Dtg Negativity

Being relatively new to TSW 2020 and DTG, it is disheartening to see so much negativity about DTG and the communities view that not a lot of effort is being put in to the games?

Has this always been the case? Or, is it something that started happening from a specific point in time?

Why do you think DTG is not listening to its fans about features and bugs? The fans are the people DTG serve and if DTG can’t be bothered listening does it have a future?

From a personal level and looking at this from the perspective of my job (I investigate energy complaints where a consumer and supplier cannot agree a resolution in order to make a fair and impartial decision), the single biggest breakdown of a consumer/business relationship is a clear lack of communication and a breakdown in quality, reliable service.

Now energy suppliers are not train simulator developers by any stretch of the imagination, but the same principals exist. Treat your consumers as a number, rather than engaging with them and working to deliver what they want and need and things start to go badly wrong. Plenty of energy suppliers have gone bust as consumers turned their backs on them.

Some of the comments I’m seeing in the forums, particularly around bugs, lack
of quality content, people feeling ripped off etc are proving that a toxic mess is brewing within the fan base. You could argue the loyaler fans are always the more vocal - so I think it’s important that DTG really does double down on listening to its fans and to show that they care about the content they are producing and making their fans happy to spend lots of money.

I hope DTG read this and take the points I’m making onboard. I know they say they want to work closer with the fans/community, but they really need to prove this. And maybe quite quickly - especially seeing as TSW2 is due soon and it’s causing quite a bit of upset in the community.

 

I

I have only been on this forum for 2 months & it's been very toxic because of TSW2.They use the forums to annoy the people that love the game calling them fanboy's & DTG protecters.Some of the people that do this only use the forums to look at threads that harass DTG & only talk trash about them.DTG does make mistakes but only the people that are die hard fans of TS only care about the little glitches & expect everything to be free.

 

The expecting everything to be free business is really bizarre.

 

Only free things in games are horrible

 

You make some very good points and you appear to have a very good insight into how many people are currently feeling.

There are some that may have expectations but I think the majority of those who have voiced their disappointment with the current situation would have been more than happy to pay for new routes and even the new game engine itself, if their current DLC's had been compatible.

I will now get my popcorn, sit back, watch and wait for the usual suspects to arrive, and begin accusing anyone who dare have a different opinion to them, question or disagree with anything DTG says or announces, of being toxic, talking trash or harassing them.

 

I really liked your whole post, but I thought I would just extract the above bit and say that I think that the tension had built up a long time before TSW 2 was announced. The shocker with TSW 2 (for many), is that it represents even more bad news. It doesn't have to, but it does.

DTG have an opportunity to start from a clean slate, and be transparent. But as we have seen in the last few days, even the freshest breath of fresh air soon turns stale, and begins to conform with the traditional DTG approach of vague deflection and bluster, followed by smoke and mirrors and then a tsunami of hype. They are not even prepared to explicitly state whether or not they will fix existing bugs in TSW 2020.

After a while, people just get sick of it. But they still love trains, so many will continue to buy DTG's stuff.

 

[removed by Protagonist - despite warnings, user has failed to curb their use of inflammatory language]

 

DTG to be honest has dug there own grave I enjoy TSW but DTG is just digging there own grave because the editor & many other of the features.Also DTG protagonist has free of speech so I don't think he will delete the post.

 

As on today -
Train Sim World - ABANDONED WITH BUGS
Fishing Sim World - ABANDONED WITH BUGS
Euro Fishing - ABANDONED WITH BUGS
Flight Sim World - ABANDONED WITH BUGS

New games -
The Catch - replace fishing sim world

Train Sim World 2 - replace Train Sim World


This company is joke

 

Certainly appears to be a pattern developing!

 

if ("make a game") then
elseif ("make promises")
else ("if fails, make a new game")
end

Typical DTG Loop

 

It does seem to be a worrying trend.

 

The Real DTG
In kind of Python
_________________________________________
DTG.py

Import DTG
DTG.init()
money=1000000
reputation=100

def file_bankruptcy():
DTG.end()
file=DTG.py
file.close()

def new_game():
#make game
money---=$€£
#convince customers
DTG.game.release()
money+=$€£
game = True

While game = True:
DTG.game.DLC.release()
money+=$€£
#Bugs reportet
#Ignore reportet bugs
#Community getting angry
community angry = True
IF community angry = True:
reputation-=2
pass
ELIF money < 0:
game = False
new_game()
ELIF money AND reputation < 0:
file_bankruptcy()

#run
new_game()
_________________________________________
I've tried keeping it simple but I think that's a good example code. Of course there are more factors like loans, third parties, employees who love working for DTG putting in their effort and ehm the management... yes.

