Why Mostly Uk And Germany ?

Discussion in 'TSW General Discussion' started by chacal#2181, Oct 11, 2021.

  1. chacal#2181

    chacal#2181 Well-Known Member

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    A noob question, but why TSW (but also TS) seems to mostly feature German British or US routes/locos ?
    - the producer are from those countries and have better acces to model trains and so on ?
    - the fan base is particularly active in those countries ?
    - the most interesting trains / locos / routes are from there ?

    Sorry for this question and by the way it's for me a nice reason to discover unknnown for me locos ..
     
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  2. Cramnor

    Cramnor Well-Known Member

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    I would say the three main reasons are that these three countries have the biggest player base, that DTG knows (more or less) how trains, signals, safety systems and so on work in these countries and that they have the assets needed to model the routes (along with "contacts" and licenses of course).
    Other countries are of course possible, but they come with uncertainty (how well will the DLC sell) and need a lot more time and thereby budget allocated to them (assets need to be created, signals need to be studied, understood and created, and so on). :)
     
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  3. OldVern

    OldVern Well-Known Member

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    Well there is a token French route plus the US ones and a Canadian effort. But yes, generally DTG seem to be fixated on the same two countries and particularly in the case of Germany we have seen a chain of very similar routes using virtually identical traction churned out. UK and Germany probably also represent the two biggest markets for train sim products, though that's not to say prototypes from other countries wouldn't sell. Maybe they just can't get the resources or information to build something in another country, Covid of course continuing to be a major factor. Then there is licensing and ultimately of course what is going to sell the most copies, despite the numerous ideas in the Suggestion forum.

    Perhaps when (if) Covid eases we may see some more diversity.
     
  4. Doomotron

    Doomotron Well-Known Member

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    The first two are correct. DTG do want to make more US routes, but the current situation has forced them to not make as much as they want to - the new NEC route was mostly made by one person who doesn't work for DTG. The limiting factor for other countries is based around two things mostly:
    1. What will sell? There is no point in DTG making routes and trains for somewhere that won't sell. They've expressed how they'd like to do other countries, but as much as I'd like - for example - South African content, there's no guarantee that everybody else does.
    2. Difficulty of production. If DTG choose to make a new British route, they have most of the assets ready to use. They have the signaling, the 'generic' assets like houses and clutter, understanding of the network and an ability to send people to take photos. If they choose to make a South African route, they'd have to build loads of generic assets, understand the network, develop the signaling system and then build the route itself. When they first made Great Western Express, they not only made GWE but they also did half for work for all future British routes. It's a big commitment when expanding into other countries and developing new signaling systems - for example, they had to develop KVB and TVM-430 for the LGV route, but by doing that they got it over with for South Eastern High Speed as well.
    EDIT: I have no idea why Sam upvoted this post...
     
    Last edited: Oct 12, 2021
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  5. chacal#2181

    chacal#2181 Well-Known Member

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    Thanks for those answer. I do understand better. Hope to see some more variety one day. I have thé feel that UK routes and logos are far more variés than German ones.. Maybe just a feeling however.
     
  6. Cramnor

    Cramnor Well-Known Member

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    Germany is also very colorful, in my home region there is no DB red at all, so variety does exist, but of course requires new licenses which are probably not trivial :)
     
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  7. aglomarsale

    aglomarsale Well-Known Member

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    yeah im tired of these countries too. Something new is HIGHLY required but at the end, dtg is a company that needs cash. Releasing a route in the uk will get them a lot.
     
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  8. DTG Matt

    DTG Matt Executive Producer Staff Member

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    A lot of the challenge is building up expertise in that area - you can't just become an expert in another countries railways overnight and there's a lot more to building an addon than just placing some scenery down - signaling is a key aspect that takes a lot of time to learn how it works along with any cab signalling, operating procedures and so forth. We need our team to become as knowledgeable in your favourite railway as you are in order for it to be a convincing product and thats a lot of work. Doesn't mean we won't do it - but hopefully gives you some insight into the challenge and why it doesnt happen very often.

    The second challenge is - it's all very well doing a new South African route (to take an earlier example) but if you then don't do any more South African content and maybe do a different country after - then the players who were hyped to see SA content will now face the reality that they may never see any more for a long time, which is possibly worse than having not had any in the first place. So each time we add a new country we really need to think about the longer term plan for it and how that fits in. One thing is clear - we can't build UK/DE/US content fast enough to keep everyone happy, so adding more countries to that cycle is just going to make it much worse in terms of cadence of releases per-country and some countries could face 1+ years between releases if we're not careful about this.

