The release stream of Sherman Hill was weird. Or the first part was because I haven't watched the entire stream. It was mentioned that lots of players didn't get the loco to start. This immediately reminded me of my introduction to TSW2. Sure it was acknowledged that tutorialwise they leave players in the dark. But then I heard the reason why players loco's were not moving. The brakes take 10 minutes to charge. 10 minutes of waiting for the break to charge? Then Matt said something like "you asked 1000 cars, that's how 1000 car works". That was a bit of headscratcher to me as this is a video game. I know It's a sim but Matt also said that the majority of players does not drive with safety systems on. Over in the playstation section one of the biggest advantages mentioned for owning a PS5 is how fast the games load. So you buy a PS5 load TSW2 super fast and then wait 10 mins before your loco moves? I can imagine that there are people out there that think it is awesome to wait 10 minutes for brakes to charge and will note that in real life it is actually 0,365 minutes longer but I'm sure those people have safety systems on. Please simcade TSW for people who like to drive trains with safety systems off. If I drive with safety systems you can bet I don't want to play a game where you have to wait 10 minutes for something to happen. With simcade I don't mean stop being a sim, give players more options to make the game more fun. Add optional Fast Forward and Flashbacks? I don't know. You build games, so you know best how to make it more fun.
You must wait for the brakes to charge. It is your punishment for always wanting instant gratification in life. It is a simulator and it simulates. Waiting a few minutes at the start of a one or two hour drive is hardly a bind, it’s just part of the activity you have chosen to do. DTG should not introduce fast forward cheats for players who can’t wait a few minutes, as it helps nobody. You are driving a train, you must do train driver things. That’s what it’s all about. There are other trains that start instantly if you prefer but for the long freight you must wait.
Yeah but that's the reality. It's a simulator and Simugraph simulates the trains realistically. So when you want 100 cars, that's the outcome. There is no other way because TSW can't do something else then simulate. Also: What does brakes have to do with safety systems? Just because your PS5 loads super fast, the brake should charge super fast as well? Can someone explain this to me? Like seriously, it's like: "I bought a super fast car for much money, do why do I have to wait for the traffic lights??". Then your decision to drive an extremely long american freight train is a little bit odd to me. You may want to try European freight trains? Other people might have fun, because they see how realistically it's done instead of having an arcade like game. This is the only part I agree to some extent. Having a fast forward function in the timetable could be really helpful for at least some people.
This might come as a shocker, but TSW is already a "Simcade." Or however you'd like to spin it. The game bypasses a lot of extra things you'd do when compared to a real train driver. There's no radio communication. No shifts to stick to. And you don't have to adhere to at least a billion different little rules. TSW has been arcade-ified in this regard, but the core challenges of train driving remain. The whole shtick with buying a route like Sherman Hill is that you're managing this big heavy freight train, with controls that are sluggish and take time to respond. This forces one to think and plan ahead, and requires some skill to master properly. It's a bit like chess in that regard. Chess on rails. So when you strip away all these little things like charging the brakes for 10 minutes, you remove the challenge. And when you remove the challenge, you remove the fun. If the brakes weren't sluggish, and instead it responded quickly, what would be there to differentiate the driving experience of an SD70ACE to that of an Electrostar?
It's possible that my English is so bad that it is impossible to understand. Yes I acknowledge that it is a sim but the majority of the players don't play it like a sim. So I don't understand remarks like: go play Train Life. Go play that polish train simulator if you want a real sim could be the same response. I don't know how you can see 10 minutes of waiting like a challenge. Sure it's the real thing and if you like that sort of thing good to you. You might now have found the most challenging game ever. I really wanted to see the meeting where they pitched the idea for a train that takes 10 mins for the brakes to recharge before the train actually moves.
The better meeting to watch is the one when whoever built the trains designed it and thought: "Right, this is going to have to take a good while to charge brakes, especially for heavy freight. Will there be any train simulation games in the future to make this into an issue?" "No sir." "Good." TSW is a simulator. It just has some elements simplified for player usage. As said above - if waiting 10 minutes for the brakes to charge is a problem - why play US freight at all? I don't personally like US freight however I understand and respect how it works, and If I bought Sherman Hill I'd be more than happy to respect the simulation of it... The example you made of; is rather, odd. Yes, granted, the fast loading speeds are a bonus of Next-Gen consoles, at least compared to Gen8, however that has nothing - literally, nothing - to do with this. This is a simulation aspect. If there was an option saying "would you like you skip past the brake charge?", Fair enough, however you may as well ask the play "would you like to skip to the next station/yard?". It's a valid point to make that TSW can sometimes be a tedious wait, however - regardless of how people play the game - it's a simulator before it's a game. Actually, It's a simulator in the context of a game. However, the simulation comes first.
I know you mention that the core challenges remain but I do want to just fully emphasise this point; Even calling TSW2 arcade-ified because it doesn't do 100% of everything involved with having a career in train driving is a bit unnecessary. I haven't seen any sim for anything that gets 100% of all that out as an out of the box experience. Run 8 doesn't have shifts or pre-arranged operations for you to follow, X-plane and MSFS don't have shifts either or pre-arranged operations either, even F1 doesn't have pre-planned racing strategy to follow, this all is to gives autonomy to the driver. The stuff you mention has little effect the core simulation of the train, and operationally those details aren't strictly needed because the game supplies you with the information through other methods, and still allows for you to have the freedom to run things more realistically. You're provided all the information a radio would give you through text dialogues, objectives, and distance markers. It is the information aspect of communication that is the most important, and that is provided to you. You can create you own list of operations for a shift. The sim doesn't stop you sticking to shift operation, its one of the best sims for it because of its free roam 24-hour timetable. Would it still be cool and more realistic to have those details provided by the game? Absolutely! But you're still being provided with the opportunities and information for realistic train operation if you want it so calling the sim arcadey for these reasons is unnecessary.
Well if waiting 10 minutes for the brakes to release on a 100 car train is not your thing, then don't buy a route with trains that long, lol I mean sorry, but properly simulating trains is kind of the point of train simulators. Sure it might be frustrating at times, thinking "why won't this start?", but that's what makes you learn new things about trains. Taking development effort to make the simulation less realistic would be on of the worst things to do, if you ask me. If one likes trains, then they will learn to understand why it takes 10 minutes for that take to start moving. If that's not your thing, drive shorter freight trains or commuter trains. After all, that's the point, there are different experiences for everyone.
It's called SimRail 2021 btw, and it doesn't look more simulator than TSW to be honest, on the contrary. And I was just trying to help, because I appreciate the attempt of simulation that is implemented in TSW and wouldn't want it to be removed. With action points and these kind of things, TSW is already too arcade-ish for me, but I appreciate that other people feel differently and there are other options out there.
