Blackpool Branches - How A Proper Uk Route Should Be Made

So, on Thursday, Blackpool Branches Officially had its first preview stream, and I must say, that this route looks absolutely phenomenal, Just Trains has absolutely hit the ground running, and pushed ahead of many developers for TSW, Blackpool Branches is (in my opinion) the best UK route in TSW to this day, I'm gonna split the key areas into 4 categories, Scenery, Timetable, Features, And Variety


Scenery

The Scenery of this route looks absolutely fantastic, The scenery is definitely on par with Niddertalbahn, the foilage looks absolutely great, and they have used so many custom assets, and there is just key little bits such as the 80s level crossings which fully involves that 80s feel

Timetable

The Timetable Is Definitely Better Than Average UK Routes we have seen, The Timetable has good service variety, the times vary from half an hour up to over an hour in some cases, and it's just an overall solid timetable, couldn't be any better

Features

Oh boy, this route has a lot of features, the guard whistling at Preston Is Just Such A Cool Bonus, and just overall enhances the routes realism, and makes it more authentic, and just when I thought that was incredible, the Ormskirk Branch Features a Token Exchange Feature, where you stop at a red signal box, then continue on the branch

Variety

The Variety On Blackpool is literally Unmatched, The Pacer Included, has 2 different engine types in the same loco, which is a First In TSW, featuring both Cummins And Leyland Engine Sounds, the Pacer Features Up To 3 Different Types of Liveries to choose from, just from this loco alone, you get so much variety, and plus, you get Announcements with the 142, voiced by JT Tom From TrainSimTV, Lovely, in addition you get the class 47, which is a returning face from NTP, now featuring 2 new liveries to choose from, you also get some nice gronk action included, with the class 08, for those who love shunting
As a Bonus With this Route, you get layers with the class 45, and class 20, for those who enjoy those locos, and an additional bonus is the 8F from Spirit Of Steam, with a Railtour, for those steam lovers!
The Pacer Sadly Has No Layers For TVL, however, it does layer into West Cornwall Local, for those who own it, so some nice variety there, and, the announcements are also on WCL for you to try




It Just Feels So Lovely To Finally Have A Route with Little to no Drawbacks, and something that those BR enthusiasts can enjoy, JTs have absolutely perfected this route and I and so many others cannot wait to play it on the 14th.

Dovetail Games, definitely needs to take notes from this route, and use it for their future content

Thanks For Viewing This Thread

 

Are you Raphael or do you two just share the same profile picture?

 

We share

 

Also forgot to mention the 101 and the class 40 is included with this as well, not so excited for the 101, as I've seen that a million times already lol, however, the class 40 is a nice addition for those BR lovers

 

Let's not get too hysterical over the route before it's out...

 

This.

I mean it does look as if JT have gone the extra distance and produced a very good route, certainly one that puts most of the other associates and DTG content in its shadow.

However... it isn't out yet. It was evident from the stream that the route was pausing and hitching quite a lot - I presume it was being streamd from the PC. The 142 looks to be as good as if not better than the SHG 158 but my verdict is still out on the TL11 sounds until I hear them in game, acceleration even if you follow the Notch 3 guidance still seems a bit Porsche like and the bounce may well be inducing motion sickness even in those who don't normally find that a problem. It is still quite a short and relatively non scenic (in terms of spectacular landscape) route, particularly the section that can be operated with the loco hauled stuff.

Yes, it looks way better than WCL on its similar stream and subsequently in reality, the attention to lineside detailing and 3D modelling looks good but we really don't quite know how this is going to unfold with the end users until Tuesday evening. I do hope it will be fine with broad grins and high fives all around but let's keep the champagne on ice until then.

 

No one should ever be excited for anything TSW-related, i guess?

Just seems like kind of a miserable approach.

I'm with OP. Everything i've seen of it so far looks great, and i will be buying as soon as it goes live.

 

Well that's been the general tenor of this thread since the beginning and everything we've read and seen about the route has pointed towards a very good effort from JT.

But I agree that chickens should never be counted in advance of a release no matter how excited the heralds may be.

I've been lifted up and then let down before with NYT, just to give one example.

 

I would agree with those who advise caution - just from past experience with Routes upon release. However, if this Route is as good as it looks, it could do for TSW4 what Birmingham, Niddertalbahn, and Peak Forest did for TSW3 - rescue it from its rocky release.

 

Placing BCC and especially PFR on par with Niddertalbahn is a rather controversial opinion...

 

Fair enough; Niddertalbahn did set a standard for sure.

 

It was always going to be. TSW players have got so used to the releases from DTG usually ranging from the average to subpar and some really poor releases from Skyhook and Rivet Games that when a dev comes along and does it properly everyone is surprised. JT have been making stunning routes for Train Sim Classic for years. It would have been very strange if that talent didn't transfer to TSW. The same would be the case if Armstrong Powerhouse ever made content for TSW and I expect the upcoming ATS route to be of a high standard too.

 

Will say I am jealous of the amount of content JT has put into the route. Makes me dream of the chance of a US freight route giving the same kind of small variety that it does.

