PC Is The Sand Pass Grade Route Relevant Now?

Greetings. I decided to refresh my memories on the route that I started with a long time ago - SPG. But I found that the scripts were broken, and there were time inconsistencies in the schedule when you missed several trains in a row that left later than you.
In this regard, I have a question - is it worth trying to ride this route in TSW5?

 

It remains one of DTG’s best efforts at a North American freight route.

However can’t really say how it runs in TSW5 as it’s one of the routes I kicked off to free up HD space for more recent offerings.

 

This is definitely the first of the American Routes that needs to be remastered, as it was done with WSR and will be done with GWE..

 

Well the guy who was doing remasters has said GWE will be his last one. Also Liam was kindly giving up his spare time to do these projects out of personal interest and a labour of love. At this stage we don't know whether DTG have any in house route builders let alone staff they can spare for minimal revenue makeovers. Though as suggested previously one way round that is to sweeten the deal with a little rolling stock DLC, such as happened for Cathcart.

 

I’d say play N A freight on TSC if you can, far more satisfying scenarios and endless variety vintage (to include steam) or modern.
Especially if you like switching and yard work. You’ll never run out of free scenarios either.

 

Relevant in that you have to purchase it in order to get AI frieght layers on certain U.S. routes.

 

I still have this route from TSW 2020. It is very unfortunate that all the recent American routes have been reduced to the same type of services for traveling from point A to point B. There is a great lack of well-developed services such as SPG and CRR

 

I still play SPG fairly often. It's still one of the best routes and, in my view, the best American freight route in the game.

It runs fine for me on TSW5.

 

Agreed. I’m tired of complaining about it. It is what it is at this point. We’re lucky to get any U.S content at this point.

 

Fine if that's how you feel. As for me, I will continue to complain about the lack of North American content, particularly heavy freight, because I firmly believe that DTG could build such routes and trains using the resources available, including their back catalog.

They just need the will to do it.

 

And to fix the issue we have with the back catalogue. The back catalogue sounds, physics and over all bugs are why we stopped buying it.

Read every thread from a US Frieght route and its just full of complaints the gameplay is not up to par for US frieght.

I think its because of most US frieght fans want the same gameplay aspects as Run 8.

And TSW will never get as detailed as Run 8 is for the driving experience. Thats Run 8's niche.

So until they can get accurate sounds, better physics ( you can't move up grade in snowy or rainy weather at all. Banking comms that actually work, so your not underpowered) and an overall better game play experience with multiple local deliveries, shunting and hump yards with the long distance runs they usually do most.

And Matt has said previously that they can't do hump yards so....it won't sell and just get the usual complaints.

So if you enjoy US frieght might as well pick up Run 8 because you'll be waiting a long time for any progress in TSW.

 

With all due respect that's " DTG- Speak ". Sorry but I simply don't accept it. If DTG don't want to do US freight, they should come right out and say so. If they do, I will take my ball and go home and you'll never hear from me again.

 

I guess your taking your ball and going home, or taking a long break, they have said it before on the forums and such. And Matt even reiterated it on the Charity stream.

Very unlikely another route will come out, even though Matt loves US frieght, unless they can get proper recordings, and if he feels it can be done right. Until then he won't release another one.

And if a route does come out don't expect it any time soon.

Those are the words right out of the EP's mouth.

But of course you won't believe them. Just like steam. Last US freight route was TSW3 with the release routes. Nothing in over 2 years so at this point you are..



Unless a 3rd party jumps in until then I just got Run 8 a month ago so that will be my go to for US freight.

 

I mean, we know HIS has a plan for a route after the ATSF pack is released, that is known, but we don't know how long that will be, and we don't know if their quality will be up to par for what the community wants.

 

IIRC, he mentioned as part of this that the expressed preference of the people was for accurate sounds over substitution.

DTG's in-house priorities don't necessarily affect third parties though, do they? If an outside developer wants to do a U.S. freight route, does one with cut corners where needed, and it's accepted by the community, maybe that would change things.

 

Sand Patch could be extended all the way to the logical end point at Connellsville, Pa. But it would mean more hours of 35 Mph trundling along a river with an almost unpronounceable name with hardly any local activity? And with the demise of USA as an industrial superpower, there will be few trains serving the steel industry past Connellsville to Pittsburgh.