 

I don't expect TSW to be free, indeed I know it isn't free because I paid for it a few months ago, but neither did I expect to asked to pay for it twice or presumably more. Yeah- you know we've been promising steam loco's in TSW since day one? Well they're coming... in TSW3. Multiplayer? Guess what! That is what has my back up and I said so fairly calmly and rationally I hope and without presuming to speak for anyone other than myself though it seems I'm not alone.

Certainly (again speaking only for myself though I doubt I'm alone in this) the way I budget there's a certain amount of money I spend on train simulation so if I get TSW2 that would be money that won't be spent on routes and other DLC- no extra income for Dovetail. Others will buy TSW2 for the routes but would have done that if it was released as TSW2021- again no gain. Some people will buy everything in sight but enough to off-set the ill will and lost income from users who don't want to be caught out again?

 

If you could boil down all the complaints about DTG to a single phrase, it would be "over-promising and under-delivering".

And there's some truth in that. The marketing copy is always something like "Take part in hundreds of fun activities on and around the railway!" and the corresponding reality is "Put up posters". Or "Drive hundreds of fascinating and varied services across a realistic rail network", and the reality is "Drive either a stopping or a non-stop service from Paddington to Reading and back."

The under-delivery also extends to bugs. Every DLC has hundreds of bugs, most trivial, but many serious, and while occasionally some are fixed, perhaps months after release, the general attitude that comes across is something like "Well, we've got your money. What would be the incentive for us to fix bugs?"

That said, the criticism of DTG in the forums is often overblown, and weakens its own case by being too bombastic. Some railfans also have a slightly unrealistic idea of what's possible or practical in computer simulations. ("My immersive experience was RUINED by the fact that passengers didn't have realistic, opening luggage. Also, I want a 300-mile fully-detailed route for £11.99, and I want it this week.")

So what's the explanation? Are DTG simply evil? No doubt. Every morning MattP wakes up, twirls his moustache, and laughs maniacally to himself as he decides how best to criminally defraud stout-hearted railfans that particular day.

But, thinking into a bit more deeply, we might wonder how it is that DTG and TSW exist at all. It's fair to say that train simulation is a tiny market. It's a niche of a niche. I don't often play flight simulators, but I know they exist. I never even knew train simulation was a thing until I saw a preview of TSW. So how is it possible that such a product is commercially viable at all? It's hard enough to make money selling even mass-market games, unless you have colossal resources to put into them.

Without having seen the numbers, my best guess would be that TSW's business is desperately marginal. It may quite well be that from month to month, the options are along the lines of:

1. Fix bugs in existing DLCs, go out of business.
2. Release new DLC, keep the lights on for another month.

I don't think anyone's rolling around in piles of cash; it's highly likely that everyone working at DTG could earn better money elsewhere, developing new levels for Candy Crush, or whatever, but chooses to work on something they're passionate about instead.

I imagine there are tremendous pressures within the company to focus on revenue-generating activities, and equally strong pushback from those who want to put out more reliable, higher-quality products, with more variety, scope, and detail. That's quite normal in any business, and that argument goes back and forth all the time. What we see as consumers is the compromise result; it's not as good as some in the company would have wished, and it doesn't make as much money as others would have liked. But we have something. That's a great deal preferable to nothing.

 

You have hit the nail squarely on the head!

The thing is how they choose to move forward with this but having chosen a third party engine, like Unreal, it appears to me that DTG have taken themselves down a path which is one way only and there's no turning back. So for them to continue making TSW compatible with the most current UE, I think there will be repeats of what we are seeing now every couple of years.

 

Is this a technical report?

 

It's not a classic technical report. But i've tried keeping it kind of techy as it's there. Besides with the new forum structure it's not really easy where to post stuff. So yea it kind of fits.

 

Wow, thumbs-up from me on this post. The phrase ‘voice of reason’ comes to mind here- acknowledging some of DTG’s shortcomings, but also acknowledging some of the forces at work inside the company that might be contributing to some of the train sim issues we have to deal with. That said, I hope we all see significant improvements in the coming Train Sim World 2 product vs, what we’ve had to live with in TSW 2020. I remain hopeful... and hope they do a much better job this time with the new features they’ve promised, as well as delivering a cleaner, as bug-free as possible product.