    The LGV route is a somewhat special case, being a globally appealing railway it is less about it being a French route and more about it being a high speed rail line.

    I'd love to see railways in more territories too - but the reality is that the best people to do new countries in the sim are the local experts and this is where third party developers stepping forward and producing content for the areas they are experts in would be a much more sustainable way forward.

    Hope that helps

    Matt.
     
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  9. chacal#2181

    chacal#2181 Well-Known Member

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    aglomarsale :
    Maybe the question should be, is there à large player basé in uk, so DTG do those routes, or is there à large player basé in UK because DTG do those routes...
     
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  10. chacal#2181

    chacal#2181 Well-Known Member

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    TrainSim-Matt
    Thanks you for this compréhensive answer. I do understand very well thé difficultés, Just hope that some more variety will come one day. Still as à beginner i have so much to discover.

    As for France, is there a possibility that one day we will see more ? Or that LGV is thé only one that will come ever.?
     
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  11. matinakbary

    matinakbary Well-Known Member

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    That's exactly my hope as well. While I am quiet happy because i am into german content, i can see why people from other countries don't feel the same as i do. And thus I hope, that more 3rd party devs step into the universe of TSW. I heard from several TS devs (there is even a thread somewhere here) that the most problematic thing is to get into the development of content. As it seems, the department at DTG which is responsible for communicating with 3rd party seems to be a little "off the track" (pun intended). Communicating with DTG seems to be quiet challenging as sometimes people have to wait weeks or even months to get answers (of course i can neither deny nor confirm this). I hope since you, Matt, have more executive power now, we see in the future more and more 3rd party who develop their own content for TSW. TSG, SHG and RvG are a very good start. But of course we all know, that there is still a huge gap in the area of thrid party who ultimatley contribute to make TSW itself more enjoyable, variable and interesing. Especially for people from other countries.
     
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  12. Purno

    Purno Well-Known Member

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    Although I realize there may be a lot of different signalling systems, aren't there a lot of similar ones too? You've done routes in Germany, UK, France, United States, Canada and Austria. There's gotta be a few countries with signalling systems that are pretty similar to at least one of those countries.

    How can that be worse? I rather have one route from my country than having no routes at all...

    But what if you offset that against those who are of the opinion that routes of the same old 3 countries are starting to look all the same very quickly? I realize that some people won't stop begging for more content of their home country until you've literally done every single route in every single railroad era, but there's also gotta be some people who've seen enough of said country. Especially if all the content features the same railroad era and same type of trains, which is what happens with Germany at the moment.

    That's a shame. I'd love to see a French route that isn't a dedicated high speed railway line. I didn't buy LGV because it's a one trick pony, and if I want to drive a high speed route, there's hybrid routes like Köln-Aachen, London-Faversham and London-Reading which offer high speed along with other types of trains. But none of those route would offer me anything like a nice scenic trip through the French countryside, seeing trains unlike I've seen before, and with a new signalling system to learn.

    I've heard several stories of third party developers facing some hurdles getting started with making content for TSW. What's DTG doing to make it easier for third parties?

    And what about community created content? The long requested editor would offer the community the opportunity to create content for countries. I feel quite helpless being solely dependant on DTG and third parties. Despite many foreign routes in the suggestion forums, it doesn't seem like we can expect any of those anytime soon, and it feels like there's absolutely nothing we can do to increase the chances...

    Not really. Although your post explains some things, it doesn't get me any closer to seeing a new country make their appearance in TSW, which is a real shame. In fact, your post only makes it look even less likely we'll ever see new countries. Although the routes from the UK, UK and Germany are quite lovely, they do start to look alike pretty quickly, especially when you've already collected a fair share of content for Train Simulator over the years, like I did. I'm getting a bit tired of the same old 3 countries over and over again, for over a decade...

    Arosa is the only route I bought right away without waiting for a discount, because it offered something new. Even though I already had Arosa for Train Simulator, it was awesome seeing a new country in TSW. Even though there's only one Swiss route so far, it's better than having none at all IMO.
     
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  13. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    Oh definitely there's a big problem with DTG communication department I'd say regarding 3rd party development.
    One big example that's relevant for the content I myself want is a maker called ChrisTrains who has made a lot of very well made unofficial Dutch content you can buy from his site. He's also on the record for saying he's very open to, and has the will and resources, to assist DTG in any Dutch content in the future and has tried to get into contact with DTG, but has only received radio silence on the part of DTG when it comes to his help.
    He has made it clear both in words and in action that he has the knowledge, the expertise as well as the tools to handle Dutch content which would already mitigate the "learning" part.
    ChrisTrains would be more than capable of this, and has already presented himself on a silver platter but got no response after trying to contact DTG.
    At that point it's in DTG's hands if such an opportunity which bypasses almost all of Matt's point still can't be taken.

