Baseless Speculation Thread

Discussion in 'TSW General Discussion' started by raildan, Aug 16, 2018.

  1. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    Given that they’ve pretty much abandoned Rapid Transit, I wouldn’t get my hopes up about them fixing Great Western Express’ signalling.

    It’s clear something like this takes quite a bit of time and resources which DTG clearly haven’t got.

    I wanted to remain optimistic about the bugs getting fixed but we’ve all seen how long it takes for even simple things to get fixed so I can’t see anything changing in the near future.

    Essentially GWE may become another forgotten about route and left abandoned. Especially as it was one of the first DLC’s for TSW.
     
  2. Medellinexpat

    Medellinexpat Well-Known Member

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    londonmidland as someone mentioned yesterday GWE is part of the base game. Of course that could change, but while it is abandoning it would be an odd strategy. If nothing else new potential players are likely to read the reviews of the base game before making a purchase commitment so you’d want the reviews to be as ‘clean’ as possible.

    Mind you DTG do move in mysterious ways. I was looking at Steam today and my country store has the pack with TSW and TS2019 bundled together cheaper than TSW on its own. Quite what their marketing department is thinking I don’t know.
     
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  3. davejc64

    davejc64 Well-Known Member

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    Well one thing is for certain if it happens its more likely to happen in the future than in the past. :cool:
     
  4. LT586

    LT586 Well-Known Member

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    Rostock doesn't sound appealling to be quite honest, I find the UK routes a lot more flowing, the German RE lines are too slow most of the time, it'll be nice to have a mix of high speed, regional and freight.

    Rapid Transit is lovely I agree but German rail isn't that interesting, with the UK there's a lot of styling to the stations and mainline stations, American Rail is cool too but again there's too many slow speed limits, I read a book playing the NEC, LIRR is about the most rapid US route i've ever seen, after the Acela driven routes in TS1.

    Id love to see some costal UK routes, GWE is the best one as it runs along side the channel at Dawlish and then there's the SWML from Waterloo to Weymouth (just my tupence)
     
  5. NorthRail1

    NorthRail1 Well-Known Member

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    In the latest studio update, Matt said there are several locomotive dlcs in production at the moment. What does everyone think these are? My current guesses are:
    • A freight dlc for Northern Trans-Pennine (maybe class 37 or 40)
    • DB BR 294 for either Ruhr Sieg Nord or Main-Spessart Bahn (maybe both)
    I don't really see DTG making new loco dlc for any route before West Somerset Railway for the following reasons:
    • CSX Heavy Haul isn't console compatible
    • Very limited expansion possibilities for Great Western Express due to time period
    • Rapid Transit would need PZB/Signalling fixing first
    • NEC: New York like GWE doesn't seem to have much loco dlc potential
     
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  6. raildan

    raildan Well-Known Member

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    IMO probably both are in the works. In fact, we recently got confirmation that a german loco that works on BOTH routes is in them works:
    Given that both routes have so many unelectrified sidings that are fully modeled, I think it's safe to say that they are working on a German diesel switcher for use on both routes- and the DB BR 294 fits the bill perfectly.

    I also think it will come first because there hasnb't been a German loco DLC yet, while the US and UK already have one. Besides, RSN was released earlier, which might mean that this would have been inj the works for longer assuming they had the idea while developing RSN.

    I was thinking they might be doing the US-UK-DE loop for locos as well, but I can't think of a good US DLC they might release after this (at the release of LIRR, the DE/DM30AC was hinted at as a possible future DLC, but not one they were actually working on at the moment), so the NTP loco is probably next after that.
     
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  7. AlexNL

    AlexNL Well-Known Member

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    Matt recently said on the Discord server that it's incredibly hard to get access to shunters, so I'm not really expecting that one to being worked on. I'm more inclined to believe it's something like a Vectron or a ES64F4 as there's hundreds of those in everyday service by dozens of operators.
     
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  8. raildan

    raildan Well-Known Member

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    Interesting, hadn't hear that before. I don't think it would be a Vectron or ES64F4, though- remember the time periods these routes take place in. Ould easily be something along those lines, though.

    I'm still sticking to my BR294 theory. The Aschaffensburg Dockyards are on the end of a good 8.5 km of extra track, so a diesel switcher locomotive would make sense, as they are the only locomotives to go through there. Given that the BR294 can be found on the main as well as in yards and also represents a good portion of Germany's switchers, I feel that they'd go to these lengths to capture it- they wouldn't really ever need to do another switcher for Germany after that.

    But, as always, this is the baseless speculation thread... anything is possible. For all we know it's something completely different from either of our guesses.
     