But content is half the value, how well the route plays is the other. But we'll see if JT has done better work than DTG has in this regard.

 

Nidder has very good scenery, but I do prefer BCC overall.

 

Can understand why people would urge caution but definitely got to let more excitement for this release, often times I think there’s hype before preview, then can kind of go down a bit sometimes at the preview, however I think that may have been one of the previews that the hype went up.

whilst caution helps in several cases, too much caution doesn’t.

it’s a soon as possible purchase guarantee from me, I’m confident things have been done right, and I’m willing to make a wide exception to the caution rule on that basis.

 

I don't see much point advising caution when it's JT we're talking about. They have a lot of credit in the bank, especially with more recent content.
It'll be one of the smoothest launches yet, most likely.

Also: it's an absolute masterclass in route/era/loco choice.

 

Absolutely spot on in all there’s 3 options the T211R Leyland engines with self changing gears gear box (TL11 engines been ones from Leyland National bus)
TL11 Leyland engines coupled to voith gearbox(T211R) this change was implemented following unrealiabilty issues with the self changing gearbox then the 3rd option is the one most widely known in the later to withdrawal of class 142 is the uprated Cummins engine with the voith gearbox

 

Yeah I can understand why people will be cautious, but it’s JT. The pro’s should out-do the cons. If JT track record is anything to go by, then this route should be the delicious cream cake that we all can all tuck into and enjoy.

 

Oh it absolutely is and if you missed stream other night just trains previewing it again tomorrow in there YouTube channel at 19:30 U.K. time

 

It's bound to have some issue or another. The main thing is that for their first route it certainly looks like they have tried to raise the bar. I have beaten the drum for a long time that TSW needs more playability as well as keeping a variety of eras covered and there has been a drought of 80s releases since TVL. This is still a day one for me and I am fairly certain if there are any negatives that the devs will try and resolve. Edinburgh to Glasgow could have been like this. But putting a bit more effort in to that was seen as too hard and wouldn't you prefer working lifts etc. In context this is being so well received across the community from the announcements so far. I am fairly confident that this will be a good buy.

 

Can just Trains just take over please?
I love that quality of the Blackpool route being made! I really would love to see them do a modern day Scottish route or any UK route (modern day)! It's absolutely brilliant what they've put into this!

 

I'm confident that it will be a good release. My reasoning is that the Devs have not been in hiding. They've been active on the forum, and have shown screenshots to backup what they've been saying. They are clearly quite proud of what they've created (and rightly so). Certain other 3rd parties are not so forthcoming and when they have been, have failed to provide any backup for what they've said. They also have an excellent track record (pun intended) in TSC.

I'm sure there will be some issues. Even Niddertahlbahn which, in my opinion, is the best route in the game so far, had a couple of problems. But I'm pretty optimistic that this will be a good one. You've only got to watch the Devs own streams that they do on Train Sim TV to see they are really enthusiastic and passionate about what they do. My only worry is how long DTG will take to process any fixes. We've seen in the past with TSG that they have fixed things as soon as the community mentioned it, but DTG didn't give those fixes any priority to release them.

So fingers crossed for a smooth rollout. Still really looking forward to this.

 

The amount of detail in this is spectacular!
From exterior and interior gaurds pannels, to token system, to announcements, to scenary, it's all absolutely amazing! I cannot wait to see this route! The only thing that JT could possibly do better is marketing and teasing the route! Even then it was still pretty good with plenty of dev blogs! This route looks amazing and I do hope it runs smoothly on all platforms. (not including PS4 & Xbox 1 because no tsw4 route runs smoothly on those).

 

I have a feeling performance could be an issue. Just watched the section with the 47 from Burn Naze to Poulton and it was juddering and hitching like billy-ho on the stream. So while that may be more of a core problem, will be interesting to see how it runs on lesser hardware.

 

Have you also considered the financials when it comes to TSW content? DTG are a large team with multiple salaries to pay, cashflow needs to be managed and therefore releases in-house need to carefully timed to ensure people get paid, sometimes it is true that quality over quantity has been seen from DTG to ensure the business remains profitable and able to retain its team ( I am not here to question the quality over quantity aspect, as there's plenty people on this forum who do that ) on the other hand JT is a very small team who for the whole work from home, they have much smaller overheads and are therefore able to invest much more time and detail into their paid for products which shows in their TSC routes to date, I am sure their TSW content will be no different. DTG could release content that's to the JT standard, but if we ( the players ) want multiple routes each year from them then there is a cost, the DLC price would have to increase to support the additional staff that DTG would need to produce such content so quickly. If all of a sudden the community wanted multiple JT routes per year then the DLC would cost more, or the overall standard would drop. The business wouldn't survive otherwise, these are people's full time jobs we are talking about, they have bills to pay like you and me.

 

The end user care little wether it's someone in their basement on a laptop or a large games publishing house, what matters is wether it's any good.

