Less Frequent Roadmap Updates

Discussion in 'TSW General Discussion' started by AirbourneAlex, Jan 1, 2022.

  1. AirbourneAlex

    AirbourneAlex Well-Known Member

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    Maybe having fewer roadmap updates might give some more flexibility when it comes to announcements, allowing more time to plan out changes to future releases before making them public, so we don't get too many roadmaps with minor updates.

    The current system of a fortnightly roadmap update seems too frequent with not enough new announcements to get excited about, also meaning the streams aren't as informative because you're only talking in regards to two weeks worth of work, often repeating things said similarly on previous streams.

    New system could involve renaming roadmap updates to e.g. the January Roadmap, February Roadmap etc. Updates could be expected on the second Tuesday of every month for example.

    Lastly, we can't really trust "if it's not on the roadmap..." anymore because there's obviously work going on behind the scenes that you can't announce (which is understandable).

    Maybe focus the roadmap solely on updates, bug fixes and the progress of 'upcoming' releases (projects that are set in stone and are guaranteed for release, so we don't become disappointed if the project scope is reduced or if development gets pushed back).
     
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  2. trainsimplayer

    trainsimplayer Well-Known Member

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    I still do prefer the fortnightly approach, it still feels like a decent amount of time has passed since the last one, and that we have the opportunity to see what the next releases are, although that's a downgrade from the old, where we could see what was being worked on.

    As for "if it's not on the roadmap...", I now more see it as "if it's not on the roadmap... ...take it that we're not working on it, to avoid false expectations." - it's mostly used towards suggestions in stream chats anyway these days.
     
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  3. davidh0501

    davidh0501 Well-Known Member

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    I'm all for them.
    More for an insight to the state of the game and Dtg's general thinking, than specific details which only opens the forum floodgates.
     
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  4. Mich

    Mich Well-Known Member

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    It wouldn't give them more flexibility, in fact it would probably do the opposite thing, having the roadmaps gives them a free space that they can talk about any sort of random update they want to talk about. Reducing the roadmap is just gonna reduce the amount of times they can bring stuff like that up. Because lets be honest here, the higher ups aren't gonna be giving bug fixes their own articles or spaces judging by how they've been prioritized so far. Any article time's gonna be given to the new "exciting" stuff, because they feel it's the only stuff that sells.

    Also the inability to give feedback on the content of a route is a massive step back. For example Clinchfield when it was initially announced had a SD40-2, even though it wasn't realistic. It was after everyone took issue with its inclusion that DTG changed it over the the SD40 instead. If we didn't have that advance warning we could've very well been stuck with a simple inaccurate reskin of the Sand Patch SD40-2. If DTG do something like that again now we can't do anything, because DTG at that point will be more than likely too far into development to change it.
    There's better way of doing that than completely hiding them. You could just list the confirmed details, while leaving unconfirmed ones off. For example lets say they decide to made Marias Pass, and that they aren't sure how much of it they were making. However they know that they're gonna start building at Whitefish. They could put it on the roadmap as Marias Pass: Whitefish to ???, thus allowing people to know it's in development and give their concerns about it, while making it clear that details aren't final.
     
    Last edited: Jan 2, 2022
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  5. Ant Craft

    Ant Craft Well-Known Member

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    In my opinion, they should bring back the early announcements like was the case in the early days of the roadmap. Now I understand why they changed it so the time between announcement and release was shorter, as people kept asking about it and felt nothing was happening with them, but a roadmap is supposed to represent the long term plans of the game.

    As it stands now, you see a DLC pop onto the Roadmap, and withing weeks, or maybe a month or two, it's already out and that feels very short term. The benefits about having them on their for longer is that people get to discuss their thoughts on the route for longer, and (hopefully) build a reasonable expectation. Also these thoughts would hopefully be seen by DTG, so if a lot of people say this area should be included (let's say a short spur off the mainline to a station), it wouldn't be too late for DTG to at least consider adding it if it isn't too much work. That could go for other features too. But since we learn about DLCs so late into the development cycle now, that's just never going to happen.

