Thames Valley Branches Discussion

Sorry, didn't realise the opinion police was out and about. Just trying to nudge the game in the right direction, which I see now is frowned upon as the law dictactes must love and praise whatever DTG gives us, even if it's a huge step in the wrong direction for the overall TSW experience.

JB

 

There people here who redesign every announced DLC in their mind and then complain that the one actually being released doesn’t match it. It’s mainly about where routes should have gone to but the unrestricted designs can go much deeper than that. For this one, some people are even redesigning how the game works to accommodate their wishes.

 

If this has the same price point, it should be worth it.

I'm amazed by the fact that the original IOW is more expensive than the (better looking, better train) 2022 version.

 

This of course is also just an opinion

 

Everyone is entitled to an opinion, but you are like a broken record. You’re simply wasting your time and energy repeating yourself.
And again you think it’s the wrong direction of the game but others feel differently. So stop making your opinion appear as facts.

And it’s not even DTG that’s making this route, it’s a one man team so you are even wrong on the insistence that DTG are the ones taking the game in a direction you perceive to be wrong.

 

Thinking about it now, and reflecting on the messages from those who say this should have been made an extension to GWER, I do think at a minimum the section between Slough and Twyford should've been included, given (except Burnham) they're all consecutive stations. Worth pointing out a similar thing was done with MVL, whereby a substantial portion of SEHS was included with the route, albeit with much improved scenery. Incorporating this idea into this DLC, with the length proposed, wouldn't have even required any scenery improvements since that was done in GWER and the two DLC's are set in the same era as one another. However, I'm happy for those who are looking forward to this, and all the best for Johannes, but this isn't for me

 

I really hope this is a success commercially and we see other branches as cheap DLC. I’d love to see the Windermere branch in game for example

 

I think this might actually work because you get three branch lines in one DLC. Just having one branch line is probably going to be less successful.

 

Maybe you dictating others with your own opinions and not respecting theirs is the problem.

 

And why shouldn't he ( or me )?

We all want this or that route, this or that train. I want the game to fit my exact prerequisites. The fact that it doesn't is always a mild ( or sometimes a strong ) disappointment. I'm willing to accept less than what I want most of the time. When the game fulfills my need perfectly I'm delighted. I'm sure everyone feels the same.

We're not a cadre or a team looking for the exact same thing. We're individuals, all different, all wanting something distinct. So each of us would like to push the game in a particular direction, consistent with his/ her own requirements/ imagination.

I've been a broken record about some things, the save game for example, and I'll keep repeating them till I'm blue in the face, even if it annoys people.

 

Again, why shouldn't they? It's perfectly natural to campaign for what you want in the game and be pissed off when you don't get it.

We're not a flock of sheep.

 

Assuming this is priced sensibly for its content, and doesn't release with issues, I'll happily buy this.

 

I mean, I'm looking forward to JT's Cumbrian Coast but still feel quite strongly it should go all the way to Barrow, given Whitehaven to there is the main part of the actual coastal section.

As regards "TVB" I still think the concept would have worked better for Cornwall where it could be recognised the great distance between the junctions is a valid reason for not including the main line and the Newquay branch would give something like a 20 mile run in its own right.

 

I'm giving my opinion as someone who's been pretty active in the MSTS, Trainz, Rail Sim / RW / TS / TSW community for the past 25 years, and as someone whose professional occupation is to ensure my company's software takes into account what the user base is asking for. I'm pointing out that customers, not only those on the forum but gamers in general, want more immersion from games and this goes the opposite way. Nobody's said that those who want short branches are wrong. Nobody's dictating their opinion. Someone here is dictacting which opinions are allowed to be expressed though. Any ideas?

 

There's a lot of that on the forum. For instance, some 3Ps can be taken to the woodshed, whereas others are pretty much sacrosanct.

 

This place is depressing sometimes.

 

It has been for ever thus!

 

Sort of, 95% of those branch line service are contained on that branch. There are a few that continue to London.

