Dtgs Continued Failure Of Communication.

The issue with that notorious stream was that Sam's home setup wasn't up to the challenge of simultaneously running the game and streaming video. Very quickly DTG made the decision that henceforward all livestreams would be done from DTG World Headquarters in Chatham from a dedicated computer. So, it's entirely possible that Sam simply didn't like the idea of having to go in to the office at night rather than doing them from home.

 

True, however I recall there was a clear understanding that they would be added very soon after the initial launch.

 

Fair enough but you do see my point about a perceived lack of vision and simple commercial moxie. Here we have a much requested and sought after train but it looks as if it is shipping with a few stop/start runs on a relatively short section of a route that has already seen DLC (465) and a makeover/extension. We are hungry for more!

 

Fair enough! I’ll stow the soapbox!

 

I'm sitting on the fence about buying it at all; the first DLC I have felt this way about. Hopefully the preview stream will help; but I'm not understanding why people are so excited about the 700; is it because it's a newer loco in reality?

 

Currently the 700 is the most modern train on Sehs having only entered service on this particular route in 2018 (they originally entered service on the Bml in 2016)

 

It looks nice and I'm sure hours of work have gone into it but... I am getting reservations about the sound implementation and being able to hit the platform ramp at 50 MPH and still stop on the mark doesn't seem quite right for the physics (happy to be proved wrong). Not a huge fan of modern stuff either. Put it this way if it had been a 4CEP or 4VEP to add a retro layer I'd have been salivating over my keyboard in anticipation. I probably will still buy it on Day One with final decision resting on feedback from the stream.

 

To be fair as far as speed goes the 700's are very quick off the mark, especially when on ac power.

 

I've just been on the MML and all the coaches on the hst are still marked as the letter A even after the update thought that was getting fixed in this patch

 

From the patch notes:

 

Oh right I missed that thank you

 

Bro, if you want to charge a good portion of money for bugged, unfinished DLCs, promise so many things like patches, features and whatever the hell you promised and announced, and then never actually deliver without giving a clear reason why - especially when these things are patches or improvements that should have been there in the first place - then yes, your customers can and should expect some communication, especially if you constantly release new DLCs with the same quality level as the previous ones, and then even have the audacity to announce the next iteration of a game where literally more than half of the game the previous game is, AND THEN FORCING CUSTOMERS TO BUY YOUR NEW GAME even though you promised everything in the previous game - sorry, but you are completely out of touch with the world if that is actually what you stand by.

 

Bro, have you not heard of sentences and paragraphs? It would make your posts so much easier to read. Some may call me a pedant, but it’s not difficult to put a full stop. Then start a new sentence.

Sometimes even a new paragraph. It just kind of breaks up the wall of text a bit and makes it easier to read.

 

Maik (tsg) is one of, if not the most accredited 3rd party dev for Tsw, the quality of the products he has worked on or provided assistance for have almost always been top notch, I'd say he's very much in touch with the way things are or should be with Tsw.

 

Agree. Maik and TSG produce first class content and do not deserve to be the target of anyone's ire.

 

I did not criticize his quality of work, I criticized his view on the treatment of customers, because it is apparently fine to blatantly lie to your customers for money! Why deliver a much needed patch or feature that has been promised since the first iteration when you can just say nothing at all and announce the next game! It's not like there is any money involved isn't it?

 

Read again, I did not criticize his work, I criticized his view. And a guy making awesome work can have bad views on something, it does not make him free of any critic whatsoever.

 

When did he (Maik) say that it was OK to blatantly lie to costumes?

Also he is 100% correct In saying that Dtg provide much more and imo greater communication then most big game studios.

 

Something to think about:

If they are to fix bugs and glitches, it costs time and money. As a GAME DEVELOPMENT company, it is perfectly reasonable to expect that they will produce more DLC in order to fund the promised fixes.

They can't just fix bugs, because they won't make any money, they have to keep producing so that their bank doesn't run dry.

 

Why let punctuation get in the way of an angry rant!

 

I think these two words sum it up.

 

The DTG staff are all off learning French I expect. Bon voyage.

 

I give DTG a pass this month. After all it is Ju"lie" and they are the masters of it.

 

The decline in communication has been gradual since Sam left imo.

