit and graphics card. My AMD 6770xt GPU sounds like it's taking off if I try to run anything more demanding than TSW.

 

In terms of some contents not being ported to the TSW 6. And other people complain here about that. But i still stay with the same answer.

 

But only the Epic Games store version has that issue, not consoles. And even if a console had that problem, that would be a Sony/Microsoft and dtg issue, nothing to do with Epic.

 

Any proof of your claim ? As far as i can see there is only assumptions. And this thread isn't even about the ridiculous EGS situation.

 

Until they visit these lovely forums and see the problem for what it really is. Can't imagine them not being frustrated.

 

Me too, my father left at an early age so please don’t play the victim card with me, you know I meant no harm in that comment whatsoever just stating facts. I’m not a fan of gaslighting.

 

The CPU in the Xbox One and PS4 is only about 38% as powerful as your 4770, so its worlds away in performance than those POS's.

 

An RX 6700XT? That GPU should still be good for a few more years, honestly it probably just wants a clean and its thermal paste being replaced. That GPU is more capable than the ones in both the Xbox Series X and PS5.

 

DTG did not say route length doesn't matter.
Quite the opposite.
The longer the route, the more intensive it is because it does in fact load in some things for the whole route from the beginning. That's how you get access to the other trains showing up on the map screen.
Likewise, you're incorrect that trains are not more "complex." The number of features keep expanding, now including improved suspension, more interiors, conductor mode, and in TSW 6 more announcements.

You can dislike DTG and try to assume the worst possible motivations for them if it pleases you,, but at least be accurate. You owe that to yourself and your neighbors on the forum.

 

Which is about the cost of a new much cheaper console.
So you'd have to compare an upgraded computer cost to a new console cost to be fair.
Graphics cards are not cheap.

When you factor in the cost of upgrading your computer for years, you get about the same investment as console users buying new every few years. The issue is people wanting the exact same 8th gen system to run for all those years, just like someone who never upgraded their 2014 computer and demands it keep playing all the latest games without upgrade.

Both PC and console require investment to stay competitive.

 

The graphics card is the most expensive upgrade, but so many other components can be upgraded much more cheaply. I don't disagree that both require investment to stay competitive. But I get to choose what specification of PC I'm buying (I always build my own bespoke PC and have used the same company for 20 years), I can future-proof it by ensuring the basics will last 10 years. I get to use it for so much more than gaming too. 50 years of photographs, all of our DVDs, all of our vinyl records and CDs, home movies, accounts, writing, my railway project which involves about 100 spreadsheets, full internet access with adblockers and very importantly for TSW, mods for games that aren't available for the other games I play like Flight Simulator and Football Manager. My huge Train Sim Classic collection too.

I appreciate that console fans will defend consoles and PC fans will defend their machines. Some people don't have a choice due to cost and space issues, but like I'll never subscribe to Spotify because I'm an audiophile with an old fashioned music system that plays records and CDs that Spotify can't take away from me if I cancel my subscription, the flexibility of having a PC that I can upgrade gradually appeals to me. It's not just about graphics cards, there are, in my opinion, so many more advantages of having a PC over a console.

 

I have both.
They're just... different.
For different things.
It's like renting a car vs buying a truck.
There are pros and cons of each.
Bottom line being that if you want to play the latest stuff you're going to have to upgrade either way.
I think it's a "problem" that will solve itself over time.
The reason DTG is still selling to Gen 8 is that...Gen 8 users are still buying the stuff, even in reduced form.
Eventually those Gen 8 people will get tired of getting inferior performance and quit buying new TSW stuff, or their legacy systems will break and they'll have to upgrade anyway. But, as long as they're willing to put up with bad performance to avoid upgrading, I don't see why DTG would stop selling to them. DTG will stop when they stop buying.

 

Me. :P

Well it's a few months shy of 8. I'd like to upgrade bit I don't know if it's worth the money for something that doesn't get used as much nowadays.

 

Your switch comparison isn't the same.

1. People can clearly see the difference in screenshots and videos.

2. Switch versions are usually priced lower than the PS4/5 & Xbox versions.