Enough Is Enough Thomas And Friends Edition

Just saw that pop up in my FB feed. Really, DTG. Really?

Left an appropriate (polite) comment.

 

Trainsimgaming1001- Definitely not me. Sorry.

 

I can't be bothered to read these long Thomas threads but the above message from DTG has got me curious.
Have they announced the creation of any of Thomas' female friends or is their 2025 Thomas world sexist?
#BeMoreDAISY

 

Thomas, Diesel, Annie & Clarabel and the Troublesome Trucks.

 

That makes it worse of course. Remember that Annie, Clarabel and Henrietta are just the 'servants' and have no life of their own.
Trust me the Sisterhood will not like it
(Even the Rev Awdry got in to trouble with this one in the past ).

This is a fun read. I wonder if DTG have seen it?
Gender Race & Class | Sodor Island Fansite

 

That's why Mattel got rid of Edward (the first train to appear and the one which started the Thomas stuff) and Henry, to bring a "gender balance" (all the while completely ignoring the already existing female characters).

 

Ominous! I guess the DTG PR machine is going to make it impossible to just ignore this " Thomas " thing.

 

They really don't have a clue.

Would someone be able to translate, 'Recently, Martin Amis eloquently defended the posthumous reputation of Philip Larkin,(1) whose personal peccadilloes were attacked post mortem even more savagely than we have come to expect in this era of moral relativism.', please as I just haven't a clue!

I did skim read through the rest of it, and, although I have never seen Thomas, I think that anyone who tries to tie those topics into a programme made for children up to 6 or 7 years old needs to find something much more worthwhile to do.

 

Really? I think that's the most disturbing part of your post Matt
(Typed with my tongue firmly in my cheek).

 

Afraid so, when I were a lad I spent all day everyday out in the fields, or terrorising the village, so never really had books, listened to music, etc. Then when my son appeared it were a bloody shock and I weren't aware of the presence of Thomas really, then as a Grandparent the children's TV channels always showed Thomas in the morning so I have never seen it with them either. I have certainly missed out on something, whether that's a good thing or not I don't know!

 

It's only been like that since the whole move to CGI and consequent Big World Bit Adventures rubbish.

The earlier seasons (1-5) and even the books weren't exclusively for children.

 

The original books were great. My Mum was a librarian so growing up, an awfully long time ago, I was able to read them all quite easily. I think, later on, you could buy a full box set that lived in an outer box made to look like a station building. Couldn't afford that then though.

 

Thomas passed me by, too. Ivor The Engine yes and a few other books featuring trains from the children’s library. Plus (eventually) a Triang Clockwork train set for Christmas some time in the mid to late 60’s. That and being taken on the occasional train trip by my parents, in particular the Tyneside suburban network which at that time was still diesel operated. Well I do have the vaguest memory of my old man taking me to see a football match in North Shields, then coming back into Newcastle via Backworth on one of the old EMU”s. Can’t recall whether it was an old style LNER one or an EPB.

 

I like the later stories (the ones not illustrated by Reginald Dalby) more, but they're all great.

I still read them now.

 

LOL. Good one, DTG.

Direct link: https://x.com/trainsimworld/status/1874425429869650422

 

Oh my, my! Just looks ridiculously out of place. Like a toy engine on a real railway. Oh wait, that's what it is right! Only I can't see where you insert the key to wind it up. Well I'm sure there'll be a manual.

 

Got to agree, doesn’t look right. If they wanted to do Thomas on the main line it should have been an existing steamer with the face attached, as heritage railways do. If they wanted to go all out Thomas the actual character, then it should be within a custom made purpose built world for it. Just wrong and incongruous. Get a grip, Dovetail.

 

Here we go again! Looks like someone has leaked video of the new Thomas DLC undergoing beta testing.

Whatever your views on Thomas the Tank Engine, you've got to agree this does look unexpectedly action packed and exciting, like TSW meets Call of Duty. Even Mr Bean joins in the mayhem.

Is that Wallace and Gromit on the track at the beginning?

 

Shame Thomas isn’t in Derail Valley. Then you could crash it into a rake of loaded oil cars and disintegrate the wretched thing!

 

Literally every game gets Thomas the Tank mods and the only one with official support is an actual train sim whose fans complain about it

 

Much ado about nothing.

You'd be forgiven for thinking the world was about to end.

 

Blimey, I never knew you felt that strongly about rakes of loaded oil cars

 

I won't link it here as it's a bit sweary but I recommend you watch Last Week Tonight's Thomas spoof they did last year. It's basically what you described, but with Henry.