    As I said earlier, I know the time was reduced so people didn't keep asking about when X, Y or Z is coming out, and why it hasn't moved up in the roadmap, but if you ask me, those people had false expectations for how a roadmap should work.

    And lastly, to finish off, another benefit of having stuff on the roadmap for longer is that it gives people more to look forward to. As of right now, there is no UK content on the roadmap, and while we know that a UK route should be expected before Metro North releases, not knowing what it is really frustrating, as it's hard to get excited when you don't even know what you're getting excited for.
     
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  6. kevin.charb81

    kevin.charb81 Well-Known Member

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    Agree that a monthly roadmap would be better. I’ve stopped watching roadmap streams over the last few months since there is so little new meat on the bone every two weeks.
     
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  7. Disintegration7

    Disintegration7 Well-Known Member

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    I think they should scrap it altogether tbh. It causes more trouble than it's worth, IMO.

    I feel like there's too much pressure to have "something new" to show every two weeks.

    I'd like a combination of teasers, announcements, trailers, and the existing DTG articles...to be released whenever the devs feel like they actually have something interesting to show us.

    I don't need an ongoing bug fix list- so long as there's proper patch notes when they're released.
     
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  8. mrchuck

    mrchuck Well-Known Member

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    I sure hope they’ll release some items from the rush hour package like for the Boston sprinter route a Hsp46 locomotive.
     
  9. Swisstrains

    Swisstrains Well-Known Member

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    Speaking of the roadmap: Will the next one be this Tuesday?
     
  10. trainsimplayer

    trainsimplayer Well-Known Member

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    Tuesday the 11th is the next one.
     
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  11. Clumsy Pacer

    Clumsy Pacer Well-Known Member

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    There'd be no point doing a roadmap on Tuesday, they've all been off work since the last one, and tomorrow (Monday 3rd) is a bank holiday I think, so Tuesday is when they all go back. Very likely nothing will have moved except the stuff that's released.
     
  12. Cramnor

    Cramnor Well-Known Member

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    The roadmap has many problems, but the frequency is certainly none of them.
     
  13. DTG Protagonist

    DTG Protagonist Has left the building Staff Member

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    There is a planned overhaul of the roadmap coming pretty soon (might not be the next one, but is likely to be the one after that) to address several of the issues listed above.

    Not confirmed the final format yet but it will include more focus on quality of life (ie bug fixing) and will cover everything either planned or in production even if it's only listed as "New route: UK" for example.

    The aim is still for the roadmap to be an honest representation of what's going on in development, and it has moved away from that in recent months.
     
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  14. Ant Craft

    Ant Craft Well-Known Member

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    Ah awesome, I can't wait for that then! And I think the idea of having something like you said with "New Route: UK" ect. would be a great thing to have in the meantime until the permission has been given to share more details. While you know something is most likely being worked on, just having that confirmation can really help I find, and if the details can't be released for reasons (I understand why it happens), then at least having a rough idea will be nice. :)
     
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  15. BlaringHorn

    BlaringHorn Well-Known Member

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    That's good to hear! Looking forward to the first "overhauled" roadmap.
     
    Last edited: Jan 3, 2022
  16. AirbourneAlex

    AirbourneAlex Well-Known Member

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    Thanks all for your opinions.

    I agree with you there, but more recently it feels like the details of included content are being made public too close to release to allow for anything other than minor changes to be made, i.e. what you see is what you should expect.

    I like this idea, as we can still gauge the progress of new projects until they can be made public.

    Also how would this affect 3rd party developers, are they compelled to provide information for each roadmap update or is it a developer choice?
     
  17. DTG Protagonist

    DTG Protagonist Has left the building Staff Member

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    As you may have already seen, this is a moving goalpost. We can only provide information from third party teams when it is routed through our internal scheduling/communications. TSG was a good example of this. Maik had a strong idea of when he was planning to released the G6, we were told something different. In those cases we always defer to the message we're given internally.