    I've used ChrisTrains and the Netherlands for this example, but this goes for all countries and I'm sure ChrisTrains isn't the only one that could easily be gotten if DTG reached out better to 3rd party content creators.
     
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  14. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    Oh definitely, I'm with you there.

    There's also something else that's important to keep in mind here.
    It's not just about the long term plan of one country, but about broadening a playerbase through representation.

    If we took a look for a moment at soccer games, there's 2 big ones, FIFA and PES, and as most know, FIFA mostly has the edge.
    However, over in Japan PES has for ages been the preferred soccer game.
    Why? Because Japanese people somehow collectively like PES' mechanics better? No.
    Although in recent years FIFA has gotten the licenses to Japan's J1-league and Women's National Team, for a long time PES has been the only one to bother to represent Japan, both the league and the Men's National Team.
    Of course soccer games and train simulation aren't the same at all, but just the fact that PES has actively represented Japanese content when FIFA didn't has bought them a lot of loyalty from the Japanese soccer gaming community even if there's loads more European soccer content as that's where most of it happens in that industry.

    In the same way, 1 or 2 routes from a new country would go a long way in securing that communities loyalty, and as long as the route is actually well made, I can live with 1 route in a few years. I understand there's other countries that deserve their route too. As long as we're not skipped entirely.
     
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  15. zhexuan_li

    zhexuan_li New Member

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    I guess one possible reason is licensing
    TSW is becoming more popular here in China. But Dovetail is still unable to make a Chinese addon for TSW in short run. From what I know China Railway is not interested in cooperate with game companies and getting permission from them is a great challenge. Same circumstance for Japan Railway. I remember the Hōkaido Shinkansen was included in the initial plan but was removed in later roadmap.
     
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  16. DTG Matt

    DTG Matt Executive Producer Staff Member

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    China and Japan are a major problem for licensing reasons for sure - but we worked with Union Workshop on TS1 to publish their Chinese addons so it's always possible something like that will happen again.

    For anyone having difficulties communicating with DTG for third party projects, feel free to CC me in on any emails, I am keen to grease the wheels on third party content production as much as possible.

    Matt.
     
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  17. davidh0501

    davidh0501 Well-Known Member

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    Yellow will make a nice change from Red Blue and Green.
    And let's hear it for plucky little Italy!
     
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  18. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    That's great! Thank you.
    Although not for myself, what e-mail address should be used to CC you with?
     
  19. DTG Matt

    DTG Matt Executive Producer Staff Member

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  20. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    I'll be sure to make an effort to get that information through and see if that content creator is willing to give it another try.
    I certainly hope something comes of this.
    Either way, thank you Matt :)
     
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  21. Doomotron

    Doomotron Well-Known Member

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    So if TGV routes have a global appear, why is it that the only LGV route that's ever been made is the bit out of Marseille? I'd love the full Rhones-Alps route with the Reseau (assuming the rumours of DTG losing the license to it because of how bad it was aren't true) in TSW, but it does seem strange that a type of route with global appeal has never been done more than once.

    Similarly, I find it surprising there hasn't been an attempt seemingly by anyone to make a Shinkansen route. Didn't Union Workshop try and give up? And what about High Speed 2 if it's ever finished before the killjoys stop it being built?
    I know some people who develop for TS, but do you also accept cat memes in your work email, or should I leave that to your personal one? :D

    Joking aside, do us proud londonmidland
     
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  22. Inkar

    Inkar Well-Known Member

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  23. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    Good one :)
    But let's make sure Matt doesn't come to regret sharing it here and instead make sure this information is put to full use to connect 3rd party content creators with DTG for more and better.
     
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  24. Rudolf

    Rudolf Well-Known Member

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    For TS DTG completely missed the market for Dutch routes. There is a large active and helpful community that developed over ten Dutch high quality routes. These are not very accessible in part because you still need a lot of payware to be able to play them and it takes some perseverance to collect all required freeware assets.

    I think DTG really missed an opportunity here. Unfortunately the Dutch community cannot develop TSW2 routes on their own. It think this leads to far less interest in TSW2. So what happens here is the chicken and egg problem. The market is there and circumstances are good, but DTG should set a step to develop it. Don't blow it for a second time please.
     