 

The way Annie and Clarabelle brutally disintegrated got me! LOL!

 

Well now, since TTT is a thing now, I'd love to see a full on Hogwarts Express with Hagrid as fireman (imagine the fry-ups!).

 

Well now that we know that West Somerset was reworked for Thomas' benefit rather than ours it makes you question the motivation for reworking Great Western???

Perhaps we are going to see this classic heading out of Paddington?


Or these working on the revived underground lines?

 

Do we? Or is it people putting 2 and 2 together?

 

I don't know about other people, but when I put 2 and 2 together I always end up with 22, it's really quite strange.......

 

Don't be daft. Everyone knows that the correct answer = DESMOND.

 

This wouldn't have happened in TSC which seems to be the serious simulator now.

 

No they'd never do fictional stuff or toy trains for TSC

 

This forum is such a weird place full of weird people trying to score likes from sarcasm. Sad really.
TSC is a proper train simulator. TSW is a glossy arcade game. Fact. Both are good in their own way.

 

A Hall Class with a reskin would do nicely. Unfortunately DTG seem to put the ban hammer down for any Hogwarts Castle reskins uploaded to the Creator Club, but at least we have the TS Community website.

To be fair, the North Somerset Railway (and the Glasgow Airport Rail Link by extension) were proposed lines. In the case of the GARL, it was one that was almost built, and the TS route is made from assets for a training simulator for the line. The NSR scheme is still being proposed (as of 2023 at least), and they even bought the 117 they wanted. It is a weird scheme though, being a shared heritage and National Rail route. I would like to see it happen either way.

On another note, The Count of Monster Disco is a top-tier route and I won't tolerate slanderation of it!

 

The NSR was also one of the few, maybe the only, way to get a Class 117 in the game and, while I only drove it a couple of times, seemed pretty good.

 

Oh I'm definitely weird, and have also definitely never cared about likes, I'm just both naturally gifted and cursed to have sarcasm as my native language......

 

I like NSR, despite it being fictional

 

DTGs own developments seem to be going in a direction to cater for casual gamers and not for true railway enthusiasts. Mark my words we will see a decline in their products over the coming year. I've said it in a few other threads, but I'm certain Rivet are going to be building their routes and with that being said I think we should be made aware if that is the case... WCMLS was a complete mess... At the moment it's just speculation of mine. But the way DTG fiercely defended WCMLS on release makes me believe my theory is correct.

People will mock us now, but give it a year and I'll be saying "I told you so... "....

It seems that any quality in terms of routes or rolling stock going forward will only be produced third party developers (minus Rivet of course).

 

Is t his really a forum for train simmers or have I stumbled upon something quite different!

I very much doubt any of the above is true and that those who believe so will be strangely quiet in a years time, or will have found another obsession.

So does that mean that DTG are only developing Thomas themed routes and Rivet are now developing the Dutch route, the Cardiff route and presumably working on whatever group of routes being released next summer!

 

I must admit I bought a lot of TSC routes in the sale and that game does seem more realistic with more ai traffic, red lights etc. also the timetabling is a lot more strict.
It’s especially noticeable for freight with really complex switching and shunting operations that just aren’t present in this game. Those are very interesting to play and a challenge, no hand holding.
This is pretty with the graphics and you can walk around and all that, but the vast majority of drives are simple from A to B runs and not much else. Also it holds your hands too much I think.
So I guess TSC is for real train simmers and TSW is for the console brigade who just want easy relaxing fun.

 

That is odd, as I don't own a console and I am a railway enthusiast first and a gamer second.

I like TSC but having a handful of scenarios does not, for me, beat having a full timetable to choose from.

 

Yet you choose the game that has much less depth because of its looks? I agree it is pretty.
You support my point when you think about it; timetable mode from A to B but very pretty graphics to look at and very easy to drive.
TSC does beat TSW with freight hands down every time. Longer and real challenges. What has happened to US freight here? Sales figures maybe because it’s so bland to drive.
As for TSC scenarios my reply is simple:
1. Workshop
2. Editor
I know which game has made me work much harder for my scores with no hand holding like I’m a kid.

 

I don't support your point at all, I have thought about it, if I did I wouldn't have responded, I would have pressed the tick.

I don't care about scores and take no notice of them.

 

I agree the timetable mode and for me its the physics I notice the most when playing TSC.

TSW is better product in my mind.

And I don't give 2 hoots about points, trophies and acheivements either and do not pay attention to them.