    The simplest approach here would be to wrapper communications into any agreements between DTG and 3rd party teams to ensure consistency in the way things are communicated. Some may want this, others may not. Therefore, again for consistency, we may just stick to listing DTG developments.

    As you can tell, there's a longer conversation to be had here.
     
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  18. AirbourneAlex

    AirbourneAlex Well-Known Member

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    Thanks for the explanation. Maybe have a separate segment of the roadmap dedicated to 3rd party projects, updated when the developer has information they want to share publicly, especially if updates aren't as frequent or are communicated in a different way (e.g. if the developer would prefer to announce a project nearer release).
     
  19. chieflongshin

    chieflongshin Well-Known Member

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    I prefer bi-weekly. My personal preference would be that things are announced and perhaps discussed a bit earlier. I understand the reluctance but this could help the community help the Dev team. ~

    That said if anything is announced it should be done with the caveat of "It's ready when its ready and perhaps give a 20/40/80% of the way there update.

    This has been pretty much done with Steam and from the streams I cannot see it's caused much hardship, they only answer what they can/choose to.

    I think IF this was employed it needs to be either delivered vaguely or once branch lines, project scopes are buttoned up.


    At the moment the roadmaps are more a chew the fat session and say Adam's releases are still looking for a window to come out.
     
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  20. trainsimplayer

    trainsimplayer Well-Known Member

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    Agreed. One of the good things about the earlier roadmaps was the fact that routes were not only announced earlier, but this meant that people where able to offer help if it were there local route, a route they use regularly, or are particularly knowledgeable in.
     
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  21. chieflongshin

    chieflongshin Well-Known Member

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    You're always going to get the "are we nearly there yet " people but if expectations are set correct I can't see it being overly damaging.

    As above don't announce until the scope is buttoned up
     
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  22. Dinosbacsi

    Dinosbacsi Well-Known Member

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    That sounds good and pretty much from what I would expect from a roadmap. Glad to hear these changes are in the works, really looking forward to it!
     
  23. DTG Protagonist

    DTG Protagonist Has left the building Staff Member

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    I think we backed ourselves into a direction that was less than ideal. The roadmap was initially set up purely to track the release schedule for preservation work after the release of TSW2. After that was complete however it had proved to be a popular format so we stuck with it. It's a living document so will always be revised and refined to be more effective. If anything, what we need to get away from is it being seen in any way as "exciting" (that way it also won't ever fall foul of being called "boring"). It's supposed to be information, and nothing more.

    We'll continue to evolve the format, trial it and change again as necessary. To do it any other way would be deaf to feedback and where it is or isn't working.
     
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  24. Alex_m30x#7297

    Alex_m30x#7297 Well-Known Member

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    The roadmap is the highlight of my two weeks!
     
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  25. mrchuck

    mrchuck Well-Known Member

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    I look forward to the roadmap every two weeks.
     
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  26. Clumsy Pacer

    Clumsy Pacer Well-Known Member

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    What needs to happen I think is DTG needs to ignore them - they're the vocal minority who ruin it for everyone else.

    Couldn't you have, instead of an article every 2 weeks, simply a page on the website that gets updated as and when it needs to, with a roundup stream every 2 weeks or every month, and maybe an announcement when something major like a new route goes on? I think having the article every 2 weeks makes something of an event out of it, and makes it seem more exciting than it is - perhaps this sort of approach could help move away from that?

    My local bus company does a similar thing (although they haven't done the live streams for a while) with its vehicle fleet: https://www.gonortheast.co.uk/enthusiast-area
     
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  27. Mr JMB

    Mr JMB Well-Known Member

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    I wonder if people look forward to reading the roadmap or the chance to see devs talking about what they are working on in the accompanying stream for 60 mins? I suspect if the roadmap stream didn't exist then it wouldn't be as popular. It is also the case that in many streams people say no dates, no announcements, but the roadmap is often where things are seen for the first time, so it has that going for it. Of course it isn't always where we see things for the first time...maybe that could be tightened up so it is always the case that the roadmap is the place where new things are announced first, even if just in outline.
     