Very insightful post... thank you for speaking for me and I’m sure for a lot of other folks in these forums.

 

It depends how long the list of excuses grows. Most people (I suspect) would not want it to slide into....

1a. Fix bugs in existing DLCs, go out of business.
1b. Test for bugs in new DLCs, go out of business.
1c. Knock up a manual for new DLCs, go out of business.
1d. Make loco DLCs like the Class 52 work on more than one 25mph route, go out of business.
1e. Make new DLC with slightly more than nearly zero content, go out of business.

2. Release new untested, empty, broken, featureless, undocumented DLC.......... keep the lights on for another month.

 

The people themselves at DTG are fine and care about the products (Sam and Matt). But the effort and care often doesn't show through such as the M3, Class 20, LIRR HRR, GWE, Class 166, Class 43 and RSN. Your issue is valid and is bought up often will it change................ ............no.

 

They could have released the three new routes on TSW for a total of $90. Yet we are getting an updated version of the game engine, with adhesion physics and other upgrades. Scenario editor and livery editor and those three routes for $30 and a better foundation to build future dlc on. I can go play TSW and enjoy the routes I own now, things like getting stuck at a red light seem to always get fixed. If a bug isn’t constantly causing my game to crash or extremely hindering my experience then I technically have no right to complain. Am I going to get upset because a bridge is to low for the 204 and clips when I drive by, no I am not because it’s really something small that doesn’t impact by game what so ever. I know what I’m getting when paying $30 for a route on TSW and it’s always delivered what I expected. Your TSW library isn’t being replaced even if it isn’t in TSW2.

 

The biggest thing working against all of us and for dtg is no real competition for them,leaving all of us stuck with whatever they decide to release to sell us,broken or bugged,as long as we foolishly still buy it.dtg will keep pumping it out.

 

Couldn't agree more. The absence of competition lowers the need for good products, which TSW is not. Still enjoyable? Yes.

 

To be fair to DTG, it does seem to still be fixing issues with TSW 2020 and is trying to commit to be being more open.

 

On the other hand, the bug fix was issued by Rivet, but DTG apparently sat on it for a while. And as for being more open, they are actually telling us less because they are only answering yes to stuff already announced and no to everything else.

 

It's true there was considerable lag from Rivet giving DTG the patch and it becoming available. I suspect the delay was because the console platforms don't make it easy to push out patches, unless you're one of their exclusive developer stables. A patch goes into their queue for approval. I noticed that when DTG released the PC patch the PS4 users got it within the same 24 hour period. If DTG wanted the patch to be available for all users across all platforms at the same time, that might explain it.

 

DTG have the potential and with TSW they have improved the simulator environment from "TS2020 Classic" also with more accurate scenery. It has a fantastic future but for some reason operational accuracy has taken a dive since TS2020.

Lets take British Railways (Not the company, but railway operations of this country) NTP/TVL/GWR where is the guard? You drive the train the guard is responsible for the doors (lights in the passenger area). If you can have an AI guard in TS2020 why not in TSW? This is also a missed opportunity in TSW to be the Guard/ Ticket Inspector. (Look at OMSI2 and how the driver collects fares) In our case the Guard/Ticket inspector would do the same.

Talking to the signaler. On the NTP and TVL routes, if you need to contact the signalman you stop at the signal and use the phone. (The dialogue could be done in the way it is on FSX when talking to the control tower). In the GWR and ECW routes via the GSMR system. However we must hit TAB and hit a button.

When you take over a service from another driver he or she will advice you of the load and any issues (Again this could be done via a dialogue box similar to FSX (Flight Sim X). Also when coupling to a train you would walk around making sure every vehicle was coupled correctly and all handbrakes released and a tail lamp on the rear where appropriate.

I could go on. And some may think this is going too far but, is the simulator not supposed to be educational?

As for "Customer Service", I get their side they have people asking all the time for this and that! and to that person its valid, and a perspective needs to be taken on what is beneficial for the platform as a whole and someones personal unique wants Like a particular route or locomotive etc. Unfortunately DTG has a history of ignoring all of its customers and having zero empathy "What they have done is epic, and anyone that criticizes are wrong".

They ask for our views and in some cases while not responding to us take them onboard

They have a good product (subject to improvement) but rubbish Customer service.