Most of us would rather wait for something resembling a railway not a 28 days later style landscape with moths flying round it. There appears to be little grasp of actually how important it is to have large stations functioning like they should. Birmingham NS must have took ages to build in TSW yet its totally immersion breaking to see nothing in it.

Stating that people need to make a living is pretty obvious. I now barely touch anything DTG put out on day one. Many others don't either. It's wait for the sales or not all. Probably spent an hour or so on Birmingham Cross City and similar on Cathcart. I only have them because of the bundle sale so paid very little. TSG and JT are showing what can be done and the rest of the Dev teams need to take note...

 

On the surface this route puts DTG to shame. The amount of stuff included makes the price for this DLC very worthwhile.

The only things that appear to impact it are core issues like things loading up right in front of you and micro-pauses etc. Just Trains ought to put pressure on DTG to improve the core so their efforts really pay off.

DTG should be highly embarrassed at what they’ve been offering lately.

 

None of that content has been for TSW however...

 

Doesn't matter tbh, JT has always been known for their high quality stuff

and I'm pretty sure it was referenced in the stream that the TSW editor was much harder than the TSC editor, yet JT still made Blackpool better than any BR era route we have seen in TSW

Honestly, very impressive from JT

 

One thing we can confirm that they won't be as many bugs and glitches as seen on routes by DTG and 3rd party's (not JT of course.)

 

Always a possibility, but JT have said on their own streams that they are happy, so hopefully that’s just a case of running it a couple of times to compile the shaders.

Pretty sure it will be fine on my PC thanks to ini changes, but also want it for PlayStation (waiting for a TSW4 sale as I only have 3 on PS) so we’ll see what console performance is like.

 

I’m very curious to see how the route actually holds up. Content from Rivet and Skyhook has so far been in line with DTG stuff, quite dismal. I was starting to think maybe TSW just wasn’t capable of doing good things.

But we’ve had great stuff from TSG and JT is looking very promising.

Maybe at last there is a glimmer of hope for the future of TSW.

 

Does the pacer have wheel slide or wheelslip protection like ap pack does ?

 

So?
JT still have a reputation for quality and accuracy. A new game won't cause them to forget their standards.

 

I'd 100% say Rivet has been below DTG.

 

I don't think anyone can say with confidence precisely what JT's standards are.

 

I can’t believe is a year later and the PIS on BCC still not fixed on AI trains. Just unreal.

 

Rivet have been comfortably below Dovetail, at least until now.
Skyhook have been in a similar area. Midland Mainline had a very rough start but I think popular opinion is that, now, it's a good route.

Dovetail content is, generally, ok - there's a fair number of gems, and a fair number of duds. The majority are just average - held down by issues or poor choices.
Skyhook is mixed at best - apart from MML, but that took a long time to get there.
Rivet have a lot of poor DLCs, a few decent ones (more recently) and a couple of good ones (even more recently).

 

In part no doubt because it’s been 18 months in the making of Blackpool branches

 

What's with the triangular cut-outs in the sleepers?

 

With regard to motion sickness, watched the section with the Duff from Burn Naze to Poulton earlier in the same circumstances (exercise bike/55' TV screen) and no adverse effects. So sadly, realistic as it might be, translating the Pacer bounce into the sim might be going to cause issues for some - as I said I don't normally suffer from this - have even IRL crossed from Rosslare to Fishguard on the night boat in a howling storm without issues. But the 142 in TSW...

 

That's more than a little hyperbolic. Everything looks good, but, until we get the route on our own hardware we won't know just how good. I think the love fest needs to be put on hold for a couple of days.

And disparaging other developers, who have worked hard at producing some pretty good content in the past, is a bit disagreeable in my view.

 

Mods...

 

Now don't get me wrong I'm not trying to get at DTG or the 3rd parties in any way but I just want to see gameplay features like what JT have added, and lesser bugs IMO.

 

Why don’t you try some positive optimism, just for once? Instead of sounding like ship has already sailed. Most of us are excited for this route. Climb aboard and join in.

 

This ^^^^
Love this!

 

The sensible option is always not to get too excited.

 

Evidence so far...

Good variety of services tick

Good variety of locos tick

New train tick

Decent timetable tick

Good comms tick

Optimism would naturally be high after the above.

Of course it could be a nightmare inducing bug fest that makes Glasgow to Edinburgh look amazing...

Not long to wait now.

 

I think the main concerns are not so much the quality of JT's output, but how it's going to run in DTG's somewhat bugfest of a core. And I still have lingering concerns about the seasick bounce of the 142 in motion.

And from my own personal POV, I am currently deeply invested in Snowrunner with the Scandinavia maps and of course a week Tuesday sees the massive SimRail update (did someone say EN57!) and the start of the Steam autumn sale for which I have a number of TSC items pencilled in. So the chances of distraction are very high vs. spending £30 on a route DLC. Oh I will probably buy it to support JT's hard work but I will be trying to balance the time with everything else.

 

The world is a depressing place as it is. You got to grab every opportunity for some excitement while you can in life.
Unless you got a holiday booked up or you’re supporting your favourite FC, then finding some joy in new content for this game is the next best thing, well for me anyways.