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  25. Doomotron

    Doomotron Well-Known Member

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    Yeah, it's about time we had some Dutch stuff. I wonder if ChrisTrains has ever made routes?
     
  26. Rudolf

    Rudolf Well-Known Member

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    Chris makes rolling stock and he also made awesome assets for railway stations. He is not a route builder. There are also teams specilized in buildings, signalling and level crossings and some other aspects of Dutch railways. So the know how is available.
     
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  27. matinakbary

    matinakbary Well-Known Member

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  28. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    Christrains has not made any routes other than his own personal test route.
    However, he has made assets and has mentioned in an interview with Rivet that he purposely didn't, though could, make safety system route assets for his Dutch trains to work on so to not overcomplicate things for hobby route creators to have to learn how to place them first. So his trains would work on every route.

    Earlier there was a stream with Matt and I managed to ask him quite some questions about this.
    Mainly, Christrains is mainly a rolling stock creator and capable of making basic route assets, but he's not a route builder.
    Basically what Matt said boils down to: Christrains would be a 2nd party content creator, meaning he has to either A) work together with DTG as a contractor, or B) collab with another studio that is willing to do the route building while he does the rolling stock and some assets.
    However, DTG does not reach out to 3rd or 2nd party content creators themselves and neither do they collaborate in a way as DTG being 2nd party de facto contracted by the 3rd party.
    I hope I boiled that part down well enough here.
    He answers that here, from 1:47:00 till 1:49:20 (there is a question inbetween but I had a follow up question there too)


    Either way, what's clear from us now is that we should try and mediate Christrains to contact DTG again and open up conversation to see what's the best path forward from there.
    Whether that means DTG would contract him as 2nd party for Dutch content, or whether our best bet would be him collaborating as 3rd party dev with for example Rivet, with whom he has had contact with in the form of an interview, so who knows maybe they could be persuaded to collab with him for Dutch content of which CT has both the know-how and the skills to help with.


    Again, best step now is to have Christrains contact DTG again and make sure he CC's Matt in it as Matt so kindly provided us. :)
     
    Last edited: Oct 12, 2021
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  29. Blu

    Blu Active Member

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    I worked for a company in the UK releasing the class 800/801 and they had major issues changing specs on the rollingstock (and they were the customer) It seems GWR didn't have so much an issue, and I'm very surprised SE got the ok for trainbow. The Japanese's are very strict.

    I suspect China maybe more governed on politics.
     
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  30. Blu

    Blu Active Member

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    Does NS still own all the branding or would the individual operators have to agree? I've always been up for a Dutch route! If it was set in the 1990s would licencing from DB NS SNCB, Lovers Rail be an issue? Aslong as the holders of those brands agreed.
     
  31. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    I don't know the details on that exactly, but I do think if I recall correctly that the sprinter livery (image below) is actually in the hands of the designer rather than the rolling stock operator.[​IMG]

    That being said, all Christrains' earlier work, though not official content as it's not published through TS20xx, has been officially and fully licensed as he does gain monetary reward for it as his work does come with a price. But that does show that all needed parties are willing to offer up their licenses under the right conditions.
    I do believe there are a few mild concessions on the part of Christrains though, like a few intentional inaccuracies that NS didn't want portrayed correctly for safety concerns and such, though I don't know for sure, but I believe I heard that.

    I did hear though that as I mentioned earlier, the Sprinter livery is notoriously difficult to get a license for which is part of the reason why there's relatively few of them on the model railroad scenery.

    Other than that, unfortunately I don't know.
    But as I said, given that all Christrains' TS20xx content is fully licensed, it should be possible to get them.
     
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  32. Blu

    Blu Active Member

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    Thank you for this. Its really interesting xD
     
  33. Blu

    Blu Active Member

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    I remember the yellow blue days xxx xD
     
  34. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    Don't thank me, thank Matt :)

    Yeah, I do too... I'm getting old...
    There's just a simple beauty to NS SGM type trains.
     
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  35. Purno

    Purno Well-Known Member

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    The huge list of dependencies is a huge downside IMO. It is what prevented me to even try getting these Dutch routes to work. Unfortunately, even though modders are very talented, they don't always make their mods accessible.

    I'd gladly have paid a bit extra to get one easy download. I want to play with trains, not with installers.

    Actually, I don't think it's that unfortunate. Considering the mess that the Dutch community made for their TS routes (referring to the mission impossible to get all required content, keeping local backups of your purchases, manually installing, and having to redo it all again if you ever need to reinstall Train Simulator), I'd rather have some professionals making a Dutch route that's actually a lot easier to use.