 

There is another way to look at it...

There are lets say 20-30 vocal members of this board, of which 3 or 4 are the most critical of everything, yet still pay to play the game. There are 1 or 2 who are critical and rude at everyone else's thoughts of the game.

DGT wont be making the game for the 20 loud ones, it will be making it for (lets hope for the financials) the thousands who buy it and play it happily or unhappily without coming on here and shouting on the pages here?

They will be listening to the 20, and bringing updates and fixes along the way, that will assist the silent majority in their game play.

All I hope for is that with this new wheel slippage difficulty thing that the timetable allows us to creep out of stations! I can envisage me being late and missing the stopping points as I cant get it going or stopping...hey ho...

Dave

 

The idea that if dtg doesn't have time to do it right before release or fix after release because they would go out of business,means they might as well just go out of business because this is a very stupid way to run a business,why would anyone defend this kind of system,we here would gladly spend are cash on a job well done either before or after release.Think of all the hours and days and weeks it took you to earn the money you spent on train sim world content,if only dtg cared about there work as much as you did taking some of your hard earned cash to spend on it.

 

Sorry, but I disagree.

If it was left to the silent majority, there would have been no delay and no using "preserved collection" in the scenario planner, DTG would have just gone ahead with releasing it as per their original intentions. At the time of the original announcement, all the older DLC's were incompatible with the new version. All of a sudden it's no longer incompatible it's just taking a couple more weeks work.

I won't say it's only because people complained, but the fact that so many of the community weren't happy will have had some bearing on the decision to delay and the extra features announced for older DLC's.

 

This is the problem with message boards...I did say "They will be listening to the 20, and bringing updates and fixes along the way, that will assist the silent majority in their game play."

The complainers have a job to highlight issues. That is not a problem. All I was trying state is the game is built for the silent majority.

D

 

Apologies, I read it as there are 20 vocal members only 3 or 4 were critical.

 

I feel the same way too. I would think DTG would have started off new with TSW 2 but what I'm currently seeing is glorified features from TS classic. My only main issue with DTG is some of their past TSW content has been pretty controversial within the community. TSW 2 could be the redemption that DTG needs to regain their trust and improve the overall environment of the community. But like many do say only time will tell. I love trains so it's pretty clear why I would buy TSW or TS classic I really don't mind the prices I just buy the routes/trains to drive trains it's a hobby that I'm guessing all of you have. But I don't buy it to immerse myself in the sim as it currently stands. Nevertheless I am happy DTG has not made any pay to win or other scummy business actions and I praise them for it.

That paragraph might have sounded negative but I just want to show how I feel of DTG. But other than that, I am looking forward for TSW 2 and I am a little excited.

 

For a small company I find them great. Plenty of other small companies out there which make shocking games and don't listen to any customers.

 

TSW2 is giving us many of the things we wanted in TSW, such as variable adhesion, better clouds, longer trains, creating scenarios, doing repaints, platform screens, and more information about your train, yet people are still unhappy. I don't get it.

 

Dont get me wrong, DTG are supplying a product that is overall good and I thank them for it. The problem is they release a new addon (fair enough, they are a business and need to make money)but they seem to fall down when addressing bugs/faults, and the way they deal with their customers in after sales.

You cant ever release a piece of software bug free as something will always crop up that beta testers missed or never came across DTG can not be blamed for this unless there is clear evidence they do not carryout rigorous testing. (Unless someone from DTG comes forward and says "Yeah we dont care and just release a product without proper testing" then we must assume they are doing their job.)

Unfortunately on the face of it you could jump to and lot do that DTG doesn't care about its customer base. I dont think this is the case, or hope not. But from day one it comes across that way, due to lack of communication with their customers when it comes to issues. Its not often you see a DTG rep say "Thank you for letting us know about this we will look into that and keep you updated".

If you report an issued they must take it onboard i'm sure, but why not tell us they have and if they cant fix it easy why not? Be open and honest and I think most of the negativity would disappear. Its all about communication.

They need to take a real look at their Customer Service and After Sales approach. which to me is the crux of the matter.

 

I believe it was because most of this was promised with the original launch of TSW back in 1800 and frozen stiff.

 

I think it's the part were you have to pay $30 for a new game with new features & routes like the horror

 

I think there are a small minority who want to keep the argument going. I think most have moved on now and will look to the future.

It comes down to the basic fact, as ever, it is your money and if you don't like what is on offer no-one is forcing you to buy into it.