 

I still don't believe/understand them on the sounds excuse- plenty of UK and DE content comes out with questionable sounds or at least sounds that aren't 100% accurate and somehow that hasn't brought the whole franchise grinding to a halt.

I truly believe Matt took some loud forum voices on that subject wayyy to much to heart.

Or they just simply aren't interested in making US Freight anymore, and/or capable of investing into improvements on the gameplay side of things.

If so i wish they would say as much instead of playing this, "if only the community wasn't so harsh" card.

Especially since community reaction doesn't seem to have any affect on projects they're really passionate about.

 

Agree. While I can be quite vocal about UK traction sounds where there is significant and noticeable differences even with slightly different prime movers from the same manufacturer (e.g. Sulzer), to me a GM sounds like a GM. Well I can probably discern the difference between a 567 and 645 but aliasing ought to be good enough. I can see there might be issues with GE traction particularly older units or Alco's, but that hasn't stopped TSC getting some good sounding stuff.

 

At this point, the rolling stock and locomotives are more relevant than the route itself. Most of the stock subs into other North American routes.

 

And that is exaclty what I think they are waiting for. Which is a real shame.

 

Agree with all of that 100%. This excuse about not being able to meet the standards of US players is ironic considering the reaction to WCMLS from UK customers. DTG doesn't seem to care enough about quality to stop them releasing routes like that one.

As I've said many times this excuse is simply a way of avoiding the truth: DTG no longer has any interest in US freight. We'll be on the East Coast /West Coast commuter treadmill for the foreseeable future, if we even get that much.

I should add that any criticism I make about DTG is aimed at management, not the guys and gals on the coalface.

 

Wonder if Focus saw how little US freight sells to the general audience and decided to tell DTG to not focus on it for US content, usually they dont get alot of love in the forum polls.

Remember, while Clinchfield was one of the most interesting US freight route back on TSW2, it was the worst selling DLC at the time.

It's weird, the ES44C4 was probably one of the best sounding US freight locomotives at the time, then DTG decided to not do any more GEVOs.

 

A major reason for that is, once again, DTG left the route unfinished by forgetting to include the banking com feature, which made a good many scenarios and services very difficult if not impossible to complete.

A patch soon after release was promised but never appeared.

 

I still play it. However, like Oakville a few of the runs have inconveniences. Red lights that won't go away for example, or the weak horns. But still inconvenient, but unplayable (you just can't complete a few of the services for credit) The route itself is still beautiful and the rolling stock still decent. Even the lighting isn't bad (unlike say Tees Valley or Clinchfield) I'd put it up against even newer routes. Any rework of it for the few minor things would have to involve a new scenario pack or loco because I don't expect TSW to put the time into refreshing it for nothing. That's just not fair to the people doing the work.
Some of the things are core things like slightly floaty cars, but I can life with them. It's not as bad as the newer routes like San Bernadino with cars that turn into submarines (go under ground) or drive right through trains at street level crossings. SPG is actually still good and I play it off and on.

 

Sherman didn't seem to do well for that matter either, that ranked second to last in those lists, and notably got massive 80 something percent discounts only a month or so after release. I speculate that both that and Clinchfield bombing in such short periods of time are probably why DTG are hesitant about doing more freight content.

You know what else? The tutorial rather notoriously was broken at launch, DTG actually needed to use the loading screen to show the steps to work around said issue until they could complete a fix for it. Like honestly, I can't imagine putting in a better anti-advert than "Sorry lads, tutorial's broken, here's the work around" on everyone's loading screen.

Can't forget about the horns as well, DTG said that they'd get new audio files as a part of a update, also didn't happen. Add on top of that some of the services being particularly prone to getting stuck due to signaling issues, and some of the stop points being awkwardly close to the signal's. As much as I like the route it's probably the route that has given me the most trouble over the years in terms of having services not end in completion for one reason or another. And that says something considering that it has one of the smallest selections of services of any route in the TSW series.

 

That’s not true as I recall. It took a long time (more than a year, I think) but the promised new horn did come.