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  9. AlexNL

    AlexNL Well-Known Member

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    The Aschaffenburg route is set in recent years; the Spessart Ramp only closed in 2017. The ES64F4 was introduced in 2003 and the Vectron was introduced in 2010, having Vectrons or ES64F4's running around on that route would be perfectly cromulent.

    A diesel shunter or locomotive (how about a Class 66 with PZB?) wouldn't be out of the question either, they wouldn't have built the harbour line with the intention of never serving it.
     
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  10. NorthRail1

    NorthRail1 Well-Known Member

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    Another depot has been added to TSW on SteamDB, this time DLC 11. It seems that DLC 12 has been skipped out for now. I would presume both DLC 11 and DLC 13 are the loco dlcs that were mentioned in the Studio Update.
     
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  11. raildan

    raildan Well-Known Member

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    Would that make DLC 12 the next US route, then?

    I think we've had enough New York by now, hoping for somewhere else this time.

    Also that means there are in fact probably 2 loco DLC's in development- the NTP one and the multi-route German one.
     
  12. NorthRail1

    NorthRail1 Well-Known Member

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    I hope that the next US route is away from the east coast since there have already been three route dlcs there. Something different like Cajon Pass or the Moffat Tunnel Sub would be good. Some diesel Amtrak services would be good to see in TSW as well.
     
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  13. raildan

    raildan Well-Known Member

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    Yes! I'm really curious about more deserted landscapes in TSW, and I'd like to see more North American freight from a different railroad than CSX. That would be great...
     
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  14. QO1922

    QO1922 Member

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    So Cajon Pass could be interesting...
     
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  15. theorganist

    theorganist Well-Known Member

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    The Cajon Pass would be interesting, I think TSW would do the landscape of that area justice.

    Assuming the next route after is a UK route, I suspect it will be something modern this time, maybe an electrified line. I wonder if the Cross City or Edinburgh to Glasgow could be contenders as they would fit in with the length of routes we are currently getting?
     
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  16. Thelonius16

    Thelonius16 Well-Known Member

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    I hope at the very least they are working to combine NEC and LIRR into one route.
     
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  17. theorganist

    theorganist Well-Known Member

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    From what Matt said on Twitch that definitely won't be happening. He could see little point in it.
     
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  18. volvolover1972

    volvolover1972 Well-Known Member

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    What would be the point? Aside from AI reasons. There no route that crosses over from the NEC to the LIRR tracks. Now if they made a let’s say New Rochelle to New Haven route, then a merge with NEC would make sense
     
  19. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    The LIRR and NEC maps do overlap at from F interlocking to Penn.
     
  20. volvolover1972

    volvolover1972 Well-Known Member

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    I meant there’s no actual service that crosses over. The track itself does.
     
  21. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    Right, but both Amtrak and LIRR pass through there and can conflict each other.
     
  22. Thelonius16

    Thelonius16 Well-Known Member

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    The point would be to offer a service mode that allows you to switch between LIRR, NEC and freight at will. In my perfect vision, it would also include Metro North to Grand Central and NJ Transit, but obviously that's asking a lot. I don't think it's asking a lot to have interaction between the two add-ons that depict a few miles of common track.
     
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  23. Digital Draftsman

    Digital Draftsman Well-Known Member

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    Given how popular joining routes in TS2019 is, it would be nice for DTG to merge TSW routes which are adjacent to each other. That way when/if the Editor appears we can create scenarios which traverse multiple routes. As things stand it won't be possible to merge existing routes using the Editor, so it's up to DTG to do the merging as we won't be able to.
     
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  24. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    When.
     
  25. raildan

    raildan Well-Known Member

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    When what? I don't get it...
     
  26. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    He said when/if the editor comes. I then said when.
     
  27. Tomas9970

    Tomas9970 Well-Known Member

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    I think it's time for a new thing to break down.
    Dimitri said at the end of the Main spessart bahn live stream that the next stream will be in two weeks instead of the next week because there is "not much to show". That probably means that there is something big coming in two weeks.
     
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  28. Digital Draftsman

    Digital Draftsman Well-Known Member

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    I doubt it'll be anything big, most likely a showcase of the SD60E for TS2019 and perhaps a stream of MSB on the Xbox or PS4.
     
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  29. raildan

    raildan Well-Known Member

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    Well, the studio update said that at least 1 but possibly multiple loco DLC would be announced in "the coming weeks"...
     
  30. SamYeager270

    SamYeager270 Well-Known Member

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    Of course it could just be the MSB release for consoles although Dmitri seemed to be trying to lower expectations of a quick release on that front. Beta release of editor or route building overview? Bear in mind they've also been streaming TS19 stuff so it might be related to something they're expecting to release for that.
     