 

I cannot understand how someone who is paying money for this content is okay when this said content almost every time comes bugged or flawed. Yes, they bringing fixes but those are mostly cosmetically and often just fixes that are easy or relatively quick to solve. (Spirit of Steam anyone?)

They are constantly bringing themselves into trouble with this rushed and flawed content and also they ruin their revenue massively. Instead of trying making this right from the get go, they keep on going releasing and then struggle to fix it up. And from what I've heard the 700 release was again a flawed one, with split up timetables (even if you did not purchased the 700) and deleting progress from players. The special signs that where advertised are also missing. Why?

This is what TSW has always been, since i can remember and since i played it first, never up to its full potential.

And before all the problems of TSW3 are solved, and all the remaining problems of the Rush Hour Release are solved, we will see TSW4 in the pipe, introducing new bugs and problems and 'solutions' that no player really understands.

 

Bugs can be difficult to solve if it is not widely reported.

They will obviously put more effort into the bugs that the majority of players are experiencing.

If they had to introduce a reduced timetable when they released the 700 (which sounds perfect imo), then there was obviously not enough time to introduce the new signs. They probably have a deadline they are pressured to meet, which can result in bugged/incomplete DLC.

And not all people who play this game are on these forums, or DTG's Facebook, twitter etc.

 

Sos did not have bugs that were easy to solve. It took them a really long time to figure out what was causing the ai spads, etc. It was a much bigger issue

 

Even the most well known issues are sometimes never sorted out. fabienlimp95 has a point. DTG continue to release DLC with issue after issue after issue and it's clearly piling up. That means they have to go back and fix a issue which whilst yes takes time, is completely self inflicted.

If they were to release a product with little issues as possible rather than rushing it out the door like NY-Trenton, then they wouldn't have a bad reputation by many and would not push some away from buying content.

Also I'm pretty sure a person who works on the timetable doesn't also place signs on a route. That would be the job of a scenery or environment team. What would have been better for some is DTG doing adding the signs before release. Cathcart Circle has Class 380 stop markers even though there is no 380 so why not just put class 700 stop markers months ago or when the route was extended/upgraded last year if a 700 was going to be in the works? That's a self inflicted problem in my books

 

When they release SEHS extended and AI trains were not showing any destinations on the release stream, oh we will take Al look should be a quick fix. Then it was BCC, then it was NYT. Like you mentioned is just keeps piling up with no end onsite, so we have a 700 with a working PIS on the route but the rest sod AI still blank. It just breaks immersion and is frustrated. You mentioned and is like the first time they heard it.

 

At first i was suprised the pis on ai trains on sehs weren't working still but I reminded myself that this game is made by dovetail games. It's a shame dtg are having issues piling up which is leaving issues taking long to address or never get addressed at all.

 

I think the only Reason why so much Player play TSW anymore is the Forum itself (some here say that we can happy with it to have a Forum for communication to other Game developers). I think DTG can be happy to have that Forum.

Imagine you play a Game and find a Game Breaking Bug after 5 mins of playtime and dont know if this Bug is knowing by the developer, where to report a Bug and when is the Time to be fixed.

I would kick this kind of Software in the Trashbin (deinstall it), never touching it again and never put any Dollar/Euro/Pound to this Game.

As a player you can (perhaps somewhere) read if a Bug is reported and how they react to it...

 

What's become clear to me is every time a route or DLC is released, it just piles on more and more bugs needing to be resolved, which DTG is clearly struggling to keep up with.

DTG has squarely placed the burden on themselves for addressing these bugs and quality issues by not releasing the Unreal Editor. With so much time and resources expended on supporting existing routes, it's become apparent that less energy can be focused on delivering high-quality new routes. CSX Heavy Haul, the first route for TSW, is arguably the highest quality route they produced. At the time though, they were able to focus all their efforts on that one route to deliver a high-quality product. Now that the collection has grown to include dozens upon dozens of routes, there are simply too many routes to support to be able to produce the same quality.

If DTG eventually decides to make the Unreal Editor available, independent modders could produce 3rd party mods to address bugs and improve quality, allowing DTG to invest more time into making sure future releases are bug free and of superb quality.