 

Personally I would like to see the stretch of the GWE that connects these branchlines included so that you can catch a train between the branches seamlessly, I wouldn't mind if it was literally just an every 30 minutes service class 166 doing a shuttle up and down the short GWE stretch going in and out of portals, pretty easy to copy and paste, no frills. For me that would give a great realistic experience.

 

But its not Dovetails Product its being developed by a third party and they are free to create what they want. They are not told by Dovetail what to create.

To be honest I am not sure about it, I have the same vibes for this as I do for the Tadami Line and had for the Cardiff City Network. To be honest I am kinda getting a litte ticked off with these short GB Routes and yes thats just my opinion. Everyones entitled to their own. \ But yeah 3rd party creators are free to do what they want.

Hentis

 

I can see why they'd logistically be included together, but separating them into 3 different min products might actually increase revenue because there's a lot of people who impulsively will spend on a $5 route and not a $15 "route." It's not a remark on the quality of the product, that seems quite good from what I've seen. (Obviously you can't entirely tell until it's released.) It's more a comment on consumer spending habits. For example if the middle longer branch with the most stations is very popular and is worth a good $5, but the other two people find "meh" there's a higher chance people will say "it's as long as Isle of Wight and it looks good, I'll throw 5 bucks at it!" Whereas if it's $15 for the three, people are more likely to hesitate and say "well I don't LOVE all three....I'll wait."
Package deals usually have to be a bit cheaper than individually because of this phenomenon. You can see it in the TSW "bundle" sales where they throw a few routes together and people say it all the time. "Well I really want to pick up this route, and it's in this bundle...but I really don't WANT the others in the bundle.."

If they were connected then it's be "one route" but if there's not connected, there's very little reason to put them in the same "package" except they seem to be in the same area. However, that could be accomplished easier by having them separate AND doing a bundled "pack" of the whole "valley" for a little cheaper together.

I can only speak for myself, but the middle one is the only one that seems long enough to be worth it. The 2 mile stretch between a pair of stations seems almost pointless. There's no real variety there. Why would anyone play it more than once? Yes some people like quick routes but that's taking it to an extreme =-)

I think people might be scared off by the whole package if it's too pricey for what it is with no connection to increase the individual value of the parts. Even if the GWE part isn't part of a "timetable" in real life, people could make their own fanciful routes up and drive it for fun. It's be a more coherent whole.

 

If they had included the sections people would moan that it wasn’t a natural start and end point for the services on the main line (probably including some of those complaining it’s not included), they can’t win and personally I’d have no interest in driving short hopes on the GWE when I can run the same service from Paddington to Reading already.

 

There was a discussion about branch lines a year or two ago and I for one, whilst enthusiastic, thought they would never be made so I am very pleased they are. I am biased as I live in Windsor (which is definitely outside London in the county of Berkshire!) but if we were ever to get a Waterloo to Windsor & Eton Riverside (WER) DLC then you could, via route hopping, go Waterloo to WER, Windsor & Eton Central to Slough, Slough to Paddington (GWE), Paddington to Waterloo (Bakerloo line). Perhaps not the most exciting round trip but one that would offer a variety of service providers (SWR, GW, TFL), third rail and diesel.

Whilst I can understand the Thames Valley Branches DLC is not everyone’s cup of tea (which DLC ever is) it will be interesting to see how this plays out. Even if it is a one off I will be pleased just to see Windsor to Slough and Brunel’s viaduct.

 

Why can’t DTG introduce a free upgrade policy to existing customers who own certain routes? (TVL & GWR combined) only eligible customers who own TVL & GWR.
The route in question (TVL) can be easily merged onto GWR, so why not give the consumer more options to take their beloved route to the next level. Route hopping is a shambles, it’s not been properly optimised so that when you route hop the train you left is there waiting for you to continue your journey. You’re just standing around with your pants down walking around trying to kill time, hoping the next available service is due *Looks PIS* the next service is due to arrive in 15 minutes. Sod that, I’m out!

 

How easy is it to merge two routes together?

 

The only part of TVL is the 23 minute…ish branch line that appeals to me, other than that I don’t see what value from a gameplay prospective this has, long term for me. No freight, no depot moves and no shunting just Linear A-B quick short routes.

