While admittedly a Santa Fe gameplay pack doesn’t do much to pique my particular interests, I’m excited to finally see an American third party developer come to TSW! From the little research I have done it seems High Iron Simulations are responsible for a huge amount of North American content for TSC. I hope this means only good things for the future of American content in TSW.
Between a Gameplay Pack and an unnamed new route, not gonna be having high hopes with them given from their reputation over at TSC (which it ain't mostly good on the US side).
Yes, I'm curious about this. Matt was talking, some time ago, about possible routes with 2nd or 3rd Class railways. Their future route will probably be based on something like NY&A, NY&SW, RBMN, Alaska etc... I believe that Santa-Fe Pack will come in a similar livery to the F7, right? Or with the blue and yellow one?
Not that I have much interest in US content, beyond the NEC regions, but I'm still happy to see more developers coming in. Gameplay packs are actually quite a smart way to start, in theory. Get a bit of practise in scenario/timetabling, reskinning, and make a bit of money to go towards the first 'real' project. Good to see the US side will, at least, get something.
Couldn’t agree more in regards to gameplay packs being a good way to ease a new developer into the franchise. My issue is mainly with Santa Fe. If it’s anything like the anachronistic F7 on CP then I’d rather have nothing at all.
Funny enough I’m in the middle of one of the charity streams in which Matt brings this up. He even mentions third party developers for American routes. If there is to be another F7, one can only hope so… better yet Bluebonnet in the 1970s or 80s!
Agreed, can't wait to see how bad some of these look. If HIS actually puts more effort into it than what they've done on TSC, then I'll eat my words.
No no, they actually talk about AT&SF 1990s-era in the roadmap. Maybe some GP38s, SD40s or GEVOs? maybe in Santa-Fe/early BNSF liveries?.
The only equipment of use for that Era they we currently have is the C40-8W, and SD40-2/SD40. The ATSF never bought any GP38-2s, as they opted for the GP39-2 instead. (And I doubt HIS would even put the effort to modify the GP38 into a GP39. GEVOs are too new. Only other option is chopping the AC4400CW into a Dash 9.
Also of note, this is supposed to be for Cajon Pass, but I also expect the Palmdale Cutoff to be empty (No Southern Pacific locos) and still no UP traffic. (Unless HIS has the UP SD40-2 from Sherman Hill layer in, as thats the only UP loco close enough for a 1990s era timetable)
Love this- a new 3rd-party is announced, and five minutes later we're already talking LOVE on them. Personally, i don't know or care about whatever TSC drama this is referring to- their TSW products will either be good or they won't. Most miserable community in gaming IMO.
It's a fair thing to point out though. They don't have a good reputation in TSC. Their U.S content in TSC sucks. I hope that they do well in TSW. Just because you never heard of them in TSC doesn't mean people can point that out.
That’s valid. It’s the same thing I’m guilty of with Rivet and some of their bad stuff. Like I said earlier though I personally am not a TSC player so could you tell me what it is HIS struggle with exactly? Sounds, physics, scenery?
HIS is basically Gary W. Dolzall, a long time DTG contractor at least since the RailWorks days. He has made hundreds of free workshop scenarios under the name "Elphaba" and "High Iron Simulations", DLC scenario packs and written books about US railroading. In recent times, he collaborated with a loco modeller (DigitalTrainModel) that has a rightfully bad reputation, his models being of blatantly wrong dimensions, badly textured, and some serious flaws like using wrong blueprints and wrong texture references leading to missing textures - I know what I'm talking about here as I've spent many hours fixing what needs to be fixed on DTM's stock. This is the lowest-class rolling stock DLC available, but he has a high output of content, and had no serious competition in TSC in terms of variety of stock. Nobody else did the stuff. The US market was his alone and other high quality devs like DieselWorkshop chose to publish themselves. Other collaborators are route builders and scripters that have made the best (and almost all) US routes for TSC - G-TraX, GreatNortherner and Smokebox. What team Gary has gathered around him for TSW we don't know. There's a lot of personal grudges involved here, I'd say let's just wait and see.
While I appreciate the context what is the issue with Gary specifically? Is it merely the fact that he tends to collaborate with modelers that make subpar content or does HIS simply make bad routes? If so then I guess it sort of justifies the negativity. But the other collaborators you say are responsible for almost all of the American TS routes, are they affiliated with HIS in any way? Surely the man’s reputation can’t be that bad…
I'm just happy we're actually gonna get new US freight stuff for TSW. Hoping for another CSX route so that we can get more use out of all the CSX locos in game, or Norfolk Southern since they have a lot of good potential locomotives to bring. Or fallen flags! How I'd love to see the Chessie System in TSW. Just hoping for something exciting, something that isn't just typical mainline runs up/down a big grade. Get some local jobs and switching in there or something! I mean I'm still gonna be interested no matter what because... freight trains are awesome. Aghhh I'm just excited
Any freight on the east is long overdue. We’ve seen enough of the west! But just like you said the tedious up and down a steep grade gets a little meh sometimes. Pick up and drop operations are what get me going. Switching, loading, unloading… anything but the extremely slow ascent and slightly quicker but still slow descent. Chessie or Conrail are the two fallen flags I’d absolutely love to see. U boats and MACs would be awesome. IIRC, we were supposed to get a u boat with SPG but whatever happened happened and we got a 4400 instead.
