Who knows. They tried a route which internally at least, was a shitstorm. Never say never, but I wouldn’t put money on them trying it again soon. As for rolling stock we’ll have to see how the 90 goes for them. It’ll be interesting to see the pricing for it, ATS isn’t exactly known for cheap stock - their TSC stock packs go for as high as £40. If they can deliver genuinely good & genuinely different stock, I won’t mind higher pricing, but if they go the route of the current UK devs for TSW & stick to releasing the same family of trains over & over, they won’t get my money & I don’t see them sticking with TSW unless they get a good return from it.
I remember I was scrolling through a past stream of Alan's in 2025 (pretty sure the stream itself occurred a few weeks after MAC released), and he was talking about exploring paid upgrades to routes. I'd assume it would basically be the same as what Liam did to GWE. He didn't confirm it, just floated around the idea. Loco DLCs seem pretty viable as they have a good modeller on speed dial (Imbue) and I know Alan himself has good relations with Richard from AP (good source of audio potentially), so along with the rest of the development team they could churn out a few high quality loco DLCs. I don't see ATS ever revisiting full on route building with the whole MAC fiasco. I'd be glady surprised if I'm wrong though.
There was mention in one of the early Class 90 blurbs about "this first DLC will focus of freight operations" or something to that effect. I wonder if ATS might be getting a passenger DLC for the 90 (or even a 91 DLC). There might be something in the Class 156 layer on MAC and we could see it or a 331
I'm pretty sure I read that there will be a second Class 90 pack for passenger services. However, aside from railtours, a passenger set with a DVT doesn't have an era-specific home on any TSW routes. So maybe there's either another WCML DLC on the way, this time for the Intercity or early Virgin Trains era or another line that had passenger services hauled by Class 90s/DVTs. I can only think of one non-WCML route that kept a fleet of 90s for passengers though.
It’s a shame because the quality of the route was exceptionally high, but was too dam short!. I’d love them to have a crack at a class 37 as that would be viable across multiple routes and eras. It’s long overdue a rework along with many of the UK diesels.
They need to get that hole between Alderley Edge and Crewe filled! It's even worst now we have routes from Crewe all the way to Euston (once TV is released). Class 90 with DVT and 1990s based timetables for the WCML JT routes?
Their Manchester route is definitely one of the best quality routes. I just find it unfulfilling though. I would love to see them extend it to Crewe. I fear they might not build any more routes, I feel that ATS is still very TSC centric and I think that is by far their favourite platform. Maybe we might see more locos. A Intercity Swallow pack for Shap would work.
Agreed, definitely one of my favourite routes, the detail is excellent. Just wish they'd fix those few dodgy signals though, spoils it a bit for me. Extension to Crewe would be perfect.
The launch issue was separate to the route building & I don’t think that be flatly blamed on DTG, even within the launch there were several separate issues which had nothing to do with the core asset problem.
Well, it was their first route. And technically not even their’s - it was in far worse of a state when they first received it (Alan has explained this many times on stream).
Of course, which is why I didn’t assign any blame in my comment, just that it wasn’t a smooth experience & I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t see a new route from them anytime soon.
When i don’t know, but I’m fairly sure Alan has said they are working on one - might be wrong though. I guess the 90 is the main focus right now
I don’t watch any ATS streams so have no idea what they talk about or what they have said about their plans for TSW stuff. I’d like to see more routes from them if they can release high quality content. MAC is a lovely route and apart from its cut down length and the dodgy junction where all the passengers spill their beer/coffee/cola it’s well made.