 

Sherman bombed partly because, on release, it had been poorly optimised with hi poly grass placed out to god knows how far from the lineside. It was a stutter fest long before DTG borked the core and made every route a stutter fest. Despite the would be iconic setting, in reality it was quite a boring run through the American equivalent of Rannoch Moor up the hill and down the other side. The one thing which might have spiced things up was if DTG had emulated TSC and made a GTEL as a subsidiary DLC and a nice driving challenge.

And it’s not just in TSW. I bought Sherman for TSC back in the day and even with the GTEL scenarios, I’ve probably played Wasatch and Shasta more.

 

I don't think it would of fully helped, especially if you looked at the ATSF F7 for Cajon Pass, as anachronistic DLC usually gets criticized by the hard core US fanbase (Something some people are already having problems with for the upcoming ATSF pack on modern Cajon).

Now if DTG somehow went all out and somehow made a decent backdated Sherman Hill featuring a GTEL, Big Boy, and period accurate stock, then maybe it would of been more exciting......

But I dont think DTG's development cycle could support that, even if steam was in working condition.

 

I don't see them ever redoing an entire route that already exists and sold badly just to put in stock they don't plan on supporting.
Stick with TSC.

 

I meant if the did THAT at the get go, not now....

 

Sherman Hill would have been much more interesting in terms of gameplay if DTG had gone that little bit further and included the Harriman Cutoff ( aka Track 3 ).
Its omission left the route unfinished, as has happened so often in the game.

 

If we go back to Sand ath Grade, I think. that the route was done by other people and under a different company policy. The task was to immerse the player in the world of American freight transportation, with many nuances. Yes, the execution is far from perfect and not fully developed when compared with the same Run 8, but in general the concept was interesting precisely because you could feel like not just a locomotive driver and feel the spirit of heavy freight transportation. I believe that American passenger routes will never become as attractive as the UK and GE routes, with the exception of suburban transportation, which has potential, but it has not been realized, due to poor infrastructure development or in simple words, the routes are too pale. They do not feel the flavor of the country and the railway structure. European routes are made with great enthusiasm and attention to detail. The only thing that we can find unique on the North American continent is freight transportation, as we will not find anywhere else on such a scale. I think many of us would agree that it would be fascinating to manage freight trains on the route, at different stages of the cycle, such as sorting wagons, assembling trains, transporting trains to a transshipment point, and then returning with another train to the fleet and further disbanding. A similar approach could be seen on the SPG and CLL routes. I would like the developers to listen more to the opinion of the community, because the project lives on it in the long run. I understand that the market dictates the rules, but profits should not be at the forefront. After all, we used to purchase routes in TSW versions 2,3,4, and many still love some of them, despite a lot of bugs that have not been fixed. It would be very good form on the part of the developer to bring outdated routes to mind, and undoubtedly it would find a positive response from the community. After all, this is exactly the kind of conscientious approach that we all expect from him.

 

Well.. definitively this route was done by other people and other technologies we have today.
Do to... it was the first route of TSW!

Which was strange for me, being DTG an UK company.

May be CSX trust on them more, than an UK train one?...

If you pay attention to the locomotives they have more details than current models.
For example... the dispatcher audios, the yellow reflective at the side of the frame of the locomotive, properly reflects, mirrors too and other details I mentioned on previous years.

 

As to the original question about this post...
In my case of course I usually play mostly the latest routes I purchased.
But I normally drives on all of them.
Mostly the German and UK ones.

For example yesterday I drove the Northern Trans-Penine again!
Or using the really great tool of TSW... Free Roam, you have lot of opportunities to do different things!

My last 2 cases:

> Peninsula Corridor: instead of drive the F40PH and passenger cars...I left that train goes by, and behind it, I drove an SD70-ACE with tank cars. Then I experience lot of yellows and reds!.

> GWE route: Select the Diesel commuter, and I drove a DB BR 402 with UK freight cars.
Similar entertaining experience

 

DTG never say they are not doing things... they stay silent. Remember how they just stopped doing in house content for Train Sim Classic 2 years ago and never made statement about it up until this day? They just abandoned a whole game without a single word. You guys can call yourself lucky for getting them to admit, that they are doing no more Steam for TSW.

 

There's not many freight only lines in the UK of descent enough length to make a separate route out of. Most of them are short branch lines.