 

Why on earth would the services start or end in different places? Are you making up scenarios in an attempt to give yourself more arguments, or do you genuinely not understand that people just want a mainline with the ability to seamlessly change to the branch lines it's physically connected to and the associated connecting services, rather than having to route hop and wait for 20 minutes for a service to turn up?

 

Pretty difficult when they're entirely different creators.

 

That's more difficult than you think unless you built the line as one piece and then later cut it into pieces. The way you describe is a challenge if you are the sole creator and very difficult if you have to deal with different creators. People think programming is some sort of "plug and play" but that's the end most people see of computers as users. Think of it like building a car. If you build 100,000 cars at the same factory then yes you can swap parts around. However, if you have an Amish guy building chairs in his shed by hand, then each one can be slightly diffferent and they don't often "fit" together perfectly. They don't fit together at all if it's two hand built pieces of furniture from two different people with two different styles.

A company like DTG isn't a monolith so making a route "fit" with another route by a different team of designers can be a challenge. Getting a DTG route and a third party route to work together... much more so.

Now if one team is doing one huge route, then cuts it into 3 parts... that fits together because it started as one single piece.

Another alternative is to severely limit who can do projects to a small group and impose restrictions on how things can be done to make it a common experience, but that takes a lot of work and oversight to maintain commonality (not just quality control but method control) and is essentially impossible to enforce for third parties.

That's why you often get wildly different products in the same "game."

 

Not really, TSC had plenty of merges of routes with different creators, for example.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1941392826&searchtext=Havre+merge

It's going to have more to do with origin point than anything if TSC's anything to go by.

 

There is no route merging in TSW. It was not an option for Incredible Games. I presume they could have extended the existing GWE if DTG handed over the source code but apart from this meaning two companies are responsible for maintaining and trouble shooting the same DLC, it would make the work of Incredible Games much more difficult. Instead of having a DLC that they are in complete control of they would be adding to an already busy GWE with the risk of causing issues in the existing content that are nothing to do with them.

If Dovetail had decided to do the branches it would have been feasible to extend GWE but they did not want to. Incredible Games did want to add the branches and to me a new DLC seems to be the only practical way they could have done so. Given the standalone nature of the services on the branches, then and now, I think it could work well

 

IG could have easily recreated the missing portions of the GWML from their route. Given it probably extends two miles either side of Twyford, Maidenhead and Slough anyway we are talking about an additional 8 miles if that of mostly plain line. And I'm sure a deal could have been done with DTG (who will no doubt be taking a big chunk of the revenue from the route) to reuse the station assets at Burnham and Taplow, assuming not already in place for Twyford, Maidenhead and Slough.

 

That's what I thought but apparently it's easy from what I read above!

 

Yeah apparently it's just like TSC and easy as pie.

 

You guys really don't come across as good faith actors when you botch a reading of a post so badly.

It's said-

I bring up that point the creator of the route is irrelevant, it's origin point, then you guys spin it around to mean I'm saying it's easy. I literally can't see how either of you come to that conclusion besides just actively allowing your liking of DTG blind you to the point of seeing snark where there isn't.

 

I hadn't actually read your post I was referring to one above from some hours ago!

And as for liking DTG I'm not one of the many buying things day one and regretting it.

They are a company who make a train simulator which in general I am happy with but is not without its faults. The only thing I've bought recently was MVL.

 

The focus of the route is not the GWML but the individual branch lines so imo having the GWML drivable is not necessary. Plus even if the section between Twyford and Slough was drivable people would then ask why the rest of it isn't included.

While I understand not everybody likes the route hopping feature I think it would work well in this case but it has to be setup correctly between both this route and GWE.

 

The fact there is so much arguing on this thread is perplexing. Also, as someone stated earlier, there no services (that im aware of) that go from Paddington to the end of the branch lines (Windsor, Marlow, Henley On Thames).
In other news, I rode the Henley branch (or the regatta line as its called) today. Looking forward to driving it

 

I wouldn’t say it’s easy, but not impossible.
The current TVL already has a few miles of GWML attached to it for the Ai layers already. IG would’ve only had to extend it a few extra miles. The work has already been done by DTG and Liam.