 

This tends to be my view of TSC, plus of course there are routes like Maerdy or the New Zealand one which will never see the light of day in TSW. And of course steam traction.

But I recently did another massive triage of my TSC, with the game occupying nearly 500Gb of HD space and many routes I will probably never touch again. Despite the flaws, there’s something about TSW that just draws you in.

And the biggest irritation of TSC is either the Standard scenarios where you are a minute or two late and fail the objective which then fails the whole run. Or the Career scenarios where the author failed to modify the scoring parameters so being a minute or two late costs you 3000 points, albeit you still pass the objective. Even though scoring doesn’t bother me, it still rankles my OCD. Also, yes we have the editors, but not a five minute job to set up a scenario and quick drive doesn’t allow you to define a timetable.

There’s also the very real danger that DTG are no longer actively supporting TSC in terms of further core development and it will quickly become a legacy product.

 

Basically, I don't care about a Thomas DLC, even though I really enjoyed the series (not the newer one with GCI) as a child. In my opinion, that's not something you absolutely need in a more or less realistic simulation. It wouldn't bother me either, BUT:

Resources are being used here that should be used much more urgently elsewhere. For example, for urgently needed optimizations and bug fixes. Here, they're silent. And (almost) nothing will happen, as always.

It seems strange when your "New Year's resolution" is to be more Thomas? So that's your resolution for 2025? Wow! How should I interpret this?



What's next? Will TSW now be squeezed with pointless licenses like Lego? Ultimately, they only put their energy into expensive licenses and the quality suffers more and more as a result. But it doesn't seem to matter because the money keeps rolling in. I don't like this development and don't want it for TSW.

Apart from that, it hasn't been done very well so far. A few 3D models are simply placed on an existing (rather boring) track. That seems like the usual lack of love, sorry.

If they were serious about it, they would have had to either design a completely new map or release a new game so that the target group could be more clearly identified. Who is the target group supposed to be? The track plus DLC will certainly cost around €40-50 (!), but for that you get - as things stand - a few locomotives with faces on a realistic-looking track. The interest of the children in question is likely to be short-lived here because the rest of a children's game is simply missing.

 

Steam is what is keeping TSC installed on my PC. If TSW had even 10% of TSC's steam content it might be enough to abandon TSC. Although 3rd rail slam door units are something TSW also lacks.

I used to make scenarios and also used to be happy hunting down assets for routes and scenarios but I just feel I can't be bothered now and largely TSW works out of the box. It certainly falls short on content though.

 

What people need to understand about this dlc is.. What you want as a individual is irrelevant to dtg.
Tsw isn't a simulator aimed solely at adult train enthusiasts.
It's a video game on PlayStation and xbox, where the target audience is childen/young adults! With a limited attention span. They are more likely to spend hours bombing up and down wsr than sticking to a timetable on wcmlos etc.
I would bet that dtg could shift the tsw franchise to fantasy routes and trains from various cartoons etc and still turn over a good profit. But they are not.

Thomas and friends are not taking over tsw! Dtg are still catering for more than one audience. So live with it. And stop being so selfish.

 

This blew up. The way I see it:

DTG is attempting to broaden the user base to create more revenue to allow in turn for more and better content. One of the major problems in game development is this (across the board): the costs of development are continuing to rise but the prices stagnate, thereby requiring an ever increasing amount of sales to break even.

Only one problem: the train sim market is pretty tiny and much expansion isn't possible. All attempts with other games by DTG have not really taken off and do not provide a way to cross-finance TSW.

At the same time, the list of issues in the routes and gameplay is almost endless and could warrant a year of fixup without new revenue. But who would pay for that? Once fixed errors are duplicated on new routes because routes are, for example, started from versions where something isn't fixed. Errors in signalling would be easy to fix but all gameplay would have to be resimulated, potentially causing havoc in large routes and potentially breaking previously working gameplay. QA is far too late in the process (and without detailed knowledge) to meaningfully find and fix these issues that are immediately visible in the preview stream.

DTG would need to spend way more time on development per route with more iteration (would cost way more), while simultaneously producing more content (would cost even more due to more employees) and keeping the prices as is or reducing them (would bring far less revenue) without trying to expand the customer base in order for the majority here to be happy.

I'm not even starting on the difficulty of finding technically capable people with the detailed knowledge required to set up signals, for example.

I would love nothing more than for DTG and thus TSW to find a way forward that is both financially sound and solves the current problems. Unfortunately, I do not see it. Therefore, I'll wait for the DLC and see how the reception is. If this brings a massive flow of revenue of a new customer base, then I'm all for it as that would bolster TSW.