  31. TrainSim-Dmitri

    TrainSim-Dmitri Well-Known Member

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    Not entirely, I was mainly trying to ask people to stop asking too much about the console release, because we cannot give that information publicly anyway until it is officially announced.

    But for your information, our goal is to aim to release both versions at the same time, this is going to make life easier for both you and us!
     
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  32. MLP Derick

    MLP Derick Well-Known Member

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    the constant barrage of people asking of when a new DLC will be out for console has been has for a while everwhere I check it's constantly being asked and I'm sick of seeing it being asked
     
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  33. hightower

    hightower Guest

    Dmitri,

    Genuine question...why is DTG so secretive about everything, all of the time? Given that you’ve effectively got no competition in the train sim market and won’t lose commercial advantage by sharing more info with your customers, why is everything hidden behind ‘I can’t tell you that’, ‘I don’t know’, ‘I’m not allowed to say’.

    Is it not wanting to make promises that might not be kept, or is it something else? A corporate policy perhaps?
     
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  34. Dave Mel

    Dave Mel Well-Known Member

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    just for your information. i used to work on British Rail Southern region as a shunter, shunter driver and Freight train driver. i used to use class 08 and 09 shunters and also class 33 as a shunter as well as mainline duties. So they could use the class 33 in British routes as a shunter
     
  35. TrainSim-Dmitri

    TrainSim-Dmitri Well-Known Member

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    Pretty sure I already spoke about this some time ago, but still.

    If you are referring to various releases, such as console release, it is simply to avoid problems if something comes up during the development. If we say that 'xxx going to be released on 1 April' two months prior, and then encounter a problem which needs us to delay the release by two weeks, it will be sub-optimal for us and yourself. You would be surprised to know how much juggling is happening behind the scenes - there are way too many variables that are often difficult to control. Just recently we had a case with a new route, which we successfully developed, but in the later stages of QA we found that the branding on the trains changed in real life, which required us to go through a fairly lengthy process of re-branding, which required obtaining new licenses, and many other smaller things that always take time. This is just one example, there are many factors in play.

    So yeah, unpredictability is the main reason why we do not talk about releases sooner than a few weeks before they actually go out.
     
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  36. hightower

    hightower Guest

    Thanks for the reply, I hadn’t seen it if you mentioned it previously.

    My point wasn’t really in relation to consoles as as far as TSW is concerned I’m PC all the way. I can understand the frustration of console users though in that they get no indication as to DLC release dates, even though said DLC has been released for the PC.

    It was more a general point that questions about anything that you might class as a future feature, DLC, a question about a bug fix, an expansion and so on is almost always met with a brick wall - normally in the form of ‘I’m not allowed to talk about that’ or ‘I have no information about that’. This applies to all channels, so Matt’s streams, Discord, these forums, the ‘other place’ & so on.

    It creates an information vacuum that leads to all the grumpiness & conjecture that then fills these forum pages. I for one would just love to see a bit more sharing of future plans, upcoming features or ideas that are being worked on, with the caveat that it is forever changeable information and might never see the light of day.

    Cheers anyway.
     
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  37. TrainSim-Dmitri

    TrainSim-Dmitri Well-Known Member

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    That's a tough one.

    I would say that the main answer is that we simply don't know ourselves. I have yet to establish contact with the devs that would allow me to answer such a question, but I know that in most cases it has to do with the bandwidth available to the Dev team. We often find out about various things happening the last minute, so this secrecy has always been the company policy, I suppose. One thing for sure though, promising and then not delivering is much worse than not saying anything.

    We are working on improving the situation with revealing more information, though. I hate talking in clichés, but improving communication is one of our priorities. We have a new form of content planned for Q1-Q2 which hopefully will be on-going and help us to engage with players and become more open. There are a lot of rusty gears to turn, I have only so much time to spend on each of my tasks, but after all, I am just a Community Manager so not all depends on me.
     
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  38. NorthRail1

    NorthRail1 Well-Known Member

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  39. Schnauzahpowahz

    Schnauzahpowahz Well-Known Member

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    I will admit its hogwash they didnt come with MSB, but i am happy to see what exactly
     
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  40. Digital Draftsman

    Digital Draftsman Well-Known Member

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    It certainly wasn't always this way with communication.

    As this is the baseless speculation thread...

    The reason for the lack of communication is in my opinion the financial situation. Everything is driven by the need to cut costs and maximise revenue. To answer truthfully the question 'why hasn't this or that bug been addressed' would be a PR disaster as the honest answer would likely be 'because it's cheaper to leave the bugs and ignore those complaining unless it noticeably impacts revenue'. This is why DTG choose to say nothing.