 

To be honest, I've not seen many complaints recently about TSW2 as a whole. I think most agree that £25 is good value for three new routes. Obviously at first there was a lot of disappointment in the preserved content being mothballed as opposed to preserved, but now that they've changed their plans this is no longer an upset. (Although I feel slightly sorry for anyone that actually likes NEC, as they'll have to to have two games installed if they want to continue playing).

Only quoted the last sentence of your post to save this being an essay, however you've hit the nail on the head. There would be so much less complaints if the information flow was better. Things like:

- Announcing preorder and discount for PC players, but leaving Console players in the dark. Then using a stream (not even a TSW2 stream) to mention there won't be preorder for console. This sort of information should be in a news article, or on the forum in the announcement section.

- Numerous bugs that are never acknowledged or fixed. Sometimes it isn't possible to fix bugs within the limitation of the game. I understand this, but threads go ignored. The memory dumps on NTP is my main nag. For some console players, this route is totally unplayable, as the game will crash at Miles Platting. This has never been fixed, and no public statement for this either. People (like me) have ended up with £35 of unusable DLC (the route and heavy freight pack). That's not a small amount of money...

- The fire and forget approach to DLC release. DLC is released and the bugs never fixed. The M3 and Class 20 are unlikely to see an update, and both have bugs. The 31 has an unplayable scenario as a result of the class 20 being released, and this is sadly also unlikely to be fixed. I've never complained about the price of TSW DLC, but I do resent paying so much for a product that has zero support and after sales.

- Lack of manuals. TSW is billed as a simulation game with advanced features. Advanced features require documentation. (This is especially true when the tutorial mentions a manual, but there isn't one - class 20 I'm looking at you).

If DTG can fix the communication issues (and they have been getting better, but there's still a long way to go), then this will do a great deal to calm the community and reduce the moaning.

 

The 33 doesn't have a manual either, or does it?

 

The cashflow situation probably is like that.

I can't help but feel that the existing TS was always the solution to the cash problem. There is literally a metric cluck-ton of content already available.

If DTG did for TS, what Lockheed Martin did for Flight Simulator, then all of that content would suddenly become gold to cash in.

All of those tired TS assets could be replaced with better assets as a blanket swoop change across all routes.

This is the first time I haven't bought a new product from DTG. I feel like I made the right move, looking at the technical reports. I'd hate to be Matt P around about now, firefighting isn't a pleasant experience after a major release. 16-20 hour days for a while to come (possibly).

I've set up a few successful businesses from _scratch_ since my 20's. Always under promise, always over deliver. Never the other way.

Never release software that isn't tested to absolute destruction. Saving a few pounds on resources at a Q&A level, only leads to spending thousands on dev time firefighting after the fact. No dev likes to firefight.

So, how do you rake the money in? Give the customer _what they want_ and loads of extras besides. Don't tell the customer about the extras. A little surprise adds some magic to things and will blow people away.

Don't try feeding the customer Chum over and over and over again. They want their Krabby Patties

A little more to add to this after more thought:

TS deserves those thousands of hours of playtime because the experience is so deep and as engaging as you want it to be. If it were a relationship, it would be a marriage.

TSW, well, Amber Heard sure is a looker, but....

 

And one important aspect of that is putting the software in front of users, not just developers. Developers know how to use it, because they wrote it. That doesn't mean users will know. There are lots of ways for software that nominally works to be confusing, complicated, counter-intuitive, frustrating, and painful to operate.

This was most clearly illustrated last night, watching Sam struggle to work the Scenario Designer on a stream. It was hard to pick the start and end points for services, because the map doesn't show the station names. It was hard to pick the loco, because there are no loco pictures or names, just code numbers (quick, which one is the Baby Bullet?)

Having selected a loco, it was easy to miss selecting a specific consist from the sub-menu for that loco. If you don't select one, the game lets you save the service and then ignores it completely—because there's no consist selected. Even when there's only one consist available, it's not auto-selected for you. Having accidentally created a service that won't do anything, it was then hard to edit it (is it 'Edit Details' or 'Edit Timetable'?).

Instead of being able to independently edit the start/end points, the loco/consist, and the stops, you have to go through each screen in sequence, like one of those mad web forms for car insurance; one mistake and you've to go through all the paperwork again. It took Sam a full 30 minutes to set up six AI trains and his own end-to-end run on East Coastway; hardly the most complicated of routes.