  28. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    I don't think they need to change the timing of the roadmap, but I do think they need to move away from it being a PR exercise and be more informative on what's actually being done.
    One suggestion I would make on that is that they've obviously decided on making a new UK route, but can't give specifics about it, but that wouldn't stop them actually saying what they CAN about the route, or even "Hey, there's a UK route in dev" with details "crystalising" as time goes on.

    For me the roadmap has become almost nullified recently because DTG can't say something without the community jumping all over them (either for developing at all when there's bugs to be fixed or having the gall to have two train simulators running at the same time (how very dare they!?)), or because they haven't quite decided on the absolute specifics yet (al la Dresden). Of course had they said six months out "Hey, we're doing a new German route", then three months out "And it starts at X station", then a month out "and ends at y station" I am sure many would prefer that to what we had then (too much info, some of which wasn't achieved) let alone what we seem to have now (a small humming sound like a badly tuned radio, except about some nice fairy lights and a 2 second repeating sound byte that does your head in)

    Hopefully they can find a balance
    And a means of actually getting bug fixes out so people can actually play them (I have suggested a "super Tuesday" affair where a new core build is released quarterly with all available bug fixes beta and below, no further core updates are released until the next round, which means we have 3 months of hopeful stability (alpha bug fixes still released ad hoc))
     
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  29. chieflongshin

    chieflongshin Well-Known Member

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    I think if there was a “we’re looking at a new uk route. It’s going to start in Essex and run up into Norfolk. We envisage it’ll be a minimum of 6 months out but if anyone can provide any pictures of this area that’d be appreciated”.

    1 month later

    “Progress is going well, we’ve started initial development on a DMU…. Here’s a component of the 3d model, guess what it is?” We’re still 4 months out, further details as we have “.


    Just something along those lines to get us on the hook. Keep the updates succinct, but timely, to the point but vague enough to give you manoeuvring space.

    Just my thoughts…..
     
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  30. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    Exactly this. Don't need all the details straight away, but when they have some, give us those
     
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  31. trainsimplayer

    trainsimplayer Well-Known Member

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    I think when they move (example) "UK Route 1" into In Production, they should probably tell us where it will (without a doubt) be running, so people can provide that information.

    Because if they just say "it runs through Essex", or "it's a suburban Scottish route" or "it's a Welsh route" - there isn't all too much anyone can do, bar help with speculative guesses as to what it can be.

    However I do agree, some little teasers/bits to keep us excited about the new DLC would be good - probably good for the company as well, as it generates continued interest, and a sense of 'hype'.
     
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  32. chieflongshin

    chieflongshin Well-Known Member

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    I think as long as they dont say "we're developing ECML from KGX to PBO using the Class xx with 4 scenarios, this branch line and spangly feature by June 5th at 6:01pm on Steam for £24.99" then anything is better than "if its not on the zzzzz....."
     
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  33. trainsimplayer

    trainsimplayer Well-Known Member

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    Yeah, it doesn't have to be a total "we're doing this, this, this and this".

    All anyone would really need to help out Is:

    "We 100% know we're doing London King's Cross to Peterborough, if anyone can help with reference, or have any suggestions for stuff we could do, let us know".

    If the branches are a possibility but not confirmed, they shouldn't mention it, because that's how issues start. (see rush hour)
     
  34. Mr JMB

    Mr JMB Well-Known Member

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    There needs to be 2 different things for the announcement and marketing of new content: firstly for those keen players a more upfront and honest approach which as you say may involve can you help us with source material?

    Secondly the approach for the marketing of the game to new players and casual players where the marketing people with strategies can take priority and they can run their campaigns etc.

    Currently we are all subject to the marketing people ruling over the whole thing and it isn't working because in places they have asked for help and received it, but only after the route was issued or playtested, when frankly it is too late to avoid bad first impressions. At times it has verged on feeling like being treated like a simpleton when clear and crisp communication would actually have helped the product.
     