    It does show however that there's quite an active Dutch community in the train simulation world. And if I remember correctly, the Dutch are known for spending quite a bit of money on their gaming hobbies... ;)

    Unless us Dutchies are just going to buy UK/US/DE routes since nothing better is available... which I fear may be the thing happening right now...
     
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  36. davidh0501

    davidh0501 Well-Known Member

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    Since we already have the Tgv, how about the Al-Boraq in Morocco.
    Marrakesh to Casablanca.
     
  37. Purno

    Purno Well-Known Member

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  38. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    We may have gotten quite specific here talking about Christrains, but for any actually specific route suggestions I'd still recommend you post that on the suggestions forum along with a more detailed explanation of why why you think that'd be a good route for the game.
    I'll also provide you a topic on that forum that guides you through how to make a proper route suggestion on that forum.
     
  39. cyrill.kroonstuiver

    cyrill.kroonstuiver Well-Known Member

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    Those are indeed some very valid points.
    I touch on a few very similar if not the same points in my petition for DTG to look for more content abroad, but this is maybe one of the most frustration part.

    This is indeed something that needs expanding upon and it's very much a double-edged sword I'd say.

    On the positive side of things; it shows the drive of the Dutch community and makes a great case for the demand being too big to ignore.
    It also proves that even if polls don't show the full demand right now, it actually is very much a case of the demand not showing before there's a product. The demand being shown by the intense drive and popularity of Dutch hobby made content despite its difficulty to acquire and install.

    The negative side of it though; it could breed complacency in any official dev team that because the hobby content already exists the demand for Dutch content has already taken care of itself and so does not need their further attention.
    Unfortunately this couldn't be further from the truth as this highly active hobby community can at the same time be read as a cry for attention and if that's ignored only breed further frustration which makes you lose loyalty and trust from a community which I'd bet my hat on is also a large part of the underreporting of Dutch demand in polls for TSW2 content despite the Dutch community being otherwise extremely active.
    If there's no trust in the devs to represent them, they're far less likely to respond to polls as well.

    Exactly on point as well.
    It's for the same reason I always only used the Freeware and it still leaves rather serious gaps in the routes leaving some practically unplayable unfortunately because it's just such an extreme hassle to get a Dutch route working at all.

    I fear that's correct as well, and as trust diminishes so will the people that still hold on.
    Not just in hopes for Dutch content, but also because I don't know how much longer I can take this monotonous slew of UK/DE/US anymore honestly.
    Of course there's the fear of the core bases acting out if they don't get their fix of UK/DE/US, but what about the rest?
    It's the same everywhere, a group that's overserved will never agree to serve others if it threatens their current position.
     
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  40. Rudolf

    Rudolf Well-Known Member

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    I agree that the Dutch community uses huge amounts of assets that are hard to find and install. I also agree I would happily pay for a Dutch route, but since nothing exists, do the challenge to locate all these assets and download them is the only option f you want to drive a Dutch route.

    The point is, I feel irritated by Matts comment saying it iis all so hard and it is difficult to make profits on routes for other countries. My educated guess is that a Dutch route would push DTG sales up considerably and DTG may get a lot of help from the Dutch community, provided they treat them with respect.
     
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  41. solicitr

    solicitr Well-Known Member

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    I would observe, though, that for a long time there have been many requests for Austrian content- and Austria avoids most of the objections raised above. The OBB uses German PZB/LZB, and the signals and signage require little more than reskins. Many if not most of the scenery assets would be similar to Germany. And the OBB's workhorse locomotives, the Taurus/Eurosprinter series, are just variants of the existing DB 182.
     
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  42. OldVern

    OldVern Well-Known Member

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    I may have mentioned this before but it might help, particularly in the Suggestions section, if DTG (possibly Matt) could post a stickied list of those countries where licensing or simple lack of co-operation by the rail operators/infrastructure means it is unlikely we would see content from that area. It might dash a few hopes but at least it would offer a realistic take on the situation. And of course things could change in time, rail companies come and go or change their policy - as we saw with the ATW themed stuff in classic TS.
     
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  43. BigMountain555

    BigMountain555 Well-Known Member

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    I guess I have to accept their reasoning.... but may I include my two cents?
    1. Demand for high speed... Shinkansen is far more popular and known world wide, but somehow DTG can't get licenses for Japanese content... even though I have seen it in other simulators (nowhere near as nice as TSW).
    2. Since we know that launching in more countries is difficult and not likely to occur, maybe we can drop the "World" from the title.
     
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