Like I said modder’s can merge routes with ease, so I find it hilarious when people on here think they have experience in route building and label it too difficult. We’re all not game developers and a lot of information we get is hearsay. It’s up to you whether you believe everything you hear.

A lot of shills on here too, so it doesn’t surprise some people will pay for the bear minimum.

 

Pump your brakes, kid.
You are doing what you accuse others of doing.
People in glass houses and such.

You literally said it was easy to do on TSC even with different creators.
That's what we were ridiculing.
How is that "misreading?"

TSW is not like TSC, and those "mergers" are not professional actions by DTG.
They are mods created by people outside of DTG, without the permission of the original creators of those routes.

Saying that it's essentially easy like TSC for DTG to merge the routes is avoiding two incorrect things you stated.
If you'd said "someone in the community can without permission merge them like in TSC" that would have been accurate.
Instead you choose to without any reason or evidence attempt to insult us personally for having valid criticism.

You don't have to like DTG or not.... the facts are the facts. It's like saying you're an "Elon Musk hater" if you say "It's difficult to build a colony on Mars." Well it IS difficult to build a colony on another planet. That doesn't depend on your love or hate of a certain person or group.

Similarly, what you are asking is not simple and providing a couple falsehoods doesn't support your case or get you closer to what you want. It just makes you in fact an actor in bad faith...again something you are accusing others of.

Do you have to live by the same rules as others or are you exempt?

 

Yes you are right. It's alright to do when the two routes share the same origin, but if they don't it can get quite complex.

 

Fair enough! Screw up on my end, the one issue I'll take is if it was in reference to a specific post it really should've just quote the post as opposed to leaving it up to rando's to work out who you're replying to.

No it wasn't, your post was in reply to this.

And your reply is that it's difficult when the route's are authored by different creators, which is where my first post took issue with things. Ironically, part of the issue was your own wording, which does imply merging would be easy if it was by the same author, but that's not true if the years of DTG routes that could be merge that haven't are anything to go by. Issue has pretty much always been the timetables first and foremost.

There's at least one route which is a "professional action" by a third party.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1518399331&searchtext=Bernina

Saying they're all "unprofessional" is misleading.

They are in a sense give permission if there's no restrictions on modding, which can be done by creators if they. Thompson Interactive itself I believe has stricter restrictions than most as one example. Would be like saying that I don't have permission to embed a YouTube video just because I didn't personally ask someone at Google. If terms of service allows it/doesn't block it, then you do have permission for it.

That wording does not cover official route mergers like Thompson's, which is why I avoided mentioning anything on it. Bare in mind DTG themselves have shown in the past they're more than willing to let third parties use their content and integrate it into their products. High Iron got to use the whole Feather River Canyon route for their extension for example. So DTG I suspect would've allowed for GWE to be used if the author wished, it's more than likely a creative choice on their part, which is why so little of my argument focuses on the legal rights aspect.

I could've given more clarification to my points for sure, I can own up to that.

 

You didn't just say "someone" could merge routes. You implied it should be DTG and the creator of TVB, and it was suggested they should just "copy" assets without permission. That's fine if you want to make a mod for yourself, but if you want to sell it then no, it has to be official and legally binding. If you want to create some mods for TSW then go for it.

If you want to demand DTG and creators do things, that's entirely different.

 

I love how people like to throw that people are DTG fanboys when you disagree.

Especially when the posts quoted don't say anything praising DTG or saying DTG was right.

LoL

 

I don’t.

This is a dlc I am genuinely looking forward to, the thread has engagement from the creator and yet I’m embarrassed about the content here. I wouldn’t blame him if he doesn’t post here again. How on earth it must feel to be a creator around here and have a ‘look what’s coming’ thread turn into such a pointless argument about something that has been confirmed to not be happening. Have an opinion, yep, not everyone is going to like everything, but know when to stop. Please. Let this thread be about what is actually coming in this dlc. This forum could really do with some ‘stick to the topic’ moderation.