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  35. dhekelian

    dhekelian Well-Known Member

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    Personally I'd like more detail about the bug fixes with DTG being more honest. Like what are they working on specifically and if there is a problem what that problem is. And when they do fix something can we have a timeframe for when it will actually get released, this is so frustrating.

    I agree with what has been said about routes above. It will be nice to know early where generally they are thinking of making it. Say time to time how about the customers suggesting a route? Say the plan is to make an UK route then a poll or something to get the most popular same with the US and EU. I'm saying this for every route but once in a blue moon say and it keep the customers interested.

    The roadmap could be opened up a little with say people from other departments getting involved?
     
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  36. solicitr

    solicitr Well-Known Member

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    I don't think the Roadmap is the right venue for bugfixes -although streams (as always) are going to make Sam/Matt/Nat/JD/whomever field bugfix questions anyway.

    I like the idea, mooted previously, of putting a pinned Bugfix thread at the top of the Announcements subforum, which will be updated regularly based on the current status (reported/being looked at/being fixed/fixed/not worth fixing/too hard to fix/whatever)
     
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  37. DTG Protagonist

    DTG Protagonist Has left the building Staff Member

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    There are no other departments that could add anything useful. We cover the route builders, preservation crew, publishing, core and QA teams already.
     
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  38. dhekelian

    dhekelian Well-Known Member

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    Sorry, I meant people themselves appearing on the stream from those departments. I'm sure someone from the QA department will get a few questions no?
     
  39. Clumsy Pacer

    Clumsy Pacer Well-Known Member

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    A few questions and bucket loads of abuse and bullying if some people on here are anything to go by.
     
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  40. dhekelian

    dhekelian Well-Known Member

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    Doesn't the stream have Mods? If so then that shouldn't be an issue should it? But there would be tough questions but that is fair? And what better way of making the consumers understand their issues no?
     
  41. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    I doubt the people who would be pushing the boundaries really care about "dev issues" when what they want is what THEY want in the game, and preferably two years ago
     
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  42. dhekelian

    dhekelian Well-Known Member

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    That's true of course but there might be some sort of understanding and a change from the narrative '...if it's not on the Roadmap' no?
     
  43. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    Well I'm the sort who says "If I haven't been told yet then I don't really care" but I understand others want a constant stream of "what's new" and when they can get hold of it (and likely complain about it)
     
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  44. dhekelian

    dhekelian Well-Known Member

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    Yeah I can see that and as far as new releases go I don't really care either. It will be nice to know generally what they are working on and extra info but it isn't vital. For me it is the fixes that are important and when they are coming but DTG will always prioritise DLC as that is where they get their lolly I spose.
     
  45. FD1003

    FD1003 Well-Known Member

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    IMO the problem is not how ofter the roadmap is updated, but rather the goal that DTG set: the roadmap should be always 100% accurate and precise.

    I think that some predefined ambiguity on the roadmap is not a bad thing, for example, we know there is a british route coming around the same time as Chemnitz but since they don't fully know the scope of the route/other reasons it's completely off the roadmap, so why set yourself this binary ON/OFF the roadmap system?

    Spirit of Steam showed that ambiguity =/= disappointed customers, what prevented that new unknown british route to be listed as (for example) "Modern Route out of X city" or "xx Main Line section"?, another example would be "MTA Harlem Line" without specifying start and end point.

    I would go even a step further and have some predetermined items (for example, UK Route, US Route) and as the project gets on the way and the scope is refined the roadmap entry gets more and more accurate.
     
    Last edited: Jan 5, 2022
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  46. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    I hope you mean "near in time" because isn't anywhere near Britain :cool:
     
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  47. FD1003

    FD1003 Well-Known Member

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    Whoops, yes I meant around the same time.
     
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  48. solicitr

    solicitr Well-Known Member

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    What? You haven't heard of the proposed North Sea Tunnel?
     
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