The unofficial editor has proved beyond doubt that despite the limitations imposed on editing cooked content in Unreal, quality improving mods are possible.

 

Would this be only applicable to PC users, or would Consoles be able to access this ?

 

Unreal Editor is a PC only application, however there should be a way to cook and deploy mods for consoles. So as far as being able to create mods from consoles, no. But console users being able to install and use mods, in theory, yes.

 

Ok, thank you.

 

Back to communication and this is meant in the nicest possible way, but we had an example yesterday where things can fall down. The outcry over the SEHS timetable nerf was dealt with very quickly and JD and Matt posted regular updates on the forum as to resolution and implementation of the fix. However at the same time the Class 700 thread(s) are full of feedback about issues that need sorting (mainly sound level and quality) but not a whisper to acknowledge whether or not these are considered genuine concerns or if any action is planned to sort them. That leads to frustration and, admitting my own guilt on such matters, repeat spamming the problems at every opportunity simply because we don’t know if our concerns are being heard.

A simple, “Yes we are aware of the issues”, and either, “No they are not considered significant”, or, “Yes there is follow up work to be done”, would go a long way to avoiding that.

 

You can say that again.

More than once I have reported the same issue but have not had any confirmation it is even being looked into.

Becomes a problem when the majority of services cannot be completed due to a random crash.

 

I noticed the same thing on most of the dlc really. We're all posting useful feedback but it doesn't seem to be heard?

Several times I've posted issues with videos and they just get glossed over both tickets and otherwise. It seems to rely on the stars alligning for soemone from dtg to see the post, take it in and reply back to it.

I'll once again point out the ROG 37 journey. I pointed out with others that was missing day one. Did a ticket, review etc, forun threads. Never got picked up until a month or so later when someone else posted a thread which got seen and a few days later Journeys were updated.

 

I still have TSW2 in my Steam menu and I know how to use it - lol

 

This !!!
The more they release, the less chance there is of getting the newer releases (let alone the older ones ) getting fix to a satisfactory standard .
That is why a lot of us applauded last year’s decision to stop any new releases and workon the old stuff. As we all know , that was a ruse

 

Yes, if I remember correctly they were ready to release and they had to wait for a "window" or something. This was early 2022 or possibly even late 2021.

 

Right on; as an employee of a company that has been bought twice recently, I can say there is a definite communication change; whether or not it's a gag order from the new-owner company, there is an abundance of caution (and I would say additional jargon) in internal communications, as well as with the customers.

 

This is a general problem I've seen on this forum over the last months, players provide feedback of all sorts on here but are unaware if the feedback is arriving at the devs of TSW.

Another problem i feel is that Tickets aren't helpful all the times, with players reporting that tickets simply go deleted after a certain time without being acknowledged ( or are acknowledged but the players didn't get feedback that it is ). I took a ticket years ago, relating to problems in Scenario Editor, and got feedback but that would have let me to invest hours of collecting informations. Which i wasn't willing to do, as im just a player, not a beta tester. But thats another topic.

A simple solution could be a little flag, a reaction only the Mods from this forum can apply to post from players that are giving feedback. That way, players would at least know that there feedback is acknowledged and the devs will look into it.

 

The DTG dev and communications teams could learn from Skyhook Games and how well Jane handled it. Sure MML had and still has issues, bit at least it felt like we were being listened to

 

Absolutely agree. To claim DTG is better than most studios at communication is nonsense. Maik may make good DLC, but his attitude towards players is contemptuous and unpleasant.
The fundamental problem is that the list of bugs and other issues - quite often serious ones - keeps getting longer and longer, and they never get fixed. Not to mention DTG likes to promise things and then not follow through - TSW2 updates anyone?

 

I’d have to disagree with that buddy. DTG DLC over Skyhook any day of the week. MML does still have its issues, mainly the ones it came with on release. Since Jane went off we’ve heard………absolutely nothing about fixes. So, I’ll keep giving my money to DTG for the time being, NOT to Skyhook Games. Just my opinion, obviously.
All that said, I like fabienlimp95 idea of having a tag on posts to show what’s being looked at by DTG.

 

It isn't nonsense, it's the truth, there are many game studios that don't engage with their community whatsoever, that is most certainly not the case with dtg.