 

I wouldn't say we're off-topic. We're in the Thames Valley Branches discussion thread and the TVB are all connected to the GWML, therefore there's bound to be discussion about how the routes interact with the GWML. This is particularly true as the workaround we're being left with - route hopping - is possibly one of the most immersion-breaking features in the game: you have to go and find a big glowing cone on the platform, which then throws you into a completely different timetable and doesn't even retain the weather settings...

I haven't seen any criticism at all aimed at Johannes. Quite the opposite in fact, as the route (or collection of routes) looks stunning and nobody's said otherwise. The only criticism here is aimed squarely at DTG for missing the opportunity to allow a third-party to extend GWE as people have been requesting for years. They could have sold TVB as paid extension for existing owners of GWE, and then happily justified continuing to sell the remastered GWE - a nearly ten year-old route - at full price in a compulsory bundle with TVB.

No issues with "merging" the routes since they'd be the same route, no issues with maintaining and patching two routes since theyd be the same route, no issues with timetables as they'd be the same timetable with the TVB services simply part of the GWE timetable. You could even have added the Greenford branch in with the services all the way to Paddington. Yes you'd need DTG and Incredible Trains to work together on future updates, no it's not impossible, yes there are legal mechanisms to ensure if one disappears then the other one retains the IP so that the route can continue to be maintained. And if you don't want TVB? Then you stay on the old GWE release which DTG stop updating, a simple solution and it's fair enough a decade after release.

A few people here are defending DTG to the bitter end on this topic with arguments that quite simply don't stand up to scrutiny when picked apart, so others are quite rightly responding.

JB

 

I still don't get what DTG has to do with this anyways. Or see anyone defending them.

It seems to me Johannes had a new idea about a concept different than any other DLC we have and decided to run with it.

I don't see anything where he said that DTG held him back or that having the GWE mainline was even part of the idea to begin with.

If you don't like what he is giving then don't buy it. Maybe have your hand at the editor like he has done and make your own route with exactly what you want.

I know for years people have said its too hard to use but if you actually put in the same amount of time and effort as you do on these forums learning the editor you probably would be pretty good at it by now.

 

Because DTG and the 3P’s should be working together to give paying customers the best possible experience. Also, unlike TSC routes, 3P content for TSW can only be sold through DTG so that implies a fairly close and cooperative relationship anyway.

One thing that gets a little wearisome as I look through my TSW collection is the plethora of sawn off routes that failed to go the extra distance (literally) to give a decent coherent whole. Bernina Line, the original North London Line (which to be fair Johannes is now extending), Peak Forest, MIA, WCL and a host of others which this route - projected technical and creative excellence notwithstanding - looks set to join.

 

My opinion differs to this. Its trying something new.

 

Sorry, but you're just being unreasonable at this point, I don't see how linking a example route implies any of that, again, irrelevant to the point that was being gotten across.

I'd agree completely with that, what's there is undeniably well made, my point I'd argue is this is almost The Order 1886 of train sim routes. A well made route that you'll get the jest of in a afternoon, and then never want to play again for most. Just because that route will have a few super fans doesn't mean the amount of content warrants its existence. Case and point, I doubt most people here even know what the hell game I'm even mentioning, it did have staying power. And in the same way I see this route being a niche product where the resources used could've been used elsewhere for a product with bigger long term impact.

100%, you can see this in a few cases in TSC, more than a few routes use a part of a DTG route as a starting point. Montana Hi-Line is one example, as it reuses Shelby from DTG's Marias Pass, and again, High Iron even got to do this exact thing with Feather River Canyon. The focus on arguing it's a legal issue is bizarre when there's cases, to DTG's credit mind you, that they likely wouldn't be a issue in this at all. Heck, even in TSW we have DTG stock being either included but modified, or being layered in from them on several routes. One of the few things I can say that's actually great about DTG is they seem to have no issue with providing third parties assets if they want them.

Doesn't really matter, having a unique idea doesn't mean that idea should not be questioned. If someone made a FPS and decided we're not going to use the standard right analog stick or mouse to aim, well yeah, that's novel. You're also going to have to put in a lot of legwork to show that deviating from the standard's worth.