As a first pack, using existing stock, adding liveries and a timetable/scenarios is a good way to start. I’m happy to get a different era’s use for Cajon Pass but will have to see what the content is and what the quality is like when it is made and previewed. I think we could all do the same as a courtesy and only rip into it (or give constructive criticism) if it actually turns out bad. There’s nothing else in the pipeline for US freight so I get that there might be a lot hanging on this for some people. Fingers crossed for something good.
BNSF didn't come into existence until 1997, and I doubt very many locomotives got repainted over the next three years. More likely we'll see ATSF Bluebonnet plaus one of the (less common) ersatz-Warbonnet jobs
Extremely well put. I see this as an immense positive for freight fans or even fans of US stuff in general. We finally have an American third party dev, I’m ecstatic!
I'm glad that we finally got a US 3rd party developer High Iron Simulations is know for doing scenario packs for both DTG and US routes and their own routes and High Iron have released routes recently one being Saluda Grade which I would like to see them do for TSW and they did a remaster/extension of Feather River Canyon and hopefully this 1990s AT&SF pack will be decent but only time will tell once it's closer to release
I’m not about to dismiss this company out of hand based on TSC. They did some great routes within the limitations of that simulator. Their Feather River Canyons Enhanced was a very nice route for example with lots of content. Imagine that in TSW? This should be good news for US players and hopefully stop the recent doom and gloom by some that DTG somehow have a bias against them, which was of course total nonsense. Not DTG’s fault that it’s so hard to get the licenses over there.
Provided, they're work is better on TSW than it is on TSC, but well see from the gameplay pack. And with High Iron's history, would expect them to be making more on gameplay packs on the current US routes than doing new routes or locos that would take time to make as usual (in other word, reuse locos & cars as they see fit).
It’s great to see the addition of a third party project, which according to the May roadmap is TSC’s US content producer. Can anyone tell me how soon I can see "Feather River Valley"?
If High Iron Simulations decide on doing that route I doubt it's the route they are working on currently
There are a few US developer for TS like Digital Train Modal ,Travel By Train, Milepost Simulations etc etc
And there's The Loco Shop (also related to DTM) - responsible for the worst ever TS Loco. No sense of using correct shaders, modelling edges, texturing and setting up simple things as notches - the 4 notch SD70M... DTG published it anyway... as long as it moves it gets approval.
THIS^^^^ 100% I'd also like to see the Pacific NW and BN MACs in green and white. Also, some high hoods
Chessie or Conrail are the two fallen flags I’d absolutely love to see. U boats and MACs would be awesome Chessie System is a possibility as High Iron did do Baltimore and Ohio Mountain Subdivisions route for TS that has a couple locomotives in Chessie System with the B&O letters under the cab and they have done a Chessie System scenario pack for Hanover Subdivision and Conrail won't happen because they won't give a license
Agree Chessie System would be a great choice. One of the most iconic liveries IMO. Obviously i'd love to see Big Blue- maybe someday whoever owns that license will decide they want to make some money lol.
The Chessie "System" was not a railroad, legally; it was a holding company that owned four Federally-recognized railroads (C&O, B&O, WM, B&OCT) which therefore were required to display their own reporting marks, even in a common "System" livery. Family Lines was the same way.
Conrail Shared Assets Operations owns the license and they haven't been wanting to play ball when it comes to licensing
I hate to be the debbie downer of new US content for TSW, but its things like this that makes us who've seen HIS content on TSC and worry on what stuff will look like on TSW. (Photo from the TSC discord) They recently patched their Feather River enhanced route, but yet to fix this snow texture error on the Geeps. (Which was well reported on after release)
Yes. (Sadly) I really hope Michael is the main workforce on rolling stock for their stuff, not Cesar....
Micha can do anything, he's built many routes (also WCML South Euston - Birmingham was built by him) and a lot of stock. But DTM is the main US modeller - that's why there's a striking quality difference between european stuff in TSC (which in AP's case surpasses TSW) and the US rolling stock (apart from the great stuff Reppo did, like the NH E33, my fav.)
Everybody should have the chance to improve itself. The first Rivet stuff on TSW was also not so much impressive. And at least they built Bernina. And that's the route with the most realistic mountains in TSW.
Despite most of Rivets DLCs are half decent with not so much good results when first released (Arosa, Sursee, Fife Circle, to name a few). And while I do also want to see them improved, but seeing the image from TSC above is the reason why I'm not having high hopes with them at all if these issues they have for US content still continues like this no matter who does the rolling stocks or locos.
Have High Iron done any of the Canadian Rockies routes? I enjoyed those in TSC and still do. Feather River Canyon Enhanced got a thumbs up from me. I still have to fire up either TSC or Trainz to do some decent shunting puzzles. Loco wise I’d love a high bonnet to come to TSW, imagine if they sold us a NS one in Saluda Grade, day one purchase for me.