Even then, half those AI services didn't work, because he had set the start times to before the player train start time, so they didn't activate at all, and just sat glumly idle in their stations. Since the simulation starts at the start time of the player train, this makes sense, but why does the game let you pick start times that result in the services not working?

Now, Sam's superhero name isn't 'Colonel Failure' for nothing, but he's not a klutz by any means (he just plays one on YouTube). He's no dumber than the average TSW player, so why did he have so much trouble with this? Partly because he hadn't used the Scenario Designer prior to launch, which seems odd for DTG's community manager, but here's the thing: if he'd had that 30 minutes of video-recorded interaction with the game before launch, and the devs had seen it, I'm pretty sure they would have been scrambling to fix the grossest of those UX landmines awaiting the new player, as I dare say they are now. Why didn't that happen, then?

 

It was an interesting watch last night (and on the other streams). Stumbling over bugs "live" for all to see. The ghost SPAD at Lewes, not being able to use a particular name in the scenario designer, struggling to know what and where things were. And this is someone that works for DTG and is very close to TSW2. How these things have not been picked up prior to launch is beyond me.

Having said that, it does look good and I'm tempted to buy it for some strange reason!

 

It is rather bizarre. A lot of the bugs I've identified took less than a hour of playing, so I can't understand how they wouldn't be noticed and fixed. The Scenario planner had loads of potential, but had ended up being a let down.

 

Others have said it before, the issue appears to be that the testers are too closely involved with the development and know how it's been developed to play. When the general public get their hands on it and do stuff the developers never imagined, it soon shows up any shortfalls.

 

Just realised I must have been caught out by the ghost SPAD while driving the Class 66 aggregate train approaching Lewes.

Couldn’t believe yesterday that I had somehow missed the yellows and the red after I was suddenly evicted from the game in disgrace.

 

Another 'inadvertently leaked user experience testing session':



It's particularly amusing that, even though you're forced (for no particularly apparent reason) to supply a name for your service, the profanity filter (for which there's no particularly apparent reason either) won't accept names containing the words "Passenger" or "Class", both of which seem quite likely choices. Can we expect to see locos renamed in the game to things like "Clbottom 377", or brakes to be switchable between freight mode and 'pbumenger' mode?

As Alan Thomson remarked on his own stream, it seems quite unbelievable that things like this weren't spotted and reported by the 25-strong QA team, or the 100-strong beta group. The only possible conclusion, therefore, is that there simply wasn't enough time to fix them before the much-trailed launch date. But why do QA and beta testing in the first place if you're not going to give yourself enough time to fix the bugs they find?

DTG's brand had, and has, two very serious problems, which pose a threat to the commercial survival of the business:

1. Poor communication (chiefly, as I mentioned before, overpromising and underdelivering)
2. Releasing stuff with bad bugs, and only fixing them much later or not at all

They have made a very promising start, thanks to Sam, on addressing the first issue. The release of TSW2 seems to show that little progress has been made so far on the second issue. What a shame for the developers, who, as Adam pointed out on another recent stream, put their hearts and souls into this game, and are understandably very upset when they're not able to prevent bugs slipping through to release. This is a failure of management, not engineering. I look forward to seeing the people responsible for those decisions appear on a live stream soon to explain them.

 

I do not hate DTG, however I feel like they make wonderful things, but they always seem to cut corners and deliver imperfect products, this, of course is reasonable due to the low price point. 30€ per route and 15€ per loco is perfectly reasonable for what we are getting.

Although I would much rather pay a premium to have better quality, for example:
Bakerloo working platform displays, more passengers, etc...

Or generally have a more immersive experience, for example on the Bakerloo there are way less trains than what there are in real life and to give you a sense of following a train ahead they envisaged this ridiculous system of red signals that clear AFTER you close the doors.

All of these little details and imperfections add up to somewhat spoil the whole experience, and I feel like, at least for the signals it couldn't have been that hard to tie them to the open door trigger + 30s timer for example.

[The livery editor, without mirroring and being able to save our own colours? Really?]
Wrong: using the projection mechanic this issue does no longer exist.

I understand many see TSW as a game not a Simulator, and frankly, it is, but if DTG spent maybe 1 or 2 weeks and charged a little premium we would get not only an accessible and easy game for beginners but a realistic experience for the more experienced guys... just the wasted potential of TSW as a platform is what makes me feel sad, and the only party to blame is DTG.