    The financial position of DTG according to the latest public data is very poor, so they are operating from a position of desperation. As most people know, desperation results in poor decision making. They're partly relying on the Video Games Tax Relief to keep the company afloat, effectively a UK Taxpayer handout. On top of that the company holds a lot of debt, with a very poor debt to asset ratio (around 150%). This is why we have seen corners being cut and the reputation of the brand being compromised for shorter term gains.

    DLC is the priority, not the Editor, not new features, not bug fixes and not communication with the community. DLC is what pays in the short term, so that's where the focus is.

    I think it may explain the absence of the Editor too. Whilst an Editor may seem like a good thing to release and the cut of profit from third parties would seem to be beneficial, it isn't that simple. When the Editor is released the PC will have vastly more content than the console version and the third party content will have a greater number of features. There's a high risk that releasing the Editor will kill the console market and the associated revenue stream, a revenue stream which DTG may estimate to be greater than the future cut of third party PC content. For the time being the Editor release may be detrimental financially, so even if it was ready to go, it's possible they'd hold on to it to keep the console revenue stream alive.

    As for bug fixes, the truth is that they'd rather lose 5% of sales from the next DLC than miss out on that next DLC entirely. The same goes for new features, they'd rather have the revenue from a new DLC than miss out on the revenue from that DLC and develop new features which add 5% in sales to future DLCs.

    As long as people keep buying the DLC, DTG will stick to their current business model. There's no need to communicate, fix bugs or listen to feedback as the only feedback they are worried about is the financial feedback in terms of sales.
     
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  41. Fabrizio520

    Fabrizio520 Guest

  42. theorganist

    theorganist Well-Known Member

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    I take it you haven't bought any DLC recently then?

    Can you provide evidence of the "truth" of your claims regarding the bug fixes?!
     
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  43. Digital Draftsman

    Digital Draftsman Well-Known Member

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    No, the last DLC I bought was West Somerset back in May last year.
     
  44. theorganist

    theorganist Well-Known Member

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    And you think everyone else should follow your example? Personally if I thought the sim was so bad that I hadn't purchased any of the last four DLC's (even though you can make a judgement telling people they shouldn't purchase them) I would just say forget it and walk away!
     
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  45. hightower

    hightower Guest

    I think that perhaps you’re being a bit harsh on DTG here. There HAVE been numerous bug fixes over the last few months and when MSB was found to have a significant issue within hours of release, it was patched by the following morning GMT. Can’t say fairer than that.

    Although they still have issues, I honestly think that if you tried RSN, NTP or MSB you’d be pleasently surprised at how far things have come on. LIRR is also very good but I wouldn’t group it with the others on the basis of the uber-quiet service mode.

    I gather you can get RSN at about £15 now, maybe take a punt on it...I honestly don’t think you’d be disappointed.
     
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  46. theorganist

    theorganist Well-Known Member

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    I would say he is being very harsh. There have been lots of bug fixes, it just suits some people to forget that.

    Personally I would like to see RT's signalling fixed and I would take them to task on that however there needs to be some objectivity if you are going to be throwing the brickbats around.

    Is everything perfect, no! Is everything awful, far from it!
     
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  47. Digital Draftsman

    Digital Draftsman Well-Known Member

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    I've played most of the routes (bar MSB) despite not owning them, and I agree RSN is a great route in terms of quality and value, which is one of the reasons I was so disapointed that MSB recycled so much from RSN but kept the price tag.

    The biggest issue I have is that they ignore the bugs with the old DLC. They seem to have written off Rapid Transit completely despite the PZB being broken. WSR still has really obvious bugs that even basic QA would have uncovered, like the service mode timetable which is impossible to complete on time, a bug which they left in for the console release. The signalling on NEC is still broken and whilst they haven't written it off like RT, there's no evidence they intend to fix it. That's three bugs right there in three different DLC which prevent the game from being played as intended, that's where I drew the line.

    Even when they do fix things they take an excessive amount of time. We have CSX:HH which has been out for nearly 2 years and we still don't have the physics fixes for it. I don't want to buy a DLC and then have to wait two years for bug fixes.
     
  48. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    Matt said that the new physics are in QA now.
     
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  49. pennine465

    pennine465 Active Member

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    QA?! What is?
     
  50. Digital Draftsman

    Digital Draftsman Well-Known Member

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    'Quality Assurance', it's the testing of a product before it's released to find bugs and ensure they are fixed before the product is sold.
     
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